Some people claim that adding damping to components to control vibration can sometimes make them sound less dynamic and somewhat lifeless. Why should this be so when damping reduces vibration and resonance?
We have also heard the same comments a number of times. Unfortunately, people mistakenly attribute these negative changes in performance solely to the addition of damping to a component. If we look at the entire evolution of an audio or video system we can gain a much more clear understanding of what is happening and why it is happening. Lets say that John, who is an audio and video enthusiast, decides to put together a really nice home theater system. He reads a number of the magazines, visits websites devoted to these topics and assembles a system composed of many highly rated components. John sits down to enjoy a well produced action movie but a few minutes into the first scene realizes that hes not hearing or seeing whats been described in the magazines by the reviewers. The highs are bright and harsh, midrange is forward and the bass is bloated and ill defined. The video picture is also disappointing the images are not very sharp or detailed, it looks rather two dimensional and th
