Sigberg Audio MANTA dual cardioid active speaker development thread

TLS Guy

TLS Guy

Seriously, I have no life.
I really was going to write a long detailed reply, But frankly it would be a waist of my time



That avatar photo is of a pair of Magico M9 speakers with MBL amplifications, Total cost would be around two million dollars
Any further description would be completely wasted on you.
Details are sparse, and their are no published measurements, not even by the manufacturer. I did ascertain is is active bi-amping to the lower drivers at 120 Hz, with an external crossover.

The bass mids are 11" drivers. I remain skeptical that a single mid driver is going to mate well with those four powerful drivers. All the bass units are sealed, so there really is nothing out of the ordinary about this design.

Pending third part reviews, I regard the design as potentially suspect.

You really have a right to expect extensive specification and exhaustive measurements for speakers costing three quarters of a ill before you even get round to powering them.

Anyone who buys those speakers absent exhaustive proof they are any good, truly an idiot.
 
Sigberg Audio

Sigberg Audio

Audioholic
I'd prefer not to have arguments about whether other systems are good or not in this thread if possible. Let's try to stay positive. :)

@mono-bloc If you're not interested in the development of these speakers, please ignore the thread. Thanks. :)
 
Sigberg Audio

Sigberg Audio

Audioholic
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The first excited customers will get their hands on the Sigberg Audio Manta next month! Meanwhile, at Velvet Recording studio just outside of Oslo, Norway, they've enjoyed the Manta for over two months already! They've got a setup of the Sigberg Audio Manta with dual 10D subwoofers in their recording studio, and Sigberg Audio SBS.1 with dual Inkognito subwoofers in their mixing&mastering studio.

I sat down with head engineer Christer Krogh for a long talk about the process of recording, about different monitors, about house curves and in-room response, and of course, the Manta! :D

"Where to start - the Mantas are awesome in so many ways! The first and weirdest experience was how Manta sounded unlike any monitor I've heard, but at the same time sounded instantly familiar. You always have to spend quite a while to get to know and understand a new monitor, but with the Manta it was different. I got this instant reaction, thinking that they not only sounded great, but they sound exactly right!"

Check out the full interview here!

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TLS Guy

TLS Guy

Seriously, I have no life.
The first excited customers will get their hands on the Sigberg Audio Manta next month! Meanwhile, at Velvet Recording studio just outside of Oslo, Norway, they've enjoyed the Manta for over two months already! They've got a setup of the Sigberg Audio Manta with dual 10D subwoofers in their recording studio, and Sigberg Audio SBS.1 with dual Inkognito subwoofers in their mixing&mastering studio.

I sat down with head engineer Christer Krogh for a long talk about the process of recording, about different monitors, about house curves and in-room response, and of course, the Manta! :D

"Where to start - the Mantas are awesome in so many ways! The first and weirdest experience was how Manta sounded unlike any monitor I've heard, but at the same time sounded instantly familiar. You always have to spend quite a while to get to know and understand a new monitor, but with the Manta it was different. I got this instant reaction, thinking that they not only sounded great, but they sound exactly right!"

Check out the full interview here!

Good to hear the speaker is getting launched. My only comment is, that having done a lot of mixing, I would NEVER mix with Ns10. if ever there was a grossly over rated speaker, then they are the poster boy!
 
Sigberg Audio

Sigberg Audio

Audioholic
Good to hear the speaker is getting launched. My only comment is, that having done a lot of mixing, I would NEVER mix with Ns10. if ever there was a grossly over rated speaker, then they are the poster boy!
I agree, but they are VERY popular still. This particular studio did have other, more neutral and higher-end monitors as well. but they also had the NS10 for reference, and/or because many engineers still ask for them I guess. :rolleyes:
 
Sigberg Audio

Sigberg Audio

Audioholic
The production cabinets have a different and somewhat thicker type of felt in front of the ports, so I had to to do some control measurements and final adjustments to the internal dampening. With these final adjustments the production tuning has been finalized, and the first pairs are on the way out the door. :)

Some coaxials have a somewhat untidy on-axis response (which isn't necessarily very problematic since you typically listen slightly off-axis), but I'm consistently impressed by this driver. :)

Here's a gated measurement on-axis @1m (non-anechoic), 100-20,000hz:
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coax.jpg
 
Sigberg Audio

Sigberg Audio

Audioholic
We're starting a series of 30-60 second ads now based on the setup at Velvet recording, as they have ended up with basically all our products. One setup with Manta + dual 10D, and one with SBS and dual Inkognito. We will also release one or two full video interviews as well, but focusing on getting out a few ads first. :)

Here is the first one:

 
highfigh

highfigh

Seriously, I have no life.
Good to hear the speaker is getting launched. My only comment is, that having done a lot of mixing, I would NEVER mix with Ns10. if ever there was a grossly over rated speaker, then they are the poster boy!
Those aren't popular because they sound good, they're popular because so many studios have them that people who move around to work on various projects don't need to try to become accustomed to the nuances in a multitude of monitors. Imagine going to 100 places to listen to music and all of the speakers are different- how could you try to enjoy the sound, how could you stand hearing the music through speakers that you dislike and how could you start to consider mixing with them as monitors?

