Sound terms explanation

[sound10]

Hi everyone, having been a member for quite a few years here, you get to see different terms being used to decribve sound. It would be great if some further explanation could be given please. Examples that I have come across are warm, laid back, forward sounding, in your face, attack, lacking detail, insight, transparency, bright, controlled, fatiguing, clinical. British sound vs Japanese sound and I'm sure there are a few more.

Thanks 🙂

 

[Vladimir]

Click on the image to zoom in.

 

[Oldphrt]

Hi everyone, having been a member for quite a few years here, you get to see different terms being used to decribve sound. It would be great if some further explanation could be given please. Examples that I have come across are warm, laid back, forward sounding, in your face, attack, lacking detail, insight, transparency, bright, controlled, fatiguing, clinical. British sound vs Japanese sound and I'm sure there are a few more.

Thanks 🙂

You can ignore them. Reviewers have to say something, so they say nonsense.

 

[CnoEvil]

https://www.whathifi.com/forum/hi-fi/some-terms-explained

 

[Gazzip]

Hi everyone, having been a member for quite a few years here, you get to see different terms being used to decribve sound. It would be great if some further explanation could be given please. Examples that I have come across are warm, laid back, forward sounding, in your face, attack, lacking detail, insight, transparency, bright, controlled, fatiguing, clinical. British sound vs Japanese sound and I'm sure there are a few more.

Thanks 🙂

You can ignore them. Reviewers have to say something, so they say nonsense.

Which adjectives would you use to describe sound? Good and bad? Perhaps everything sounds the same so don't bother?

 

[MajorFubar]

I don't think they purposefully right in code, it's mainly self explanitory surely.

 

[nick8858]

Its subjective claptrap basically.

 

[chelstondave]

The reviewers describe how they experience the sound and the only way they can do that is by metaphor. This gives an impression of how a piece of equipment sounds to them at that time. Whether or not it sounds the same to you in your room is a different matter

 

[Gazzip]

Its subjective claptrap basically.

What exactly is the alternative? "The newest amplification offering from Marantz sounded good not bad. It facilitates the playing of music much like the last Marantz did. The music when played sounded like music. The case is black not silver like the last one. It weighs about the same. That's all I can say about it without spouting subjective claptrap. Perhaps I should not have used the words good and bad in my opening statement".

FFS some people will complain about anything.

 

[Vladimir]

Its subjective claptrap basically.

What exactly is the alternative? "The newest amplification offering from Marantz sounded good not bad. It facilitates the playing of music much like the last Marantz did. The music when played sounded like music. The case is black not silver like the last one. It weighs about the same. That's all I can say about it without spouting subjective claptrap. Perhaps I should not have used the words good and bad in my opening statement".

FFS some people will complain about anything.

Colorfull words vs specs and measurements. Ideally a good review would have both. Example the Stereophile.

 

[sound10]

Hi, thanks for all your replies and views which are all very interesting. I guess what really matters is how something sounds to you and if you like it or not, or prefer something else. That's why I think it's important to try to demo equipment before buying.

 

[Frank Harvey]

FFS some people will complain about anything.

Agreed. Especially when it is anything to do with the h-fi industry. But they still post on related forums. Makes you wonder why some people are interested in this hobby at all.

There are a lot of people who want to know how it measures, and for those that are interested in something that doesn't deviate from a completely flat response, that's great. But a lot of people want to know what it actually sounds like, not the distortion level at 1kHz at 75dB or whatever. They want a description - even if it is someone else's interpretation and opinion - on how it sounds and whether it is worth researching before they spend their time and petrol money doing so.

 

[Samd]

I don't think they purposefully right in code, it's mainly self explanitory surely.

but the OP is right. Some are not clear statements of 'sound characteristics'. What does laid back, for example, really mean? It could be anything from careless to comatose!

 

[Vladimir]

In Sean Olive's research professional reviewers scored much worse in DBT than hifi retailers and trained listeners. It is a lot of claptrap, they have no bloody clue what they are doing or saying. They are simply drumming up some business for manufacturers.

Anecdotes sell, graphs and numbers not so much.

 

[Gaz37]

How can a listener be trained?

Can you hear this? Yes or No?

No

Listen really carefully, now can you hear it?

No

OK, tilt your head slightly and cup your hands behing your ears, now can you hear it?

Yes

Congratulations you are now a trained listener and as such are qualified to talk pretentious nonesense about audio gear, this should be done in such a manner as to belittle anybody who doesn't agree with you, if you do this convincingly enough audio equipment manufacturers will lend you lots of really expensive toys to play with, in return you are expected to convince people to part company with vast amounts of cash for overpriced kit, there is of course no comeback because nobody is ever going to publicly admit they were so gullible that they were ripped off

 

[Gaz37]

Hi everyone, having been a member for quite a few years here, you get to see different terms being used to decribve sound. It would be great if some further explanation could be given please. Examples that I have come across are warm, laid back, forward sounding, in your face, attack, lacking detail, insight, transparency, bright, controlled, fatiguing, clinical. British sound vs Japanese sound and I'm sure there are a few more.

