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Quality speakers for classical music with high output/volume

Galliardist

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Aren’t these more than double the budget?
 

bodhi

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I call that logic and sure it's simpler to say buy those expensive active speakers because they score little better not really thinking about anything.

There certainly seems to be kind of a blind spot here with speaker recommendations. As in everybody just recommends only the absolute best speakers even though I guess most understand that the perceived additional sound quality is pretty slim in everyday listening compared to 5-10x price.

Big Genelecs and Neumanns are good buys, but only if you actually know what you are paying for.
 

RobL

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Nowhere did I recommend asymmetric placement. You're going to get reflections from the walls regardless of your placement(unless you treat with absorption). They will be slightly reduced in level with the speaker further away, but what this really affects is the boundary interference frequencies more than anything else.

"don't place speakers in corners or near walls" is just flat out bad advice, period. It depends on the room. http://tripp.com.au/sbir.htm or similar calculators can help, but it's always best to just measure placement options yourself.

I found this SBIR animation on another forum, not sure how to post other than as a link. Pretty interesting.
 

Galliardist

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Bring back corner horns.
I "helped" someone with a pair of corner horns they'd built once: it would have been the early 1990s. It was interesting. After putting the speakers into the corners, we had to move furniture away from the speakers before they worked well. We got a stereo image with an orchestra that was actually rather good if a little vague, and bass wasn't really present. The treble horn was pretty small and this probably helped with reflections. The good news was no real sweet spot - the image was over a large area of the room. The problem showed up when I tried a recording of classical guitar that was good on what I had back then, one of my weaknesses (and something we are always told is easy to reproduce). The thing was, it was about three times the normal size and the strings did not sound properly struck, so for me that was a failure. I'd say that large enough corner horns would not have treble and midrange "right in the corner" though and may be successful for that reason, in the right room.

Of course corner horns have never really gone away, and there are still people building them for sale in some parts of the world, as well as plans available. They may be better than what I heard that day (probably are). They aren't a cheap proposition though. DIY is probably the way to do it, and it might be interesting to do one with modern DSP techniques and see how much they can still be improved.

As an aside, I do wonder whether the three channel stereo work in the 1950s was done in part because of corner horns. A full range centre speaker may be a good way to solidify the stereo image I heard that day, of course. Related to that, that vintage of Klipschorn, when they come onto the market, sometimes have a centre speaker as part of the package.

I could never do them in our current room. Too many doors in corners for anything like that.
 

Galliardist

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He said he could pay a little more lol
Speaker budget: the buyer's maximum amount to spend, everyone else's minimum amount for recommendations
 
OP
E

excelsius

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Thank you for all the additional comments, especially those that go against the grain of the original suggestions. I'm getting information overload because I haven't really delved this deep into audio before. It seems like I might have missed viable recommendations in the thread because of the overload and partially because not enough audiophiles seemed to support that route. Since the opinion seems to be more split now, I agree that I'm probably missing something. I also need to read some more since I wasn't aware of what's a DSP before this thread or why I need it. I want to keep things simple still, but at the same time, I don't want this simplicity to turn into a headache later when I'm trying to expand the system. Some modularity would be important, especially since I also wanted to get a second set of less powerful speakers for my home office room (listening to music during work).

And I didn't realize how critical speaker placement is. I'm still not looking for exclusive sweet spot listening or putting the speakers in the middle of my room, but if avoiding corners or placing the speakers just a little away from the wall is necessary for SQ, then yes, will do that. Floor is all carpet, so perhaps no reflections there.

I need to take some time away to think about all this and also go through this thread again, taking notes. I will come back with additional questions to clarify some of the points. Will continue reading the additional comments/discussion here while I'm thinking and researching, so please keep that going. I have more to observe than contribute for now.
 

Vladimir Filevski

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Actually, it is very simple - OP wants the best sound quality and the maximum possible output/volume from a bookshelf loudspeaker, at about $3000 for a pair.
Active studio monitors Neumann KH-150 can do all of that. Fullstop. They even include "free" amplifiers!
No need for DSP or subwoofer for now. Please do not confuse him.
 

ahofer

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Actually, it is very simple - OP wants the best sound quality and the maximum possible output/volume from a bookshelf loudspeaker, at about $3000 for a pair.
Active studio monitors Neumann KH-150 can do all of that. Fullstop. They even include "free" amplifiers!
No need for DSP or subwoofer for now. Please do not confuse him.
Fair point. Still worth a listen to see if he prefers a wider or narrower dispersion design.

