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"..you are more likely to be mislead or confused by measurement results ..." -- Condecending attitude toward audiophiles

All measurements show where a speaker deviates from theoretical perfection, although someone else's measurements can't include the effects of your own listening room, or account for your unique sound quality preferences.

Large deviations are not something an audiophile should ignore when deciding which speakers to audition.

The real issue is to decide which speakers you want to consider for purchase -- there are FAR too many brands and models for one audiophile to choose from.

Measurements won't tell you how any speakers will sound at home in your room -- but even an audition in a store won't tell you that.

Measurements will guide you toward speakers that are MORE LIKELY to sound above average when you hear them at home.

I'm assuming a listener over many years has compared speakers whose sound quality he has experienced at home, with their published measurements, and HAS found some measurement(s) that generally correlates with speakers he likes and/or dislikes at home.

For one example: I have found over many years that step-response, as measured by John Atkinson at Stereophile, correlates well with my own subjective speaker opinions of speakers I have borrowed for an audition at home, at least for the near field speaker positions I use at home.

On axis anechoic frequency response shows the ability of a speaker to accurately reproduce the input signal.

Room reflections in a real room will make the frequency response at the listeners ears worse, compared with on-axis anechoic measurements ... but there is no reason to design speakers with a poor on-axis frequency response and hope the room reflections will make the sound more accurate by the time it reaches the listener's ears!

There may be debates over what amount of high freuency roll-off over 2kHz sounds natural, and over the need for bass ramp-up under 80Hz. (because a "flat" frequency response at frequency extremes doesn't sound flat to most listeners) ... but there is little debate over the desire for a flat frequency response in the 80-2000Hz, range.

Step response shows the ability of a speaker to accurately reproduce a transient sound. It correlates with sound quality better than flipping a coin.

While flat on-axis anechoic frequency response in the mid-range frequencies, and an excellent step response, don't guarantee you will like a speaker's sound quality in your room, the measurements do roughly correlate with speaker preferences for most listeners in most rooms.

Most important: Measurements may help an audiophile separate above-average speakers from below-average speakers, and that can really help an audiophile decide what speakers he will audition before his next purchase.
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Richard BassNut Greene
Subjective Audiophile 2007

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