What was the Decade for the Golden-Age in Audio?

[gene]

The hobby of audio has gone through a lot of changes over the years. Whether you call it hi-fi, stereo, audio, home theater, immersive, the interest and pursuit of high-quality reproduced sound in the home has long been an enduring interest for a very large number of people. Is there one time period that can be said to be audio’s “Golden Age?” Is this based on real measurable performance metrics or purely nostalgia? Does any particular era stand out from the rest? We take you on a tour of the decades in audio starting from the 60's until today to answer those questions.

Please let us know what your "Golden-Age" of audio is and don't forget to vote in our poll.

Read: The Golden-Age of Audio

Read: The Golden-Age of Audio

 

[sterling shoote]

I'm a Sony ES fan, and Sony ES was at it's pinnacle in the late 1990's. At that time Sony produced top quality Tuners, CD, MD, Cassette, and DAT Decks, as well as nice Receivers, Stereo Power Amps, and Multi-cannel Digital/Stereo Analog Preamps, which in some user configurations became known as a Sony Stack. Today, Sony has seen the future and only offers ES quality in a handful of Receivers, 1 Integrated Amp, 1 UBD Player, and a digital library player. In our near distant future I forecast cell phones will have the power to deliver multi-channel music and audio/video to powered speakers thus bringing to an end the audiophilia age. Yep, every movie made instantly accessible in 64 channel surround sound, sold as plug and play packages for anyone to enjoy from a little discretionary income.

 

[Darenwh]

Audio has been evolving continuously since the invention of the first recording. It has continued to make broad strides in quality and functionality both for music and for movies. As such those continuous improvements to sound recording, processing, sound formats and increased capabilities of modern equipment has lead to an ever improving age of audio. This has lead to a new golden age with every change. We are currently at the apex but as evolution continues it is very likely that a new apex shall appear in the future. As such at this time it is impossible to say what the final golden years will be. But one thing is for certain, we have been blessed to be able to experience the continuous evolution of this technology and I would not have it any other way.

 

[Speedskater]

The late 1980's when the second generation CD players replaced the LP as the medium of choice.

 

[shadyJ]

Very good article, Steve. It's a shame and an irony that as hi-fi audio has evolved to such amazing levels of performance and sound quality, interest has increasingly waned. Nowadays it's basically a niche market and a hobby for a small fraction of the populace, even though the price of entry for amazing sound systems is lower than ever before. The highest selling loudspeakers are those dreadful blue tooth things, and monoaural sound is the new hotness.

 

[Stereo68]

I voted for the '60s -- the age of Radio Shack, Lafayette, Allied Electronics, and the kits from Eico, Dynaco, Heath, and others. The solid-state revolution was underway. Hi fi companies were introducing great products, including the receivers that came to dominate. Neophytes such as myself were discovering "The Sound" and enthusiasts were into it. Maybe the amplifier power wasn't there, but I remember my first weekend at college, in 1963, and hearing the Beach Boys out of speakers a couple hundred yards away at a fraternity house. I hadn't imagined that possible.

The author makes good arguments for the golden age coming later, but to me, the '60s were the "Age of Enlightenment" for audio. I actually put this at 1965-1975, but that would be splitting hairs.

 

[jgstudios]

I feel the 70s were the best. I miss the beauty of the brushed silver faceplates, knobs, switches, power meters and the elegance of each brands layouts and lighting. The quality feel of the knobs and tuner dials. And I really miss the ability to set my own EQ however an album needed it. Thank the gods we can still get our hands on vintage gear.

 

[Pogre]

Very good article, Steve. It's a shame and an irony that as hi-fi audio has evolved to such amazing levels of performance and sound quality, interest has increasingly waned. Nowadays it's basically a niche market and a hobby for a small fraction of the populace, even though the price of entry for amazing sound systems is lower than ever before. The highest selling loudspeakers are those dreadful blue tooth things, and monoaural sound is the new hotness.

We're gonna be those old farts who still believe that "2 speakers are better than one".

 

[TLS Guy]

For the UK it was very much the fifties and sixties and I wold say especially the 50s.

 

[corey]

I selected the 80's, as then you could still go in to an audio specialty store, demo equipment, and dream of your next upgrade.

 

[Soldierblue211]

I feel an appreciation of all era's should be respected. You can't appreciate where you are if you don't know how you got there. In the age of fake news though, we have a lot of junk touted as being sent from the audio gods... (too much?!) Sometimes it's hard to differentiate quality from hype just from one brand never mind the competition. I feel the quality of today beats the majority of yesteryear. Unfortunately popularity doesn't equate quality today and it's easy to reminisce the simplicity we used to know.

 

[3db]

I voted the 90s (if earlier, I will correct) because of Dr Floyd Tool's work in the NRC done in audio. Before his ground breaking work, most people believed in voodoo and audio BS, some of which still runs rampant today..like the arguement of sealed verses ported sub and loudspeakers being better for music, audio interconnects and speaker cables, seperates verses AVRs and the list goes on.

