Nothing in engineering is free. Every design choice costs something somewhere else.

Take Pace, Rhythm and Timing (PRAT) as an example. Certain designs excel at making your foot move without asking permission. But the same circuits that produce that propulsive energy sometimes do it at the expense of density and weight — a lightness in the presentation that trades one kind of musical truth for another.

The trades run everywhere: A transparent system shows you deep into the recording, but transparency and solidity don't always travel together. I've heard systems so revealing that instruments seemed almost weightless — floating in space, beautifully resolved, but lacking the physical presence that makes a piano sound like a piano rather than a very detailed idea of one. The microscope reveals, but the patient sometimes disappears.

Even the soundstage involves a choice. Some systems image with such three-dimensional precision that they surpass the concert hall itself — thrilling, and occasionally so organized it tips into something no real acoustic space quite sounds like. Focus or naturalness. Specificity or ease. The trades are everywhere once you know to listen for them.

The challenge for any designer is to artfully blend those values and trade-offs into the most coherent and magical musical presentation possible. That's been our quest at PS Audio for more than half a century. When Chris Brunhaver voices an Aspen loudspeaker, or we're finalizing a PMG design in the Listening Lab, we're not chasing a spec sheet — we're weighing exactly these trades, by ear, until the music comes out whole.

And while we understand perfection is a myth, that's never slowed us down for a moment. We can certainly make toes tap and send a chill through you at the whack of a snare.

Perfection is an illusion. But it's one we keep chasing.

And we're glad you're along for the ride.