How to Audition Speakers

[Bahtman]

I certainly wish I could join in on this discussion about auditioning speakers and learn from others.
Back in the the US, sure.
Unfortunatly I left the land of techno and customer considertion years ago when I wandered of to Thailand, where neither exist.

Component selection here is quite liimited, as are thier english skills (as well as my Thai) and if one is lucky, one may sample 2, maybe 3 seats of speakers on a open showrooom floor.
"Return policy"??? mai kho jai ( I don't understand).
Warranty, sure. Send it off the the factory someplace for months at a time, but you can't even return spoiled food here, let alone something thats pricey.

So how am I to select my system?
Well back in the day I had an Yamaha RXV-1, and an Onkyo xxxx so I'm leaning that way. I had 4x Pioneer 6 ways I bought in Japan in the mid 60's but it's next to impossible to find a mix of Pioneer speakers here. Speaker wire's and other connectors here are bought of a spool in the local hardware store.

220v ungrounded wiring is common. Touch a metal part of the computer or anything wired for that matter and feel a nice little jolt. Not enough to do real damage, but enough to be real annoying. If I reach for the toast, from inside the toaster oven, I even get a jolt from the bread.

Pricing here is 20% higher than the US due to customs. The alternative is to buy and ship from the states but add the shipping costs and customs duties, and I'm further in the hole.
Most likely however something the items would end up being "lost" in customs as they have a desire for such goods.

So I'm stuck reading this and other forums for advice and opinions and must make my buying decisions on you recommendations and your listed components.

Everyone's got a different ear and opinion about what sounds best to them and buying "what sounds best to you".

I won't even go into acoustics here. Picture houses made from concrete.

Don't get me wrong, I love it here, but do miss the niceities of a first world country.

Cheers and thanks for the chatter.

 

[sparkrat]

I certainly wish I could join in on this discussion about auditioning speakers and learn from others.
Back in the the US, sure.
Unfortunatly I left the land of techno and customer considertion years ago when I wandered of to Thailand, where neither exist.

Component selection here is quite liimited, as are thier english skills (as well as my Thai) and if one is lucky, one may sample 2, maybe 3 seats of speakers on a open showrooom floor.
"Return policy"??? mai kho jai ( I don't understand).
Warranty, sure. Send it off the the factory someplace for months at a time, but you can't even return spoiled food here, let alone something thats pricey.

So how am I to select my system?
Well back in the day I had an Yamaha RXV-1, and an Onkyo xxxx so I'm leaning that way. I had 4x Pioneer 6 ways I bought in Japan in the mid 60's but it's next to impossible to find a mix of Pioneer speakers here. Speaker wire's and other connectors here are bought of a spool in the local hardware store.

220v ungrounded wiring is common. Touch a metal part of the computer or anything wired for that matter and feel a nice little jolt. Not enough to do real damage, but enough to be real annoying. If I reach for the toast, from inside the toaster oven, I even get a jolt from the bread.

Pricing here is 20% higher than the US due to customs. The alternative is to buy and ship from the states but add the shipping costs and customs duties, and I'm further in the hole.
Most likely however something the items would end up being "lost" in customs as they have a desire for such goods.

So I'm stuck reading this and other forums for advice and opinions and must make my buying decisions on you recommendations and your listed components.

Everyone's got a different ear and opinion about what sounds best to them and buying "what sounds best to you".

I won't even go into acoustics here. Picture houses made from concrete.

Don't get me wrong, I love it here, but do miss the niceities of a first world country.

Cheers and thanks for the chatter.

 

[sparkrat]

To continue in a more serious direction.....
I did a lot of auditioning listening to at least 50 or 70 different speakers in many different stores and some of what I learned from this I will try to cover here.

Yes you need a big variety of music and what works you probably only can decide for yourself, some of the music that I find most revealing can be quite silent music with few instruments, could be things like Kate Bush, Tori Amos.... If you can stand this, that is ; this is extremely revealing and very hard for speakers to get correct, female voices and pianos probably tell you immediately if things are not right... some of the records from Leftfield are also exceedingly well made without any form of compression and if the system is up to it... will sound like something else. With Leftfield you will know if the sub 30Hz region is ok Try the "Leftism" Album

I would very much look out for the imponator effect as what you're probably not looking for is the speakers that sound the most impressive; The impressive speakers quite often sound like this because they do have some sort of artificial imponator effect builtin (they're not linear or not natural sounding), this will be bad in the long run as any artificial coloring is not supposed to be there in the first place, in the end it will make you sell the speakers....

