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haralanov wrote:

My comment may look too simplistic, but it is not. The frequency response is not self contained entity, because it shows the energy balance of the Sound. So you can have flat energy balance of good Sound and you can have flat energy balance of bad sound. In both cases the sound is different, but the energy balance is the same - paradox? That is important. On the other hand, if you have irregularities of the frequency response (the so called peaks/dips) they put their own accents in the sound, so they give fake intonation when reproducing some of the notes, which destroys the original musical interpretation to some degree. So they modify the performer’s intentions in their own way. The algorithm of modifying is always the same (for a given system), no matter what the recording is. It is the same as adding sugar to everything you eat, even when you go to a fine restaurant – when you add sugar to your meal, there is no way to understand how the cooker wanted this meal to taste, so you can not understand his original intentions. It is directly related to the transparency of the original musical messages - just how unaffected you (OK, not you, but your system) can reproduce (recreate) them.

First of all let me to state that I made many many many many many experiments with listening and messing and I always came to the very same observation: with proper measuring the flat response is always preferable, not even preferable but significantly better. However, there is a lot of more to it and that “a lot of more” very much moderates the validity of the above.

First of all: we, to a degree, do not recognize with our awareness the unevenness of response. I mean we recognize it but we do not register it as something destructive that is preventing us to listen music. The destruction comes from phase anomalies not from amplitude. In most of the cases, again to a degree, we are not distracted by amplitude deviations but we distracted by the mechanisms that caused the amplitude anomalies.  If the mechanisms that caused the amplitude anomalies are in phase, have the same TTH characteristic  and the same natural reproduction nature then those amplitude anomalies might be whatever they are – they are in your way.  Hearing very easy and very painfully adapts to any natural amplitude anomalies. Haralanov of cause is very correct about his “sugar to your meal” explanation but I would add: “depends of what kind of sugar” as the sourced of food sweetness (amplitude anomalies) is the key. In one case you might have +10dB over octave, in phase and with identical TTH and it is will be hardly affecting anything. In another case you might have +.5dB over octave, with phase mismatch or with sharper TTH and it will make sound hardly listenable. So, it is not about amplitude but the way how this wrong amplitude comes to existence.

Second: flatness of response is not a goal but just an abstract base. It is like an orchestra needs to be tuned to oboe’s “A”. No one define what the “A” shall be an different orchestras tuned to “A” that is +/- 10-15Hz, sill to maintain the proper relationship to instruments, instrumental groups and even to play intentionally unturned  the played need to know where the “A” is. So, the flatness is not necessary but the system owner and the channels must know where the flatness is. Again, my experience indicates that with proper TTH balance the flatter response is always much more preferable.

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