Revel Concerta2 M16 Bookshelf Speaker Review

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It's hard to stand out in a field of sub $1k bookshelf speakers, but Revel has done just that with their Concerta2 M16s. Revel has demonstrated top-notch engineering, build quality and value with their new Concerta2 line up of speakers.

The M16s are balanced speakers that do a lot very well. They offer high fidelity sound to match their aesthetics and you'll have to read on to see how they performed in our objective measurement testing too.

Read: Revel Concerta2 M16 Bookshelf Speaker Review

 

[Steve81]

Nice review James! I may have missed it, but I didn't see a "chocolatey midrange" measurement. Are we talking M&M's or Ghirardelli?

 

[TheWarrior]

Those measurements are incredible!

 

[XIANV]

+1! More reviews like this, please!

 

[KenM10759]

Well executed review, and a pretty good speaker for the money. Nice job!

 

[Dennis Murphy]

Those measurements are incredible!

Frankly, I found the measurements very puzzling. If all of those periodic ups and downs are due to reflections from the mic stand, why not show a standard anechoic plot with a narrower sampling window that would eliminate them? It's very hard to get a handle on the true response of the speaker with the measurements that are shown. You can also show the results with a wider window, if that's what it takes to get resolution down into the bass. But the method that's being used here makes comparisons with other speakers very difficult.

 

[shadyJ]

The ripples above 6 kHz may be coming from the part of the mic stand where the stand attaches to the microphone, in which case a short window would not help. That is an issue which will be addressed in future reviews where the mic stand will be modified. Widening the window would introduce ground reflections which would obscure the speakers behavior a lot more. The method used here actually achieves a pretty close match to Harman's own anechoic data up to 6 kHz. If the ripples above 6 kHz are averaged out, it is a very close match for the entire response. It is not a perfect measurement, but future measurements should be much improved.

 

[Dennis Murphy]

The ripples above 6 kHz may be coming from the part of the mic stand where the stand attaches to the microphone, in which case a short window would not help. That is an issue which will be addressed in future reviews where the mic stand will be modified. Widening the window would introduce ground reflections which would obscure the speakers behavior a lot more. The method used here actually achieves a pretty close match to Harman's own anechoic data up to 6 kHz. If the ripples above 6 kHz are averaged out, it is a very close match for the entire response. It is not a perfect measurement, but future measurements should be much improved.

Well, I'm impressed that you're going to the lengths that you are to provide plots with at least some meaningful information into the bass region. I've never had problems with mic stand ripples, so it must be the particular configuration you're using. I hope you can work that out.

 

[AcuDefTechGuy]

Harman speakers (Infinity P362) have never had a problem with on-axis and off-axis FR.

Same goes for KEF, TAD, PSB, RBH, Salk, Philharmonic, Ascend, NHT, Paradigm.

 

[TheWarrior]

Frankly, I found the measurements very puzzling. If all of those periodic ups and downs are due to reflections from the mic stand, why not show a standard anechoic plot with a narrower sampling window that would eliminate them? It's very hard to get a handle on the true response of the speaker with the measurements that are shown. You can also show the results with a wider window, if that's what it takes to get resolution down into the bass. But the method that's being used here makes comparisons with other speakers very difficult.

It's just another viewpoint, and a prettier, more intuitive one for the masses. And since you can only choose resolution in one domain or the other, I'm happier knowing there aren't any resonances hiding! You get a great idea of how balanced the speaker is off axis. The lack of consistent off axis spikes shows there are no significant resonances, no ringing! Pretty good for outdoor measurements!, I think!

On the subject of consistent measurements, I'd just like to see Harman's spinorama data on every speaker! Maybe we need to crowd fund anechoic chambers? It would eliminate so much wasted rare earth metals from entering the market place and subsequently the dumpster (for those that don't recycle, shame!) in the first place!

Olive and Toole were able to achieve a .86 coefficient correlating 70 anechoic measurements to listener preferences. Most manufacturers won't even post as much info as you do, Dennis!

 

[shadyJ]

It's just another viewpoint, and a prettier, more intuitive one for the masses. And since you can only choose resolution in one domain or the other, I'm happier knowing there aren't any resonances hiding! You get a great idea of how balanced the speaker is off axis. The lack of consistent off axis spikes shows there are no significant resonances, no ringing! Pretty good for outdoor measurements!, I think!

On the subject of consistent measurements, I'd just like to see Harman's spinorama data on every speaker! Maybe we need to crowd fund anechoic chambers? It would eliminate so much wasted rare earth metals from entering the market place and subsequently the dumpster (for those that don't recycle, shame!) in the first place!

Olive and Toole were able to achieve a .86 coefficient correlating 70 anechoic measurements to listener preferences. Most manufacturers won't even post as much info as you do, Dennis!

In the future we will be doing the full spatial averaging graph a la Harman 'spin-o-rama' and the CEA-2034 measurement presentation. In this review we only did on-axis, early-reflections, and listening window.

As for a crowd funded anechoic chamber, Canada kinda had something like that with the facilities at the NRCC. Floyd Toole said that Canadian companies were able to get their speakers measured for a song, and that was a big help to Canadian speaker manufacturers. I don't think we will ever see something like that in the USA, anechoic chambers are very expensive.

As for the pollution of rare earth metals, it looks like taking them out of the ground is even more ecologically damaging than trying to put them back in.

 

[TheWarrior]

In the future we will be doing the full spatial averaging graph a la Harman 'spin-o-rama' and the CEA-2034 measurement presentation. In this review we only did on-axis, early-reflections, and listening window.

As for a crowd funded anechoic chamber, Canada kinda had something like that with the facilities at the NRCC. Floyd Toole said that Canadian companies were able to get their speakers measured for a sing, and that was a big help to Canadian speaker manufacturers. I don't think we will ever see something like that in the USA, anechoic chambers are very expensive.

As for the pollution of rare earth metals, it looks like taking them out of the ground is even more ecologically damaging than trying to put them back in.

Outstanding! I really admire your efforts toward quality measurements. Effort, being the 'key' word! Just as with an anechoic chamber, it's not the design that's difficult, it's the labor in placing a large number of materials with greater accuracy than that of a conventional house. But, if there's the 'will', there's a way!

And yes, I'd like to see a lot more of the reducing and reusing going on. Which also means placing standards that prevents a large number of manufacturer's from producing bad speakers, or 'wasting' raw materials that really should no longer be mined!

 

[DrJohnRead]

I recently heard three bookshelf speakers:

Kef LS50
Kef R300
and Martin Logan 35XT

I am keen to know how these fit into this group...

For me the choice was clear as follows, so far:

1. Kef R300
2. Kef LS50
3. ML 35XT

Yet the R300 was a little bright and good base with a missing middle pallete...but very spacious great sound stage...against it is a rather large - deep - size speaker (15.2 x 8.3 x 13.6 in.)

 

[shadyJ]

Haven't heard the R300s or ML speakers, but I have heard the LS50s on many occasions, and they always sounded nice to me. I wouldn't try to draw a comparison with the Revels unless I heard them in the same room while A/B'ing them. Aural memory is too poor to do otherwise. Both are excellent speakers, and both sport very good measurement sets. The Revel Concerta2 M16s can be had for significantly less than their MSRP, in fact they can be had for around the same price as the KEF Q300s. The Revel speaker that is comparable to the LS50 or R300 would be the M106. You can't go wrong with any of these.

 

[KenM10759]

A "missing middle palette" isn't a term I'd ever heard associated with KEF's R300. I find them to be particularly good in that range and just a touch laid-back at the very top end.