speaker grills?

[fmw]

I agree 100%. I know what I hear or don't hear without requiring such formalities, and its a good bet that most other people do too.

Everybody does. If that weren't the case, the high end audio industry wouldn't even exist.

 

[Thaedium]

I'm not suggesting you do an objective listening test. Obviously, you don't know how to conduct one. I'm suggesting that speaker manufacturers not make statements like that unless they can back them up. To say that I'm skeptical that a speaker manufacturer did or even could design a grill cloth to improve the sound of their speakers would be an understatement. If they can prove it, then they should publish the proof or at least explain the science behind it. Isn't this the same speaker manufacturer that recommends biwiring?

Obviously I don't know how the industry conducts its objective listening tests. But since my listening environment is where I will be listening, and I have no intention of spending money, I suspect my plan being ****-simple is more then adequate to get an unbiased opinion on whether or not there is an audible difference.

For myself, I haven't noticed a difference, but my room environment is small and my seat placement is in the sweet spot. To quote a review from over at Stereophile,

The Studio/100 v.3 looks very attractive with its drivers exposed, but, as with all Paradigm designs, the black cloth-over-plastic-frame grille provides the necessary smooth baffle profile in the vicinity of the diaphragms to optimize the speaker's dispersion. The '100 is therefore intended to be listened to with its grille on; omitting it results in both a less-even off-axis response and some dips and peaks appearing in the treble response.

Link to the review here.

I'm not claiming ney or yey for it. Just some thoughts.

 

[emorphien]

A lot of people make that claim, I've never really been able to discern anything strongly one way or the other. I leave the grills on speakers that have them (my home theather, my Axioms) and I don't put them on the speakers that never came with any (my Totems).

 

[highfihoney]

Yes I did. I said the grilles don't affect the sound. And they don't.



Why? The original question was whether or not grilles made an audible difference. Dealing with anything else would be hijack as I see it.

Show me how the op's question leads to the rant about doing a dbt,once again,not one single person in this thread claimed to her a difference,Pretty far stretch if ya ask me.

Like i said,even the slightest mention

 

[fmw]

Show me how the op's question leads to the rant about doing a dbt,once again,not one single person in this thread claimed to her a difference,Pretty far stretch if ya ask me.

Like i said,even the slightest mention

Apparently, you have a problem with the truth. I won't mention a blind test again. Happy? Someone else stated that a speaker manufacturer claims to design speaker grilles to improve the sound of their speakers. That is patently ridiculous, you know it and I said so. As a former audiophile who has been cured of the problem I'm very sensitive to high end audio manufacturers preying on the placebo effect we all encounter. The high end audio industry in general is based on self generated beliefs and lies. I absolutely hate the lies. The beliefs are human nature and I don't criticize those but I do try to correct them. I criticize the manufacturers mercilessly. But I'll keep it to myself in the future. If you prefer the lies then I won't get in your way.

As a suggestion, why not just filter out my posts? You don't like my position or the truth and the web site offers that kind of service. Personally, I'd rather you didn't read my posts and criticize me for stating an opinion or, in this case, the truth. I don't even want to contribute here any more. Goodbye.

 

[3db]

Apparently, you have a problem with the truth. I won't mention a blind test again. Happy? Someone else stated that a speaker manufacturer claims to design speaker grilles to improve the sound of their speakers. That is patently ridiculous, you know it and I said so. As a former audiophile who has been cured of the problem I'm very sensitive to high end audio manufacturers preying on the placebo effect we all encounter. The high end audio industry in general is based on self generated beliefs and lies. I absolutely hate the lies. The beliefs are human nature and I don't criticize those but I do try to correct them. I criticize the manufacturers mercilessly. But I'll keep it to myself in the future. If you prefer the lies then I won't get in your way.

I concur whole heartedly with you. And the biggest frauds in the hi-fi arena are the cable and interconnect companies. But I digress

 

[Joe Schmoe]

As a former audiophile who has been cured of the problem ...

That explains a lot. As someone who never fell into the trap in the first place (except, embarassingly, one incident involving about $100 worth of cables/interconnects), I can sympathize.
Here are the things I have learned: Cables make zero difference except for gauge (which only matters if the runs are very long.)
Biwiring does nothing whatsoever, and biamping offers only very trivial improvement.
CD players are a completely mature technology, so that expensive players offer nothing that cheap ones cannot do just as well.
Speaker performance increases linearly with price up to around $400-$500/pr, increases much more gradually up to about $800-$1000/pr, and becomes virtually flat after that (so that improving on the performance of the best $1000/pr speakers would require at least $5000/pr.)