 

[Big-Q]

I got into audio equipment in the mid-80's but my love for music started in the mid-70's. I love the 80's and 90's the best. You could get great sounding and performing mid-hifi gear. Luxman made great receivers then for reasonable prices. I still have my R-115 and it sounds fabulous. Still, my Marantz SR7013 is awesome in my home theater. There is good stuff for all era's.

 

[Brian H.]

Hey guys, fantastic article. Made me go back a few years with some of my vintage equip. I agree with your choices, and of course I would like to add in just one of my own, if I may. I still have in use a Pioneer Elite SC09-TX. Imho, I think that this was the flagship receiver for Pioneer. I currently run an 11.2 system, and this beast (96lbs!) has been at the heart of my system for the past ten years. It does everything that I require of it. I am upgrading my entire system very soon, I will post on the forum what I purchased & room specs., etc. Thanks for my opportunity to comment. As a note to all, please stay safe and cherish your loved ones around you in this crazy but very real situation. Thank you Gene & everyone at Audioholics for a great job.

 

[John Sully]

I voted for the 2000's mainly because we know so much more about producing a good sounding speaker today than we have ever known before. Because of this a good sounding system can be put together for a very reasonable amount of money.

I got my start when my dad bought us a system in 1969 or so. I consisted of a turntable, a Dynaco SCA-35 tube integrated amp and a pair of AR 4x speakers. I was amazed at the sound that little system produced and was hooked. In high school I put together a pretty decent little system consisting, in the end, of a Hafler DH-101 pre-amp, Dynaco FM-5 tuner, a fancy Sony PSX-500 turntable, a decent 3-head cassette deck, an SAE 125 watt per channel amp and a pair of Dynaco A-35 speakers. That system blew away the usual dorm room system of those days: a Pioneer SX-424, a Technics turntable and a pair of Smaller Advents.

In reality there were several golden ages though. In the 1970's it was the golden age of power and pre amps. It was possible to buy an amp with lots of power and power reserves to drive low impedance loads at basically any price point. This was a good thing. On the pre amp side, phono pre amps with incredibly low noise and great RIAA correction became common, even at low price points.

In the 80's the emergence of the CD as the playback medium of choice was a real highlight. Some of the early transfers were pretty bad and sounded almost as if the mastering engineer had just left the RIAA preemphasis curve in place. But others sounded fantastic, listen to Dire Straits "Brothers In Arms" for a look at what digital sound could do. I got on the digital bandwagon pretty early, around '84 or so, and engineers pretty quickly learned how to exploit it to make really great sounding recordings.

But the 2000's and on really take the cake. Those nice sounding Dynaco speakers I bought on sale for $150/pr in 1975? More than $700 in today's dollars. Those AR 4x's from 1969? Over $800 today. You can get a pretty badass pair of bookshelves for that much today that will sound way better than those old AR's ever did. Since, IMHO, speakers rule your system and the current era is the era consistently high quality speaker design, this is the golden age.

 

[Verdinut]

I would say the sixties and the seventies. Stereophonic audio started in the late 1950's, then came quadraphonic sound in the late 1960's which vanished as it never got a real popularity.
But in the 1970's, there were more home audio manufacturers with competition leading to some better products. In this decade, at audio shows you were able to meet large manufacturers reps, with whom you could ask specifics related to their new products which were being displayed. Nowadays, in those shows which also include the video portion of the AV market which led to multi-channel surround audio, you often meet distributor reps, or store sellers who know bugger all about the products which they are promoting, and a lot of them use bullshit marketing tactics to sell some of the snake oil products.

 

[lovinthehd]

Where are the 2010s?

 

[Alexornot]

Thanks for your article, I couldn't stop reading it and I'll be terribly late for work, but it was worth it! To me the Golden age was probably in the seventies, for reasons that go beyond the audio perfection, but I totally agree that today's audio is the closest thing to perfect reproduction thanks to years and years developing electronics and speakers. I'm astonished by the music reproduced by a Nad amplifier with Wharfedale speakers and a simple tube pre (Chinese production), all combined for just less than 1000 Euros.
I truly hope this will not be the end of the show... Fingers crossed!

 

[JerryLove]

I"m not sure why there's debate.

Other than aesthetics, which are entirely subjective, and focused solely on hardware, the best performance is right now.

The electronics for two-channel non-corrected sounds have been pretty steady state since CD players and their DACs got sorted out in the 80s/90s, and I'm not honestly sure I hear a great deal has improved in speaker sound. I have owned both Infinity RS IIIb and B&W 801 Matrix III, and the sound compares quite well with the modern high-end speakers I've listened to / owned.

Multi-channel hardware is best today.

Now a real question would be about the software end. When were the best masters being put out? When was mainstream music available in the best formats? I'd assert that 5-channel SACD or DVD-A of 10-20 years ago > Vinyl of today.

 

[Mikado463]

Like anything else when you speak of 'The Golden Age' it usually has a correlation with ones age. For me it would be the late sixties through the seventies. Pretty much for the reasons mentioned in Steve's article. As someone who grew up and got involved with music / audio during the analog era, the eighties was a decade of transition as digital entered the domain.

Obviously the question when asked of a younger person will get a much different answer. Just like automobiles, the 'good 'ole days' is clearly defined by one age.