Say goodbye to the noughties: Yesterday’s hi-fi biz is BUSTED, bro

Mine's better than yours is....

Why the nyah nyah na nya nya? Feels like grade school...Okay, I'll play.

Yamaha RX-773WABL Receiver 100 watts RMS @ 7.2 channels converted to 5.1 w/ BiAmped Polk Monitor 70's for the front and 50's on sides, 25 for center and two Polk 100 watt powered 10" subwoofers on right and left sides. Samsung BD & CD Player and Denon Turntable. Makes any of these soundbars or "wireless" speakers sound like the overpriced toys they are. Reciever Does Wifi, Bluetooth, Network, Pandora etc, everything but wipe up. No it's not perfect but I got the whole thing for under a grand new. Ya gotta hear a movie though, just like the theatre only home!

Alot of audio quality is related to the source so resolution DOES play a part, but modern technology covers up alot of problems. With a decent system it's hard to tell the difference.

I'll stick with my floorstanders and WAV/FLAC

Crappy speakers with MP3 quality sound may do it for some people, but I like my banging bass and full definition floorstanders with my Marantz amp and proper quality audio.

I could never go back to MP3 after buying my stuff on WAV this last while.

Do any of the wireless BlueTooth speaker systems work well?

I've been using wireless headphones for a long time due to renting (900 Mhz type). I wouldn't recommend them, but some are ok. They always work at least, because there's no syncing, and they have powerful transmitters overcoming thick walled apartments, than equivalent Wi-Fi / USB Media Streamers or BlueTooth devices.

But every time I consider switching to BlueTooth I inevitably pull back due to sync problems or interruptions or breaks in the sound... So how are they for audio these days?... How much do you need to spend? For example, If you buy this budget set, are you actually dead in the water... :-

https://www.aldi.ie/en/specialbuys/hurry-while-stocks-last/

What will you do in 10 years with it?

I mean your typical component stereo system is not only much cheaper (when you use used components like speakers), but is also rather future proof. Analogue audio is like the text files of electronics, it just works and every device can speak it. Even SPDIF is widely used and understood by many vendors. Contrast that to some wireless solutions which depend on complex, sometimes even proprietary, protocols.

So the way those wireless multi-room systems are built today they are just suitable to extract money from hipsters.

Tea cosy

Would love a multi-room set-up, but then remember my Edinburgh flat is so bloody small I can hear data dribbling from our backup drive in the living room everywhere in the flat. Bigger flat, then fancy sound system...

We recently bought a Sony KDL 815 TV which came with a Sony soundbar. The TV's great, but I'm not overly impressed with these soundbars. We stuck it on the spare TV in the bedroom. Sure, fancy features (bluetooth, RFID, USB & optical), the the sound quality is... well... a bit like sticking your head inside a tea cosy (shh, I'm being English) - which I have to admit is marginally better than the 15-year-old hi-fi it was previously connected to - but no great shakes. I've still got a pretty good amp & 'proper' Sony speakers on the big TV in the living room. Those are 10 year old too. Vastly superior without the feature overload.

Between the AppleTV, Mac Mini, PS4, iPhones, iPads, smart-TV apps and various MacBooks in our flat at any given time what I need is really good headphones, not another hi-fi device.

Blatant Tolling

Is that what this article is?

I too could list my HiFi components and, in considerable detail, describe why they hugely outperform this new kit in almost every metric you can imagine (and there's a LOT of metrics), except perhaps portability.

Hi resolution? Multiroom? Wireless control? Have you tried simply using JRiver from a HTPC or laptop feeding a decent DAC? No need at all to replace superior speakers and amplification, and the results I've got are simply staggering, and amazingly flexible.

Also, there's no need to rely on ongoing subscription costs for inferior quality streamed music... Sure, use it to preview things that you might like, but even having lossless (FLAC) copies of CD's is massively better quality, and any proper high resolution content that you may have (if your DAC can handle it) is a bonus.

Is it just my perception but every new 'advance' just seems to detract from my concepts of quality, ownership and control. I'll stick with what I've got, and you can ram your soundbars up your flange tunnels.

I feel so old

looking at my Mission 762 speakers from 1989

Interesting, I've a squeezebox setup at home going into an amp/speaker setup in 2 rooms. I have no need to listen in every room, only having a few! I also have little time to listen to what I have so wouldn't be purchasing something that I wouldn't need and wouldn't sound as good as what I currently have.

What am I missing?