 

[fmw]

...... As someone who never fell into the trap in the first place .....

I'm not going to needle you too much, Joe, since you have a pretty reasonable attitude about audio sonics. However, you said exactly the opposite thing in post #19. That's the trap I've been talking about.

You can't trust your ears unless you divorce the listening from the subjective influence of your brain. Same for everyone like I said in post #21. We are all able to distinguish gross sonic differences such as a CD playing through a good hi fi system compared to the same one played through a boom box. But it all falls apart when we start trying to hear subtle differences without a controlled test. It falls apart every time for everyone - including me, you and hifihoney.

Care to debate this, hifihoney, or do you just want to criticize me?

 

[Joe Schmoe]

We are all able to distinguish gross sonic differences such as a CD playing through a good hi fi system compared to the same one played through a boom box.

Yes, and that is where I part company with audiophiles. To me, those differences that everyone can hear are all that matter. Why should I care about (much less spend money on) differences too subtle to be detected except under highly controlled conditions (conditions not present during normal listening)?

 

[fmw]

Obviously I don't know how the industry conducts its objective listening tests. But since my listening environment is where I will be listening, and I have no intention of spending money, I suspect my plan being ****-simple is more then adequate to get an unbiased opinion on whether or not there is an audible difference.

For myself, I haven't noticed a difference, but my room environment is small and my seat placement is in the sweet spot. To quote a review from over at Stereophile,

Link to the review here.

I'm not claiming ney or yey for it. Just some thoughts.

I'm normally pretty intolerant of Stereophile reviews. I consider them to be about 75% nonsense. However, in this case, the author didn't say he heard a better sound presentation with the grilles on. He was just explaining the manufacturer's intent. It is the manufacture that deserves the derision for the nonsense in this case, not Stereophile. I give the author credit for avoiding the lie in the review. In fact I think it was a pretty good review for Stereophile. Perhaps they've improved since I stopped reading them several years ago.

Note, please, that I don't have a problem with the performance of Paradigm speakers. I'm sure they are good products. I only have a problem with the manufacturer suggesting things to very suggestable audiophiles about their products that help separate them from the competition - when the suggested things are lies. I would rather they talk about how non resonant the enclosures are or the quality of the drivers or the exhaustive tests they ran to find the perfect crossover frequencies - anything but nonsense. I don't like that they market grille cloths and biwiring. It sends shivers up my spine and, in my case, disqualifies the products from ever having a place in my home. There you go, hifihoney, another rant for you to take on.

 

[manofsteel2397]

i swear i can hear a difference with the grills off but i think its mind over matter because they look so much powerful with them off because there is a lot of silver...so realy there probaly is no difference just looks like there is

 

[Halon451]

I agree - it's a psychological thing to see the speakers without grills - they immediately have a visual impact on your senses, and therefore the mind may perceive more sound coming from them, when in fact that's not the reality.

 

[manofsteel2397]

yea and also can be very distracting tried to watch a moive with them off just to see if i could hear a difference but ended up looking at the speakers more than movie

 

[Joe Schmoe]

yea and also can be very distracting tried to watch a moive with them off just to see if i could hear a difference but ended up looking at the speakers more than movie

Good observation. Speakers without grills do tend to attract the eye, which is not always a good thing.

 

[highfihoney]

Care to debate this, hifihoney, or do you just want to criticize me?

Yes i will debate you but right now im having much more fun critizing you,there is nothing worse than a person who PUSHEStheir beliefs or veiws on others,at all costs,& this is whats happening once again.

Not one person said their speakers sounded better with the grills off,not one, yet you took this thread straight into another round of endless dbt dribble,talk of bi-wiring,exotic cables ect.

Just a mention of a manufacturers recomendation about their grills opened the door for you & your off & running,obviously you have a problem with what that manufacturer recomends,you should write them personally about it as soon as possible.

From reading your past posts it is aparent to me that you feel that you were taken in by the audio industry for years,if your happy running top of the line speakers, powered by a "soundesign amplifier" with a "coby cd player" as the source then more power to ya,you should show the same courtesy that others afford you.

Pay attention to the post you wrote yesterday at 6:35am then wonder why i called you out for another thread take over with your veiws,your opinion seemed to turn a bit snotty wouldnt ya say.

 

[fmw]

Yes i will debate you but right now im having much more fun critizing you,there is nothing worse than a person who PUSHEStheir beliefs or veiws on others,at all costs,& this is whats happening once again.

Not one person said their speakers sounded better with the grills off,not one, yet you took this thread straight into another round of endless dbt dribble,talk of bi-wiring,exotic cables ect.

