Audio progress over the last 20 years
(1989 - 2009)We've
seen lots of progress in the past 20 years.
I’ve been following this hobby for 40 years
now, and trying to stay at the bleeding edge as much as I could
afford to along the way.
So here is my take on the various areas that
have seen the greatest progress in that period:
Sources
The rise (and occasional fall) of
high-resolution multichannel digital : SACD / DVD-A / BluRay
Jitter-free linkups like DenonLink 4 allow all
the above to be sent to a suitable preamp with no degradation.
Ever since CD-4 / SQ back in the 70’s I’ve
lusted for better surround sound, and it finally has arrived in the
past decade.
Now, with access to ultra-high quality
multichannel, it’s the rest of the system that labors to keep up.
Server based music is a huge step in terms of
convenience and with Preamps that decode inside (e.g. Denon
AVP-A1HD), transports are no longer a concern.
Amps
New topologies refined, such as the Sunfire
class G and many variants of Class D
We now have amps that can produce huge amounts
of power (and current in the case of Class G) that don’t heat up a
room and run up your power bill.
Speakers
Much could be written here, as the explosion of
DIY has lead to many interesting designs. But primarily it’s the
funded R&D at leading speaker manufactures the world over that is
truly amazing.
I’ll select a few of the most significant that
I’ve seen:
Coincident drivers, like the KEF UniQ and
Vienna acoustics and Thiel, are all great improvements for
point-source designs.
The use of computer-aided virtualized design,
and high-resolution real-world testing (e.g. laser vibrometry) have
allowed not only tremendous driver design improvements but
introduced innovative speaker cabinet designs (e.g KEF Muon, Blade,
B&W Nautilus)
Line sources have also progressed, with Wisdom
audio providing good examples with a completely vertically integrate
Sage line. Scaena has a great product as well. Unfortunately, this
is a niche market due to size/price, but performance is out of this
world.
Since I'm a fan, I’d need to talk about
Electrostats.
I’d say the MartinLogan DualForce bass driver
(in the CLX) is a truly innovative design that has yet to see its
full potential exploited.
Other ESL progress, such as the Xstat microperf
panels are more evolutionary. Cool, but not radical.
The rise in powered bass driver amplification
is also notable as a major improvement in the line, allowing
external amps to deal only with the panel.
Room Acoustics
While it’s been known for a long time that
acoustics are important, I feel that in the past 20 years we’ve seen
a much greater emphasis on small room acoustics and the art of room
tuning.
Accessible solutions like Realtraps, GIK and
others are allowing more of us to tame the beast that is the small
room.
Knowledge and research has also exploded on
this topic, with introduction of books like Floyd Toole’s – Sound
Reproduction a major landmark.
Much more accessible end-user tools for
acoustic measuring are another huge boon. Laptops that run REW and
other measurement software open up a whole new world of insight to
individuals, providing problem identification and improvement
validation.
Room Correction
If I had to pick only one item as the most
significant progress in the past 20 years, it would the arena of
room correction.
Not only have the hardware solutions improved,
but much of the research behind technologies such as Audyssey have
been ground-breaking in terms of how to measure and how to integrate
all that data into meaningful and accurate correction profiles.
While spectral domain corrections (e.g.
parametric EQ) have been around forever, the true innovation is the
ability to now integrate the temporal domain as well into the
speaker/room correction models.
Again Audyssey is the ground-breaking tech
here, with their convolved FIR-based corrections, they address
critical issues such as delayed reflections and provide vastly
improved soundstages.
On top of room correction, rides a whole new
wave of dynamics management solutions:
Dynamic loudness compensation (e.g. Audyssey
Dynamic EQ, DBX AutoWarmth, etc.) that provides spectral and
relative-volume rebalancing as a function of the master volume
level.
Dynamic Volume compensation (e.g Audyssey
Dynamic Vol, Dolby Volume) with provides users with ‘smart’ gain
riding and dynamic compression to equalize program material volume
transitions and to allow for improved low-volume speech
comprehension while maintaining a limited max level for late-night
listening.
While all of the above is absolutely
flabbergasting in terms of the audible, as well as usability
improvements, we’ve only started to see what these and related
technologies can provide. Stay tuned …
Communities
One of the biggest improvements has
been the Internet and the rise of online, collaborative (OK
sometimes combative ;) ) forums such as
MLC, where we
can all share our knowledge and experiences.
These highly focused verticals are enabling
more people to enjoy better sound reproduction and definitely
improving the economics of the vendors (how many $’s have you spent
due to someone posting about a piece of gear?)
So, lot’s of progress IMHO.