Quite often I find the best speakers to sound like "nothing at all" because they're just giving you whatever it gets... When I first auditioned the Duntech PCL-15's I was quite unimpressed as they sounded like nothing special at all, the treble was not there and I'm not sure I liked them....
Until suddenly the treble was there, light as snowflakes..... like a magic
I didn't like these speakers in the start; until I realized they're sensational because the response is flat as Kansas, they're absolutely phase/time coherent and give you out the signal exactly as it gets into the speakers... In the long run, this is what was right for me and probably the best thing I ever bought, it's magic and still.... they can't play loud and there's no lower bass at all

Products like this may not be correct for you but you should look out for these similar effects, I suggest.

So what do you need.... you need lots of lots of lots of time to audition over and over and over again and in the end.... settle for the speakers that mostly makes you enjoy the music and forget about the technique,

I think it's absolutely wrong and misleading to suggest that speakers should all be placed in the same place within the room, this depends on the speakers and different speakers have different tuning that makes them work optimal in different positioning within the room, for some speakers this may work out but as a general rule this is not necessarily correct. At least this is my experience with different speakers.

I would not switch quickly between speakers but at least listen to a few songs with a speaker, perhaps even much more to find how you enjoy this, and then later repeat this with other speakers.... it's surprising how your memory may recall signature of other speakers, even after a significant point in time

Quick switching between speakers is only gonna make you forget about what's important, namely the experience and listening pleasure, you will probably end up as a listening machine trying to look for technicalities that are different.... this is more about listening pleasure than technical differences.....

If speakers trick you to believe that you're listening to music and not electronics, then you're into something that may potentially make you happy in the long run....

And speakers can then be enjoyable.... even without cable risers or Ferrari red speaker cables

Hi Haralda & All

Your appreciation of the Duntech PCL-15 took my interest and I would like to share my story regarding these speakers.
This is my first post on this forum.

Recently in Canberra ACT Australia, there was an auction for the Ductech PCL-15 speakers that had come out of the Parliament House. There must have been 20 Matched pairs of these speakers. I trowed the web for information which was: accurate and flat response. I won a pair and took them home and listened to them. At first it appeared that the speakers did not give an impressive sound, but after listening to me more I felt that it was the flat response that had fooled me. These speakers are fantastic, there response range is stunning for their size.

I have been building a Theatre room and planned to go 5.1 or 7.1. It seamed like a good opportunity to get a number of these speakers for the purpose.
In the end I now have 10 x PCL-15 speakers. Some may think this to be crazy but what could be better than a complete system with the same speakers.
I have setup a 7.1 system with these speakers using a PC Running XBMC output to a Media Matrix X-Frame 88 & MM8802 Driving and 2 x Australian Amps 6 x 100W per unit.
Its a insane 7.1 the sound is so well match that when sound moves around the room it is! the same sound! The Media Matrix gives infinite control over the sound quality and the Mosfet Amps drive these speakers so well!
The Media Matrix and the Amps were auctioned and came from the Australian Opera House.

I do hope to Add some Subwoofers at a later stage primarily for Audio but for theatre the base level more than adequate and the sound crystal clear.
At some stage soon I will get it properly setup and EQ it. I do feel that I need to take care with the Sub woofer choice not to unbalance the quality of these Duntech PCL-15 speakers.

Regards to all
Greg

 

[haraldo]

I certainly wish I could join in on this discussion about auditioning speakers and learn from others.
....

You would enjoy Oslo Hi-fi Center.... it's not the US, well....
The stuff they sell is certainly not for free, by far; but it's free to audition and they will consistently blow your socks off, every time

 

[haraldo]

Hi Haralda & All

Your appreciation of the Duntech PCL-15 took my interest and I would like to share my story regarding these speakers.
This is my first post on this forum.

.........

Regards to all
Greg

Thx Greg!!!!!!!!!

I never came across anyone else having PCL-15.... I read somewhere that some guys claim these to be the best imaging speakers ever made, at any price .... I am not saying that's true because I don't have credibility to say.... But in this process of louder, more bass, more SPL, we risk losing some aspects, which is.... it's about the experience listening to music ... The PCL-15's provide this .... in spades

 

[sparkrat]

Thx Greg!!!!!!!!!

I never came across anyone else having PCL-15.... I read somewhere that some guys claim these to be the best imaging speakers ever made, at any price .... I am not saying that's true because I don't have credibility to say.... But in this process of louder, more bass, more SPL, we risk losing some aspects, which is.... it's about the experience listening to music ... The PCL-15's provide this .... in spades

Hi haraldo

Yes I agree with your comments.
I would love to have a more louder, more base etc. Perhaps in my case is suspect my wife would disown me if I spent the $ to have some of the speakers displayed in this thread. Even more if I setup a 7.1 with such speakers... nice but $ out of my league! hence my choice in the last post.

