Apologies in advance but I have a yarn to share... lol
Having a bit of spare time and some distance from home, I visited a hi-fi store the other day. Not anything special for our audience here, I recognise, but I was dressed like I fell off the back of a truck because priorities (music > clothes).
I like this crew; so I think I will spare them being labelled today. Great range of serious hi-fi gear and one of the few to continue to stock Anthem, of whom I have an irrepressible affection.
So they have the gear; and naturally they have my dream upgrade AV receiver; and it is hooked up for sampling. What I need, though, is to be convinced of the virtue of Atmos. I have never heard Atmos: it is not a thing here in my bogan suburbs, even before partners enforced soundbars on the less hard headed among us. So I wanted to hear Atmos.
So here I am in a listening room. Lots of Krix going on which is great because I am also eyeing off them for ceiling speakers. There are only two ceiling speakers but it should at least give a feel. Two side speakers as well.
There's a media player hooked up. No music to demo with at all so I am limited to movies. Not great as a reference point. A movie is put on as a demo but the audio options are limited to 5.1/7.1. The atmos and side speakers are silent as expected. I try to find a movie with a playable atmos soundtrack; I fail. So the room is setup for Atmos, which a top end Atmos compatible receiver, and I can not actually sample Atmos.
The sampling experience was, for the most part, no better than my home system. The video setup was clearly superior - that is not hard - but in terms of audio it's up for debate which is better between what I am hearing and at home. Without some quality musical content I cannot even reach a conclusion.
I ask if there is any Atmos content we can sample at all. They do not know. I do not want to push my luck given that I am wearing thongs (flip-flops for the Americans) and am clearly at the low end of their clientele. But seriously? Stocking some of the best gear around and cannot even demonstrate it? I bite my tongue.
It turns out that the bulk of their customers seem to be doing media rooms. In ~90% of cases they do the Anthem installation and setup, which I found interesting as I had never thought of doing such a thing (and have been running ARC etc for six or so years).
Where is all this going? Well, some thoughts:
- The average hi-fi customer is relatively unaware of hi-fi and has no idea what they are doing;
- The average hi-fi customer wants a movie theatre and certainly differs from us music lovers in usage;
- I am personally far less bothered by aesthetics than the typical clientelle (eg. I certainly would never want a system in build into walls - I want to be able to change/move things);
- The prevalence of people who money (of whom I am not one) is certainly still driving a lot of hi-fi sales;
- Atmos is not going away in the near future as the setups they are doing are for Atmos - the customers will hear it in some form and will not want to go backwards;
- It is Atmos in movies that is going to keep this format alive;
- Combining the above, the current prevalence of excellent hi-fi equipment for music is therefore an accident;
- We are for the most part beneficiaries of a bizarre system of people wanting home cinemas;
- I, for one, hope this trendy home cinema movement continues for the foreseeable future so that we may continue to benefit
Alas, what I got out of this visit... hands on feel of the Krix ceiling speakers and more understanding of how to install them myself