I’ve not heard the Neumanns. I have small Genelecs and they are very near field designs.
 

Yuhasz01

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I was able to find that paper online. Seems to be a simple article with just 5 pages. I'll dive into it tonight. But if there are additional articles, let me know. I would be especially curious tests that combine some sort of scientific measurement, but I understand that using a microphone to assess quality of a samples music coming out of a speaker could have it's own challenges.

I thought SACD died because it was too hard to setup/adopt, especially compared to the ease of iPods and similar devices. By the same measure, DVDs are also dying because movies are going digital. However, in the digital realm, it seems that high sampled audio files are making a come back, if anything. This includes classical music where you can buy high resolution flac files.
Online retailers upsample files so they can charge more, no sound quality goals at all.
 

Steve Dallas

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I was able to find that paper online. Seems to be a simple article with just 5 pages. I'll dive into it tonight. But if there are additional articles, let me know. I would be especially curious tests that combine some sort of scientific measurement, but I understand that using a microphone to assess quality of a samples music coming out of a speaker could have it's own challenges.

I thought SACD died because it was too hard to setup/adopt, especially compared to the ease of iPods and similar devices. By the same measure, DVDs are also dying because movies are going digital. However, in the digital realm, it seems that high sampled audio files are making a come back, if anything. This includes classical music where you can buy high resolution flac files.
Buyer beware. Many of those "high resolution" files are simply upsampled from 16/44. When played back in a DAW with a spectrum analyzer active, you can see there is nothing above 22KHz but emptiness or even noise. All you are buying is file size, noise, and psychoacoustics, with emphasis on "psycho."

Once I realized this, I stopped spending a lot of money on music and started buying used CDs, which are often $4 delivered. I rip those to flac for storage on my NAS, and much money is saved.

As a further data point, most amplifiers struggle to reach 14 bits of dynamic range.

Also, have you tested your hearing to see how high you can hear through speakers in a room? My hearing in my typical listening conditions extends to 14.6KHz. I can hear up to 16KHz when wearing headphones. If you cannot hear ultrasonic sounds, why would you care if they exist? You can test your hearing using this online tone generator.
 
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ZolaIII

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Actually, it is very simple - OP wants the best sound quality and the maximum possible output/volume from a bookshelf loudspeaker, at about $3000 for a pair.
Active studio monitors Neumann KH-150 can do all of that. Fullstop. They even include "free" amplifiers!
No need for DSP or subwoofer for now. Please do not confuse him.
Biased and wrong proposition resulting in 6.9 preference score - 7.1 equed that cannot possibly match output of 150W more on amplifier per chenel with DBR62 not doing bottom 100 Hz and two 300W sub's which would in perspective score 7.8 and 8.2 equed while having 15~20° better horizontal directivity and same vertical one (±30°), came with much better performing mains amplifier and much better DSP for the same price.
That's 900W RMS more resulting in at least 6 dB more SPL and one bottom octave more with better reproduction for instruments such as pipe organ, harp or contrabass. For same amount of money quite a difference.
 

ZolaIII

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Fair point. Still worth a listen to see if he prefers a wider or narrower dispersion design.

I’ve not heard the Neumanns. I have small Genelecs and they are very near field designs.
They all are (not very wide horizontal directivity) more near field approach.
 

HarmonicTHD

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@mj30250 I am in the US. Wow, it's listed there for $1,333. Are we talking about thomannmusic.com? Is it legit?
Absolutely. Thomann is one of the biggest retailer worldwide for pro audio equipment headquartered in Germany and they have a reputation to loose as such. I would think they have probably local warehouses in big non-European markets.

At least in Europe they have a 3 week return policy- no questions asked, which also applies to the few non EU countries.

I bought some small Genelecs and the Neumann KH80 (for my office) and the Neumann KH750 plus some audio interfaces, mics and smaller stuff.
I returned the Genelecs without a problem. (Just don’t abuse it as we would all pay in the end).
 

Avp1

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I am building my first system where I am going to stream music from my computer to a streamer (likely Bluesound Node) and connect it to the speakers both in my office and in another room.