To contribute more to this thread, Buying speakers without even hearing them is always a risk. And I believe as others have mentioned, What really matters in choosing a sound system in which the final sound is to your liking and preference.
The reason for my choice is not just because of the speakers and amp, Its because of the Media Matrix system. With the combination of a total of 16 Channels in and 16 channels out, The media Matrix system is a DSP systems which has 8 preset programmable buttons. X-Ware software is a drop and drag software in which you can any type of studio environment. What this means is you could add additional front speakers and mix them in our out with any EQ or desired sound you would want.

Back to Auditioning a system, just change the room and the sound is different. And very few of use really know what we are hearing and as we age our hearing changes! Taking a few tracks of music we know can be helpful. Of cause if we buy at the top end than do we really need to hear it? My thoughts are to look for the systems that in spec provide the flattest response and known sound accuracy. Than have a system that you can tune to your liking. DSP systems can also have Valve simulation... Shock I know this will offend some. And I apologise, I have not spun the turn table in many years and what I have compared to many in this forum belongs in the bin.
But I must say I do have an appreciation for the purity of sound having build some sound gear and PA engineering in the past. "Purity of sound, What's that??!!
And this leads me back to the Media Matrix, Great system but unless we know what we are hearing and how to manage the sound on a systems we are in the end saying, What a great or poor sound and remain unable to do anything about it. Sound what a great science!

Back to our hearing. I would think now being 57, I would appreciated more top end. Solid base would be good because you can feel it . So this would in theory mean the best system out there may not be tuned for me. But my children would appreciate it more, having a fuller hearing spectrum but they would not know why! So back to the Media Matrix Presets and our variety of music choices.

Starting with your room and system the best starting point is to EQ the room than make variations in Preferences. This can not be done in a showroom!
and most full spectrum accurate speaker systems can be made to sound sweet if you have enough control over it, (Risky words I know).

I hope my concepts are not out of line for this thread but I do think it may be relevant.

Cheers
Greg

 

[sparkrat]

Hi haraldo

Yes I agree with your comments.
I would love to have a more louder, more base etc. Perhaps in my case is suspect my wife would disown me if I spent the $ to have some of the speakers displayed in this thread. Even more if I setup a 7.1 with such speakers... nice but $ out of my league! hence my choice in the last post.

To contribute more to this thread, Buying speakers without even hearing them is always a risk. And I believe as others have mentioned, What really matters in choosing a sound system in which the final sound is to your liking and preference.
The reason for my choice is not just because of the speakers and amp, Its because of the Media Matrix system. With the combination of a total of 16 Channels in and 16 channels out, The media Matrix system is a DSP systems which has 8 preset programmable buttons. X-Ware software is a drop and drag software in which you can any type of studio environment. What this means is you could add additional front speakers and mix them in our out with any EQ or desired sound you would want.

Back to Auditioning a system, just change the room and the sound is different. And very few of use really know what we are hearing and as we age our hearing changes! Taking a few tracks of music we know can be helpful. Of cause if we buy at the top end than do we really need to hear it? My thoughts are to look for the systems that in spec provide the flattest response and known sound accuracy. Than have a system that you can tune to your liking. DSP systems can also have Valve simulation... Shock I know this will offend some. And I apologise, I have not spun the turn table in many years and what I have compared to many in this forum belongs in the bin.
But I must say I do have an appreciation for the purity of sound having build some sound gear and PA engineering in the past. "Purity of sound, What's that??!!
And this leads me back to the Media Matrix, Great system but unless we know what we are hearing and how to manage the sound on a systems we are in the end saying, What a great or poor sound and remain unable to do anything about it. Sound what a great science!

Back to our hearing. I would think now being 57, I would appreciated more top end. Solid base would be good because you can feel it . So this would in theory mean the best system out there may not be tuned for me. But my children would appreciate it more, having a fuller hearing spectrum but they would not know why! So back to the Media Matrix Presets and our variety of music choices.

Starting with your room and system the best starting point is to EQ the room than make variations in Preferences. This can not be done in a showroom!
and most full spectrum accurate speaker systems can be made to sound sweet if you have enough control over it, (Risky words I know).

I hope my concepts are not out of line for this thread but I do think it may be relevant.

Cheers
Greg

Gee those systems look great, I can only lust and durule.
I think if I spent time Auditioning I would have trouble going home.