Just a mention of a manufacturers recomendation about their grills opened the door for you & your off & running,obviously you have a problem with what that manufacturer recomends,you should write them personally about it as soon as possible.

From reading your past posts it is aparent to me that you feel that you were taken in by the audio industry for years,if your happy running top of the line speakers, powered by a "soundesign amplifier" with a "coby cd player" as the source then more power to ya,you should show the same courtesy that others afford you.

Pay attention to the post you wrote yesterday at 6:35am then wonder why i called you out for another thread take over with your veiws,your opinion seemed to turn a bit snotty wouldnt ya say.

Yawn. Any time you'd like to debate the issues, let me know.

 

[highfihoney]

As a suggestion, why not just filter out my posts? You don't like my position or the truth and the web site offers that kind of service. Personally, I'd rather you didn't read my posts and criticize me for stating an opinion or, in this case, the truth. I don't even want to contribute here any more. Goodbye.

For the record its not your position i dont like its your disposition,your opinion on this is no different than my own but offering ones opinion is far different from a thread take over.

And as for me not liking this web site i dont have a clue where ya came up with that one,if i didnt like this place i wouldnt be here ever,just because Audioholics moto says truth in audio does not give you the right to self righteously push your veiws at all costs.

As for filtering members posts,i tried that with all the known dbt pushers,all i ended up with was trying to figure out how the thread got derailed in the first place.

 

[fmw]

For the record its not your position i dont like its your disposition,your opinion on this is no different than my own but offering ones opinion is far different from a thread take over.

And as for me not liking this web site i dont have a clue where ya came up with that one,if i didnt like this place i wouldnt be here ever,just because Audioholics moto says truth in audio does not give you the right to self righteously push your veiws at all costs.

As for filtering members posts,i tried that with all the known dbt pushers,all i ended up with was trying to figure out how the thread got derailed in the first place.

See post #36

 

[Halon451]

Personally, I'm outta this one - the horse is dead, so I don't have to administer anymore beatings on my own account. My humble opinion thus far stated is just that... humble.

See you all on a different thread, different topic.

 

[Thaedium]

I agree the FMW can come on strong at times, and a bit "Snobbish". Whether its due to experience, bad day, or anything else is really not pertinent. I tend to sift through anyones BS without feeling personally attacked, and if there is solid and reasonable foundation to their reasoning then I'll give it equal weight in consideration. I, like anyone else, have my rough moments and can be quick to react on this forum since I come here to enjoy a day off from hard work in the military. And naturally, if I disagree with someone and I'm all agitated from work stress I tend to write hastely. Regardless, I've never read any post of FMW's that was not usually supported by some sort of quantifiable evidence, except for rhetoric and banter.

That said, his comments with regards to the Paradigm grills got me to do some investigations. I've really not done all that much, but I've begun a start to it. After all, it is pushed by Paradigm that their "grill covers" make a difference in its intended sound. So FMW is right, wheres the proof?

Well I pulled up another article review that actually did some testing, and though the reviewer doesn't touch to much on the subject here is one comment he made,

The Paradigm Signatures were measured with their grilles removed. For both speakers (S4 and C3), the grilles slightly reduced the treble level but also made the high-frequency response rougher.

Link to article, here.

The comment suggests that during his testing at some point he threw on the grills and measured a difference. Whether he thought the difference was worth displaying the same data sheets but with the grilles on, or whether he just thought it wasn't central to the main course of the review is anyones guess.

For me, this review gives a little credence to Paradigm's claim, but still fails to offer any fact truly backing it up.

I took a picture of the inside of the Studio 100 grille, and from what I've seen of other grills, or socks it definently appears a bit more unique. Take a look for yourselves, and any comments are definently appreciated. I'm interested in getting the truth of it.



Also this link here, for another review on Paradigms where the reviewer offers significant commentary on the grill, but again, no data. Specifically he notes an almost 180 degree difference from with the grill off as to when it is on.

I checked out Paradigm's website and took a look in the Q&A section, one of the questions there was;

Q: Should I play my Paradigm® speakers with the grills on or off?
Aaradigm® and Paradigm® Reference speakers are designed with low-diffraction grills that minimize interference from enclosure edges. These grills also incorporate a Controlled Waveguide™ to ensure superior wide-dispersion uniformity. As such, they are meant to be played with grills on.

It seems to me, that if you can design room additives that can affect room acoustics then its not too out of the realm of possibility that you could design a grill to have an impact on the sound being emitted from the drivers.


I've also E-mailed Paradigm to see if I can get a response and perhaps some data on this claim, so maybe soon I can post what Paradigm has to say in its defense of their grills.