Quote:
Originally posted by Eagle_Driver
Not quite. The reduced output power is more likely a direct cause of the second point that I stated: maximum battery life. Very-high-power headphone outputs in portables are also very power-hungry to begin with - almost as power-hungry as a stable CD transport motor is. (Some crappy CD motors are also extremely power-hungry, due to the primitive, archaic motor design.) |
I disagree, I think Durian is right. "AVLS" has nothing to do with 'maximum battery life'. It's a feature consumers never asked for and don't need. So why do manufacturers now make -deliberate- attempts to limit the volume? Its very reasonable to assume litigation as a factor, and I could see this being a court case in the US. I believe it is also because Sony et al. were influenced by research reports saying that people get accustomed to loud listening levels and this damages their hearing, realized that if their precious consumers go deaf from listening to the walk/discmans, they won't have much use to buy these products. And there goes a sale... Warnings about hearing damage are all over Sony's consumer literature.
I also disagree with the theory that you can't make a decent sounding portable today without setting the price at $1,000. That's ridiculous, the price of inflation has not risen that much since 95, when you could have a reasonably good sounding portable for at least a reasonable price. For example, you could limit things that impair sound quality without raising the cost a cent; such as not extending battery times to such extremes, or only raising it a few cents, such as using a few better quality electronic parts that improve or at least do not impair the sound quality. Simply adding a switch to remove compression completely helps, as does ensuring a good quality path to the headphone output, taking care not to degrade it. And NOT deliberately limiting the volume (which limits dynamics as well), would be a good place to start improving the sound quality of portables today. But as someone else said, its clear to me that more and more, consumers at large don't give a rat's patootie about sound quality. After putting up ads to sell my portables recently, no one ever asked me about that aspect. What is most important on their minds is: "Does it play MP3's?". Which says it all right there. As if it wasnt' bad enough that the audio industry took a HUGE backslide in progress by coming out with CD's, which proved to be far, far inferior to decent analog LP playback, and was accepted simply because they told consumers it was progress and consumers believed it, now the standard in sound quality has become even lower with MP3's. A format no better than the cassettes I used to listen to on my Walkman, fifteen years ago.
It isn't just portables that have drastically declined in sound quality, its the ENTIRE field of audio equipment (don't get me started on home theatre...). Thanks to consumer marketing and the lowest common denominator, all of us that appreciate and actually remember sound quality, now have to eat the garbage the ignorant masses choose to eat. Because good food is scarce.