One of my first dilemmas is getting high quality speakers that can reproduce 24/192 sound (or at least 24/96) with high fidelity, mostly classical music, including vocals, but also be capable of high volume output (current room size is 13.5 x 20.5 ft). I have been considering KEF LS50 II, but according to a review linked on this forum, that speaker might not have a high output. Review says it's 90dB max at 13ft (4m).

My question is what speakers can I get that produce both accurate sound and also have high output? I'd prefer active speakers, but can consider passive with an amp (don't have an amp currently). The budget is under $3000, but can go a bit higher if it will make a big difference. Also would prefer bookshelf rather than floor standing speakers.

Budget is too low for what you expect to achieve. There is no workaround for that. If you want to get average sound level of 90dB at listening position, then speaker should be able to produce at least 105dB clean peak under same conditions. Realistically you need to look at price range of $8000-10000. Active speakers brands were already mentioned above (KH, Genelec, likely Focal). But you will have to look at mid-field models, which are 2-3 times more expensive than your budget. You may also consider active Kef LS60, if cosmetics is important. From passive I would look at used B&W 802D2. But you will also need proper amplifier, like used Bryston 4bsst2 for the total cost of $10K. Bookshelf speakers along with stands will occupy the same area as floorstaing ones, but will never get you deep bass due to being too small for that. Some bookshelf speakers are actually bigger than floorstanders.
 
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Sokel

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If I'm not mistaken OP goes for high output at 4 meters.
Neumann states max 100db C at 2.3 meters for a pair full range for the 150's (I already posted the screenshot)

Do you know what's the output at 4 meters?
Do you consider that enough after what we have seen about peaks even at 75db average listening???
Do your math for once,there's no solution one-fits-all for everything!
 

ZolaIII

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@Avp1 there are cheap two way pasive speakers that using influence of room and large back port's right placed can go all the way down to 20 Hz in small to medium sized rooms. Of course bass quality won't be best and they can't play on ear blinding loudness levels doing so much. An example of such:
Q_Acoustics_3030i_im_Raum.jpg

Interesting enough anechoic chamber measurements of such cancel all the port and room influences at list in case of those and you get a closed port measured response.
I have those and use them with port's closed and two closed enclosure sub's as after all quality of response is priority (C50 to ISO 3382-1 early-to-late arriving sound energy) at least for me. To some people every budget is too low but such rarely improve anything after spending a lot of money.
 

Avp1

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If I'm not mistaken OP goes for high output at 4 meters.
Neumann states max 100db C at 2.3 meters for a pair full range for the 150's (I already posted the screenshot)

Do you know what's the output at 4 meters?
Do you consider that enough after what we have seen about peaks even at 75db average listening???
Do your math for once,there's no solution one-fits-all for everything!
75dB is too low. Noise level is likely around 40dB. Unless this is background music, 90dB at listening seat should be a target.with peaks 15dB above that. From Newman range KH420 is a contender speaker for this use, unless he plans to use subs.
 

Avp1

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@Avp1 there are cheap two way pasive speakers that using influence of room and large back port's right placed can go all the way down to 20 Hz in small to medium sized rooms. Of course bass quality won't be best and they can't play on ear blinding loudness levels doing so much. An example of such:
View attachment 273132
Interesting enough anechoic chamber measurements of such cancel all the port and room influences at list in case of those and you get a closed port measured response.
I have those and use them with port's closed and two closed enclosure sub's as after all quality of response is priority (C50 to ISO 3382-1 early-to-late arriving sound energy) at least for me. To some people every budget is too low but such rarely improve anything after spending a lot of money.

Two ways is no go for classical orchestra. You do not want a hole in midrange or wild phase swings. And you are right - if you use room resonances, you can have higher bass level, but this will be "one note" bass.
 

Sokel

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75dB is too low. Noise level is likely around 40dB. Unless this is background music, 90dB at listening seat should be a target.with peaks 15dB above that. From Newman range KH420 is a contender speaker for this use, unless he plans to use subs.
Yep.
In a thread some time ago this is what REW's SPL logger looks like for the beautiful classical Má Vlast: Vltava:


Vltava.PNG


Peaks are north of 110db (Z) at my measurement but everyone can translate that by only looking at the difference and adjust it accordingly.
 
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