What I don't get about Bluetooth or other wireless speakers is... don't they still need power? If they need power, don't they need wires? If they need wires then, er, why not just wire them in to the source and solve power supply and latency in one go. I suppose I get that some people might prefer to plug in a power brick locally for each remote speaker (with all the wasted stand-by energy that implies) rather than having wires run all around the house, but unless you happen to have pre-wired mains sockets right next to where the speakers want to be then you still have a trailing wire problem.

Tony Andrews speaks to my soul more often than not. This guy has spoken more sense than lots of journalists/reviewers.

Having heard various Turbosound and now some lovely Funktion1 systems, I'd let him chime in some more:

Bad sound is a vexation to the spirit http://youtu.be/gL92nlCR8cY

http://youtu.be/2HCVB4ZYeI0

The noughties *started* it... "say goodbye to the second half of the 20th century"

The "traditional" style HiFi setup- which dominated from the 1960s onwards- had already seriously declined in terms of dominance and cultural importance by the second half of the noughties, as people had moved to the iPod or listened to music on their computers.

Remember the trend for cheesy iPod-only speakers and devices? Yes, that in itself is a passe and dated concept now, and the devices themselves are probably gathering dust, unused. (*) Similarly, the iPod era itself is mostly past. *That* is the device that represented the decade, and one that would justify saying "Goodbye to the Noughties", since the iPod is a shadow of what it was, and streaming is overtaking even its "holding your own music model".

But the point is that even then- by the end of the noughties- both were still post-trad-HiFi devices aimed at people who wanted to listen to music at home and didn't have- or want to use- a traditional hifi setup.

It's true that the current decade has seen this trend spread more widely from audio hifi to video separates et al, and streaming become normalised. But the noughties were still the beginning of the present post-HiFi age, not the end of the previous one.

In short, it's been going on longer than you think now.

(*) And deservedly so- anyone with half a brain could have predicted this (and I did), since any system specifically designed around one manufacturer's trendy device du jour (i.e. the then-current version of the iPod back when a new one came out every year) was obviously cheesy ephemeral tat, regardless of its inflated price tag. The irony of these post-physical-medium-centric devices being even more closely tied to a specific physical MP3 player...

No need to compromise on sound quality to get a straightforward modern setup. I have a pair of Epoz Aktimate Blues - hi-fi quality "active" speakers with built-in amp and DAC. My Mac mini connects straight to those via USB so I can play from Spotify, iTunes, etc. There's also the added benefit that I can fire audio straight at the speakers via Bluetooth from tablets, smartphones, etc., which is very convenient. A great-sounding system - simple, flexible, modern.

A million different

bells-and-whistles sound bars, wireless gadgets and all sorts of other largely pointless things, yet I can only think of a single company making sub-£250 powered desktop speakers that aren't utter shit.

It's sad but most people today seem to have given up listening to quality music in favour of convenience.

Is this a joke? There is something new in the universe?

What do they say about a flawed premise? Ripping up pappy’s hi-fi handbook (or his pappy’s hi-fi handbook) doesn't change what was in them.

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General Electric calls this new idea Home Music Distribution System. It works like this:

Each of the consoles has a tiny FM transmitter built into it. Your regular household wiring carries it's signal. The portable speaker above is your receiver. Simply plug it into any standard outlet. You'll enjoy radio or phonograph music-- directly from the console-- in amy room you choose. - from LIFE Magazine March 9 1963

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This is not an article in Popular Science, it's print ad in in LIFE Magazine from over 50 years ago. Mutli room via power line networking was available from your local G-E dealer's "Accent on Value" Audio Products Department while JFK was in office.

It probably wasn't new then, either. So yes, a joke. There is nothing new in the universe.

The age of gimmick eletronics

I once had a home sound system that was dirt simple.

2 Panasonic 3 way speakers. (honest to god tweeter, mid range and bass in each cabinet)

1 100 watt amp/receiver

1 Technics strobe turntable

1 jukebox DVD player

Stereo input on the amp for TV

All connected by RCA jacks or straight bare wire into clips. (yes, RCA jacks and bare wire clips)

I have never heard sound so clean outside of a studio nor could I EVER turn the volume up past halfway.

EVER. You could hear the song clear as a bell 4 houses down just at halfway. And by clear I mean, CLEAR.

The speakers were vintage 1980. The turntable was somewhere of that era as well. The amp was a newer department store special made by one of the Japanese brands (forgot who. the old amp/recv had finally lost one channel). The DVD was a Phillips.

NONE of it fancy or special. And it sounded better than most of today's bars, theaters and car systems.

Have you ever heard sound so clear you could talk AND be heard while it was still playing very loud? Yeah, like that.

Screw the gimmick crap.