Thanks 🙂

Warm - Slightly muffled

Laid back - uninteresting

Forward sounding - Gets on your nerves

In your face - As above

Attack - Bulls**t

Lacking detail - Very muffled

Insight - Bulls**t used to get you to spend more money

Transparency - Bulls**t used to get you to spend more money

Bright - Annoyingly harsh treble

Controlled - Bulls**t used to get you to spend more money

Fatiguing - Gets on your nerves but not as quickly as "in your face"

British sound V Japanese sound - Sounds good but needs constant attention still goes wrong soon after warranty expires V Still sounds good after 30 years of abuse and neglect.

 

[audiventory]

You can ignore them. Reviewers have to say something, so they say nonsense.

It is impression terms. It linked with measured features of music (modified by audio tools). How to do it described in books about mastering an mixing (panning, reverberation, EQ, compression, may be other).

 

[Frank Harvey]

How can a listener be trained?

Can you hear this? Yes or No?

No

Listen really carefully, now can you hear it?

No

OK, tilt your head slightly and cup your hands behing your ears, now can you hear it?

Yes

It's not so much how to listen, but what to listen for.

Part of it is what I have mentioned a few times before on forums. When you watch a film, do you only focus on the actors in the foreground? There can be a lot more going on than that...

 

[Andrewjvt]

Hi everyone, having been a member for quite a few years here, you get to see different terms being used to decribve sound. It would be great if some further explanation could be given please. Examples that I have come across are warm, laid back, forward sounding, in your face, attack, lacking detail, insight, transparency, bright, controlled, fatiguing, clinical. British sound vs Japanese sound and I'm sure there are a few more.

Thanks 🙂

 

My interpretation from most of these terms is just to describe the sound when it deviates from neutral, uncoloured sound.

Through design purpose or design fault.

 

[nick8858]

My interpretation from most of these terms is just to describe the sound when it deviates from neutral, uncoloured sound.

Except you now need to define neutral uncoloured sound which again is a subjective comment?

 

[Andrewjvt]

My interpretation from most of these terms is just to describe the sound when it deviates from neutral, uncoloured sound.

Except you now need to define neutral uncoloured sound which again is a subjective comment?

Everyone has different likes/dislikes about sound reproduction. But

Music is music or instruments should sound like real instruments and not a watered down or over exaggerated version of it.

No matter what you or I think, a piano or a violin should sound what it sounds like.

So if you listened to a violin in your living space, im sure there would be times that the hi frequency could be a little harsh on the ears.
Now a neutral sound on a sound system will try to give you that also.

In the same way a warm system will try avoid giving you that or protects you from that.

Also a overly harsh system would over emphasize this to become unlistenable.

You also get lots of plumming/thickening in the mid range on lots of speakers ive heard.

So the only way is to a-b demo v each other and also listen to a lot of real live music and even then its an opinion but we cant change how real instruments sound.

Then we have room problems, poor speaker design(or wrong speaker for room) and amps that dont provide good quality CLEAN power.

Distortion is the main culprit also

 

[nick8858]

plumming/thickening/unlistenable.....

Still subjective nonesense!

 

[Vladimir]

How can a listener be trained?

Can you hear this? Yes or No?

No

Listen really carefully, now can you hear it?

No

OK, tilt your head slightly and cup your hands behing your ears, now can you hear it?

Yes

Congratulations you are now a trained listener and as such are qualified to talk pretentious nonesense about audio gear, this should be done in such a manner as to belittle anybody who doesn't agree with you, if you do this convincingly enough audio equipment manufacturers will lend you lots of really expensive toys to play with, in return you are expected to convince people to part company with vast amounts of cash for overpriced kit, there is of course no comeback because nobody is ever going to publicly admit they were so gullible that they were ripped off

Not quite.

It's a program by McGill University and Harman labs to train preselected group of people (healthy hearing is a requirement) to know what to listen for and be able to detect things like distortion, frequency tonal balance (timbre) etc. Training to know exactly what the OP of this thread is asking about. Yes it exists.

Harman then uses these trained listeners in DBT trials to learn what makes a great sounding loudspeaker without the bias of marketing or aesthetics.

Try it.

 

[Andrewjvt]

plumming/thickening/unlistenable.....

Still subjective nonesense!

Apart from words what tests and ab comparison have you done.
Its not as hard as you think once you know what to listen for.
The main culprit being distortion is esay to hear.

When it is subjective nonsense is when reviewers use words like the op has stated to describe cables, racks, power cables and stands.
For the basis of selling magazines

 

[Blacksabbath25]

My interpretation from most of these terms is just to describe the sound when it deviates from neutral, uncoloured sound.

Except you now need to define neutral uncoloured sound which again is a subjective comment?

Everyone has different likes/dislikes about sound reproduction. But

Music is music or instruments should sound like real instruments and not a watered down or over exaggerated version of it.

No matter what you or I think, a piano or a violin should sound what it sounds like.

So if you listened to a violin in your living space, im sure there would be times that the hi frequency could be a little harsh on the ears. Now a neutral sound on a sound system will try to give you that also.

In the same way a warm system will try avoid giving you that or protects you from that.

Also a overly harsh system would over emphasize this to become unlistenable.

You also get lots of plumming/thickening in the mid range on lots of speakers ive heard.

So the only way is to a-b demo v each other and also listen to a lot of real live music and even then its an opinion but we cant change how real instruments sound.

Then we have room problems, poor speaker design(or wrong speaker for room) and amps that dont provide good quality CLEAN power.

Distortion is the main culprit also

i think it helps if you have been around real instruments then you know whats real and whats not soundwise