They also reveal problems with the mix in ways that many other monitors don't. I have heard music through some monitors and it was almost like they smoothed the sound as if they were using a trowel to smooth concrete or cake frosting. After the mix, the music was played through other speakers and some of it was almost un-listenable. I know someone who recorded at a decent studio, but the main speakers were B&W 801- in the control room when the basic tracks were recorded, I hated the sound. That studio moved and has a new owner, who replaced the B&W with Genelec and he difference n sound is incredible but the thing that I have seen in just about every studio- Yamaha NS-10. I don't know of anyone who actually likes them but they serve a purpose.
 
TLS Guy

TLS Guy

Seriously, I have no life.
Those aren't popular because they sound good, they're popular because so many studios have them that people who move around to work on various projects don't need to try to become accustomed to the nuances in a multitude of monitors. Imagine going to 100 places to listen to music and all of the speakers are different- how could you try to enjoy the sound, how could you stand hearing the music through speakers that you dislike and how could you start to consider mixing with them as monitors?

They also reveal problems with the mix in ways that many other monitors don't. I have heard music through some monitors and it was almost like they smoothed the sound as if they were using a trowel to smooth concrete or cake frosting. After the mix, the music was played through other speakers and some of it was almost un-listenable. I know someone who recorded at a decent studio, but the main speakers were B&W 801- in the control room when the basic tracks were recorded, I hated the sound. That studio moved and has a new owner, who replaced the B&W with Genelec and he difference n sound is incredible but the thing that I have seen in just about every studio- Yamaha NS-10. I don't know of anyone who actually likes them but they serve a purpose.
You have made my point. If you mix with aberrant speakers, then when you play on decent speakers, the faulty sound of the monitors is revealed.

This week an engineer did a mix and recording all weekend. The monitors were those Ymahas. Then came here to listen to his work. It all sounds awful to me anyway, but he seemed happy.

What I notice is that on all this type of recording is that there is never any depth of field, and it always sounds more like mono than stereo. Not only that when you look at it on the phase scope, it actually is more like mono than stereo. It all revolves round these pop industry techniques. You can't put up a bunch of mics, and use pan pots to create your sound field. Unless you use isolation booths, which seem to have been out of fashion for some time, then there is so much bleed between the mics, it is essentially more like a mono than a stereo recording. This is why you can not use an upmixer with music from the pop rock domain, as it all pretty much goes to the center channel, unless you use center spread.

Whereas in classical recordings, the sound field is from distant mics, and I note the Decca tree and variants are becoming increasingly common. That way the upmixers work wonderfully well and you get a wide deep sound stage with center spread off. On the phase scope it looks like stereo, which it is.

So, I suppose it does not matter how you monitor it, as it will always sound awful, as it is universally miss engineered from the ground up.
 
highfigh

highfigh

Seriously, I have no life.
You have made my point. If you mix with aberrant speakers, then when you play on decent speakers, the faulty sound of the monitors is revealed.

This week an engineer did a mix and recording all weekend. The monitors were those Ymahas. Then came here to listen to his work. It all sounds awful to me anyway, but he seemed happy.

What I notice is that on all this type of recording is that there is never any depth of field, and it always sounds more like mono than stereo. Not only that when you look at it on the phase scope, it actually is more like mono than stereo. It all revolves round these pop industry techniques. You can't put up a bunch of mics, and use pan pots to create your sound field. Unless you use isolation booths, which seem to have been out of fashion for some time, then there is so much bleed between the mics, it is essentially more like a mono than a stereo recording. This is why you can not use an upmixer with music from the pop rock domain, as it all pretty much goes to the center channel, unless you use center spread.

Whereas in classical recordings, the sound field is from distant mics, and I note the Decca tree and variants are becoming increasingly common. That way the upmixers work wonderfully well and you get a wide deep sound stage with center spread off. On the phase scope it looks like stereo, which it is.

