Hmmmm....
"Resolution".
To me this is equated to fishing. Hear me out....
As one fishes, they look across the lake and all they see is a body of water. This is the average stereo aficionado. All they see is a body of water and they are fine with that. The body of water is the epitome of excellence to them. It is all they desire and want in a system. For many? This is bliss and there is NOTHING wrong with that whatsoever. In some aspects? I am jealous. Many of us would be.
As one gets into fishing, they get this thing called "polarized" glasses.
Oh, WOW!. This opens up a whole other world, as one can see more than they thought possible. Even beyond their wildest dreams! So cool. So, they go on with fishing and all is well in the world...
Now, they get a better pair of polarized glasses and it lets them see better. Not much better but better, nonetheless. They are amazed. They talk about the differences online and share this discovery with their friends. It's amazing to them. Although it may just be a little bit of difference? To them? Oh, it means the world because their own personal audio journey is rocked in ways that they can't fathom.
Now, imagine this....
A lake with crystal clear water. No distortion, seemingly a mile before you see any distortion of the truth. You want a crystal clear vision of it, right? Well, many systems color this to where we are all out of focus. Being out of focus leads us to paths that are not aligned with being in focus to what our realities are when it comes to reproduction of music. We wander. We sway away from our goals. It happens. It is what it is.
Getting back to the crystal clear lake a mile deep and the glasses you may or may not have worn looking at said lake....
Resolution is this:
You are looking at a lake. The lake is crystal clear for what seems like forever to one's eyes. BUT, It's hampered by 10 layers of glass. Each layer of glass has a haze that distorts the original view. Each layer (even if perfectly clean) distorts the perfectly good view. So, the listener (or in this case the viewer) looks at the view. It's amazing! He/she can see beyond what they ever thought before! Every view is exquisite!
But what they don't know is that they are being blocked by panes of glass.
Keep in mind, there are 10 panes of glass. At this point, let's say that they have already put on the polarized glasses, shall we? So, we remove one pane of glass. Distortion is improved and clarity is better. Again, the listener is amazed. They talk about the differences online and share this discovery with their friends. It's amazing to them. Although it may just be a little bit of difference? To them? Oh, it means the world because their own personal audio journey is rocked in ways that they can't fathom.
(You will read that again and again throughout this post)
Now, let's say that we remove the 2nd pane of glass, shall we? Okay, so now the listener (viewer) can get a little more focus/clarity on the fish below the surface. He/she may be able to point out the shape and overall shape of said fish from a distance. This cool, right? Clarity.
Now, let's take out the third pane of glass. At this point, you may be able to tell from 50' away what type of fish it is. You might be able to tell the colors if you are lucky and the waters are calm.....now let's go ahead and take out 3 more panes of glass.
Holy Moly! One can see down 150' with no issues whatsoever and it's getting scary because of the depth perception. It's deep but it goes deeper. This is what you can see but what you can hear is completely different as well. Layers of audio. Perception. Sound stage. Air. Realism, the list goes on and on...
......................................
Very long story short? When you get down to the last 5% of your system. When one gets down to squeezing his/her eyes to see/hear their system at the fullest? Transparency is when all of the panes of glass are gone and one can start tweaking their system to their own liking at that point. However they want, whenever they want because all of the panes of glass are GONE.
This, to me, is transparency. YMMV.
Tom