How revealing are your speakers? And does it make you play some records less?

My speakers are more along the revealing line.

It suits my current music taste, jazz. Good for classical but not so great for rock.

Poorly mastered/produced albums sound poor. But well mastered ones sound amazing! Its a compromise I'm willing to make.

mine are moderately revealing.

unlike older high resolution speakers, they present lots of detail but do not dissect the music until it becomes incoherent parts.

the images are musical but do not superimpose their character over the music.

i would have loved to have heard chris ball's paragon speakers.

My speakers are not especially revealing I don't think... but I've found that the whole system is.

Sometimes I think 'revealing' speakers are chosen (or are necessary) in order to gain the resolution desired, when the rest of the system is not as revealing as the listener would like.
That's probably not such a good approach. Start with the core of the system, the source end & keep everything else 'in balance'.

Being usually the least low distortion component in music systems, the loudspeaker's most important qualities IMHO are neutrality & (sufficiently wide) bandwidth.

By 'revealing', if we mean 'resolution' (of musical information), I don't rate that top of my list of important traits of a music sytem.
I would rate 'rhythm','dynamic freedom', sense of 'presence', as traits most important - & the loudspeaker is not usually responsible for providing these. (Except maybe the latter.)
YMMV of course

DarkLantern blog - darklanternforowen.wordpress.com

Image, model? The ones with the optional added base unit? Can't recall the name, Revelation?

petite performa 2 with fancy morel tweeter and composite mid/bass, regular drivers for bass.

Ah, nice one!

It's all coming back to me now. Sorry, old age had temporarily taken over...

i know the feeling !
i try to write everything down, then often lose the bit of paper !

Write your notes on your cell phone, they are harder to lose!
I find the better speakers to have a more integrated and cohesive sound that doesn’t thrust detail at you, while still being clear enough to hear characteristics of the recording or the system. You can hear that a recording might be compromised, but you don’t really mind as you can listen through the crud to get to the heart of the instruments.

AMR-iFi R&D

Reminds me of when downsizing to retire in 2010, listed a pair of Dynaudio Audience 85s. An Audioenz member and his wife, from Howick came for a listen. I loved those spkrs for their ability to render a believable scale of sound, but they insisted on listening at very low volume and complained they did not reveal inner detail! Swapped in my Mission 753s (which I was keeping and still have) and immediately the inner detail they craved was revealed. I was impressed by the way they listened - I put two chairs side by side as close to the sweet spot as possible, and they both sat with their heads tilted in almost touching each other. Obviously the sweet spot was important to them.

Ah that's what you'd have to call a 'sweet' spot

DarkLantern blog - darklanternforowen.wordpress.com

But that would create problems for the two closest to the sweet (🥰) spot would it not, in that the two innermost ears of both people would receive a different acoustic environment than the two outermost ears?

AMR-iFi R&D

A similar consideration are analytical cartridges (line contact, etc) who by design also amplify the imperfections of records.

I would have thought a line contact profile would minimise tracing imperfections on a record as they can vertically contact more of the groove, and glide over worn sections previously traced by a conical or an elliptical stylus? The resolution would be down to the magnetic circuit and cantilever design.
But it’s controversial. The Nagaoka MP300 has an elliptical stylus, the MP500 a line contact stylus, both with the same cartridge body. Quite a few listeners prefer the elliptical version.

AMR-iFi R&D

Interesting! But doesn't correct imaging come from a more revealing speaker, tight focus as oppose to blurriness

Food for thought 😋

Manager & Product specialist at Rapallo AV & HI-FI

I suspect it comes from all of the components, not just the speakers... Good speakers let you hear more of how the electronics image.

AMR-iFi R&D

Agreed but the speakers have to be fast enough to keep up with the changes in frequency,

Hence the revealing nature of some speakers for example ribbons, electrostatic and horns, thinner materials that move faster

The detail and information within the recording is there it's just whether the electronics and speakers can reproduce it

Speakers and components that cannot reproduce the detail is what makes the less transparent

Manager & Product specialist at Rapallo AV & HI-FI

The weight of a diaphragm material would determine how much lag there is between mechanical input and the time it takes to accelerate and decelerate it. That results in a characteristic phase response of the speaker and you can interpret it as ‘speed’. Unwanted resonances (peaks and troughs in the response) serve to take away from the final resolution of the speaker. Plasma speakers accelerate almost instantly, electrostatics not far behind, horn loaded speakers not far behind that. The diaphragm in a horn loaded speaker moves only a short distance and thus takes less time to get there than a normal cone or dome speaker. Electrostatics have a large surface area that also has to move only a tiny distance, as the sheer surface area then adds up to make the same audio volume as a small diaphragm.
Do you think a revealing speaker can also be pleasant to listen to, even if it reveals flaws in the electronics and recordings?

AMR-iFi R&D

I agree with everything you said, maybe I should have said the detail is there in a GOOD recording 😉

Manager & Product specialist at Rapallo AV & HI-FI

Agree!😉
I suspect detail is also there in a poor recording but it’s obscured by a few factors, like mike position, tape distortion, poor mixing consoles with loads of electrolytic caps, too many copies, frequency response aberrations etc. I think a good speaker and system can reveal that as well as details on a good recording.

AMR-iFi R&D