So, I suppose it does not matter how you monitor it, as it will always sound awful, as it is universally miss engineered from the ground up.
I'm not defending the mix quality, but it makes the people who travel from studio to studio happy (I guess) that they don't need to bring their own monitors. I have seen small monitors that can be placed in a foam-lined suitcase, which could be easier, but those recordings are mostly going to be the kind that had people making a cassette copy and listening to it through a car radio (this was common in the '70s-'80s), but not for Classical or Jazz recordings.

Many pop/rock recordings are made with isolation, but that still leaves the mixing to someone who seems to only have one ear in the middle of their face. Then, there are the recordings with too much separation- those are annoying, at best. The ones that are recorded 'live in the studio' are done because the interaction of the players is better than if they can't see each other or if the tracks are recorded at different times and in different places. Using pro studio musicians makes a huge difference because, while some musicians are OK live, they can't get the hang of playing in time without the others. Many can't play along with a click track, some can't play without it but the thing that's missing is the ensemble playing music, as opposed to assembling separate tracks and trying to make some kind of magic.
 
Sigberg Audio

Sigberg Audio

Audioholic
A few pictures from a Hifi show here in Norway this weekend. :) Lots of great feedback on the system. We were running the Mantas with four subwoofers (2x 10D and 2x Inkognito 12).

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Sigberg Audio

Sigberg Audio

Audioholic
An English translation of the recent review of Manta and 10D in the Norwegian magazine Stereopluss is now available. Please keep in mind that this was originally in Norwegian if there are some weird sentences here and there. :) Please also note that this is a subjective review without measurements, so make of it what you will.

Conclusion from the test:
"The sound quality of Sigberg Audio’s Manta and the accompanying 10D subwoofers is an impressive experience in every way and you would need to invest quite heavily in passive speakers and electronics in order to compete – and that’s without taking the amazing holography and focus of the speakers, as well as the highly impressive feeling of being in the recording studio or close to the stage, into account."

Link: https://cdn.shopify.com/s/files/1/0...ta_og_10D_Subwoofere_English.pdf?v=1697013546

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TLS Guy

TLS Guy

Seriously, I have no life.
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A full suite of measurements of the Manta has now been shared on spinorama.org, see the following link for all the graphs:
https://www.spinorama.org/speakers/Sigberg Audio Manta/Sigberg Audio/index_vendor.html
There seems to be a definite problem centered around 1.5 KHz. That is an area where the ear is very sensitive and you don't want problems. Have you any idea of the cause and possible remedy?
 
Sigberg Audio

Sigberg Audio

Audioholic
There seems to be a definite problem centered around 1.5 KHz. That is an area where the ear is very sensitive and you don't want problems. Have you any idea of the cause and possible remedy?
Well, you'd definitely rather have a slight dip than a peak, that's for sure. :)

Beyond that, the full picture is a bit more complicated than the on-axis response. There's a dip on-axis, but there is excess energy off-axis. Here is on-axis vs 40 degrees. Which means "fixing" the on-axis response here, doesn't necessarily result in a balanced sound when off-axis is taken into account.
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And if we look at the estimated in-room response, we see that what may seem like a significant dip on-axis, is only about 1dB deviation from overall trend in that graph. The dip and subsequent peak is within +/-1.5dB. I'm not sure I would categorize that as a "definite problem", and the overall in-room sound sounds balanced.
1698738529964.png


listening window shows slight dip between 1-2khz, and minimal peak at 2khz.
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Sigberg Audio

Sigberg Audio

Audioholic
A possibly interesting additional data point, here we can see two different in-room measurement of the Mantas (average of left+right) with no EQ. Two different rooms. (500-20,000hz).

As you can see, they're both balanced across the 1-2khz region. At least for me, this (balanced in-room sound) is the goal, not picture perfect anechoic measurements.

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TLS Guy

TLS Guy

Seriously, I have no life.
A possibly interesting additional data point, here we can see two different in-room measurement of the Mantas (average of left+right) with no EQ. Two different rooms. (500-20,000hz).

As you can see, they're both balanced across the 1-2khz region. At least for me, this (balanced in-room sound) is the goal, not picture perfect anechoic measurements.

View attachment 63934
View attachment 63935
For sure I would rather have a dip than a peak. Sins of omission are always preferable to sins of commission. However that midrange band is an area of special concern, and one really has to get that region as free of defects as possible. That is why I avoid a crossover in that 800Hz to 2,500 Hz band like the plague.
 
Sigberg Audio

Sigberg Audio

Audioholic
I see I haven't updated this thread in a little while.

The Manta is now available in White as well! :D

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