Focal Aria 906 Speaker Review

[daftcombo]

I don't read polish but here are some other (basic) measurements.
Interestingly, they also measured the 948 , the 936 and the 926.

Thanks a lot! Never seen measurements of the 926 before.

Those bigger brothers are less flat, especially with bass bumps. No wonder with all those woofers!

 

[Matias]

No.
It uses Flax fibres. Flax is a plant and the fibres from the stem have been used as a natural structural material fo centuries in rope and string. It is an ecological alternative to glass in fibre reinforced composites, ie a fibre structure in a resin matrix.
It is widely used in recyclable composites in the European car industry.
I looked into using it in place of fibreglass in racing car bodywork (which is why I know a bit about it).
The alternative would be composite glass or kevlar fibre cones.
The fibres are not extracted from the flax seeds that some people eat, or at least not until after it germinates, the plant grows and the seed is long gone..

Thanks, I did not know that. I also read the description below too. The things we learn in ASR.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flax

 

[thewas]

For anechoic purposes yes.

For living rooms, at least in my room, I have found it to be ~4dB. I still use 3dB for quick calculations as it’s easier to say that doubling distance is the same as halving wattage.

For a spherical soundwave (like usually low frequencies) its 6 dB and for a cylindrical one 3 dB, which can happen for example when you are in the nearfield of a line array, a reason they arrays are so popular at PA events as there is not so large SPL difference between the front and rear places (plus also the reduction of ground reflections).

 

[AudioSceptic]

I just noticed, these appear to measure better than the JBL 705p and with this sale price you get a pair of speakers for the price of a single 705p unit. That's a steal

The JBL is a powered speaker, so you have to factor in an amp for the Focal.

 

[BDWoody]

The JBL is a powered speaker, so you have to factor in an amp for the Focal.

And a DAC. It has digital and analog inputs...plus internal preset and custom filter settings...and they can be had for $500 each.

 

[AudioSceptic]

And a DAC. It has digital and analog inputs...plus internal preset and custom filter settings...and they can be had for $500 each.

Good point, I missed that, although quite a few integrated amps include DACs these days.

 

[QMuse]

The broad bump in the midrange seems it would be troublesome. With our discussion on the Buchardt S400 high-Q midrange peak getting a lot of attention in your recent review, I would expect this speaker's wide-Q bump to be more noticeable to the ear. Luckily, I assume it can be EQ'd down rather easily.

Region between 600Hz and 4kHz can indeed be efectivelly EQ-ed but the 4kHz-14khz dip in LW is best left untouched as correcting it would push ER and SP too high. Luckilly that one doesn't look problematic with estimated in-room response.

 

[Ron Texas]

https://www.accessories4less.com/ma...way-bookshelf-speaker-piano-black-each/1.html
$900 for a pair in sexy piano black.

 

[napilopez]

There seem to be at least 3 people here who subjectively prefer the Focal Aria 906 / Chora 806 to the Kef R3 even though @edechamps calculations show that according to the preference score there should be nearly a 90% (0.9 difference) chance the R3 is preferred. I know 3 people is not necessarily statistically significant but has this discrepancy been discussed somewhere on the forum already?

Yes, the most likely candidate, at least for me and @VintageFlanker, seems to be wider directivity. The From 2k to 10kHZ, which I consider to be roughly the most critical region for the impression of a wide soundstage, the inverted dome tweeter simply leads to wider directivity than almost anything else in the market. Most speakers with 1 inch tweeters sans waveguides start to beam around 6kHz, while Focals tweeter keeps directivity wide until 10kHz.

Polar maps kind of give me a headache, but it's easy to see with SPL plots. Here's the R3:

And Here's the Chora 806:

The two speakers have similar directivity up to 2kHz, but after that the chora maintains much more energy. By 7ish kHz ay 75 degrees the Chora is down like 7 dB, the R3 is down like 14. The lines are more tightly spaced with the chora and while they are less 'pretty' there's some evidence to suggest some people will prefer a less even wide directivity sound to a perfectly even off axis narrower sound.

Do keep in mind I personally have usually qualified my preference for the Chora by saying at least when crossed with a sub. I'm less confident I'd prefer the Chora over the R3 without one as the latter just digs so deep into the bass for a bookshelf.

 

[VintageFlanker]

https://www.accessories4less.com/ma...way-bookshelf-speaker-piano-black-each/1.html
$900 for a pair in sexy piano black.

As far as I'm concerned, I won't buy piano black finish never ever again. Pretty damn good looking, but on the other hand: just horrid dust/micro-scratches magnet, whatever how much you take care of it (with mircofiber or so)...

But I have to admit: Focal nails industrial design with piano black and S900 stands (also love mine with the grilles on):

There seem to be at least 3 people here who subjectively prefer the Focal Aria 906 / Chora 806 to the Kef R3 even though @edechamps calculations show that according to the preference score there should be nearly a 90% (0.9 difference) chance the R3 is preferred.

Yes, the most likely candidate, at least for me and @VintageFlanker, seems to be wider directivity.

For sure! Don't kow how I will deal with Evoke 20, which seems to be not as consistent as 906S Of-Axis...

I still have no doubt about the R3 being a better performer in most areas (FR, imaging, power handling, lower bass output). But at the end of the day: it comes to personnal preferences and room-dependence. I just enjoyed the 906s more: warmer, smoother, wider. That's about it.

Speaking of the Evoke...

From AUDIO (DE):

906s:

Evoke 20s:

From Audio PL:

906s:

Evoke 20s:

(Black trace is with grilles on. Bass curve for Evoke is with and without port plug)

 

[maty]

KEF R3 and Focal Aria 906 need EQ.

If you add a subwoofer(s) in the equation, Focal Aria 906 seems very interesting.

 

[napilopez]

As far as I'm concerned, I won't buy piano black finish never ever again. Pretty damn good looking, but on the other end: just horrid dust/micro-scratches magnet, whatever how much you take care of it (with mircofiber or so)...

But I have to admit: Focal nails industrial design with piano black and S900 stands (also love mine with the grilles on):

View attachment 69044



For sure! Don't kow how I will deal with Evoke 20, which seems to be not as consistent as 906S Of-Axis...

I still have do doubt about the R3 being a better performer in most areas (FR, imaging, power handling, lower bass output). But at the end of the day: it comes to personnal preferences and room-dependence. I just enjoyed the 906s more: warmer, smoother, wider. That's about it.

From AUDIO (DE):

906s:View attachment 69050

Evoke 20s:
View attachment 69051

From Audio PL:

906s:
View attachment 69052

Evoke 20s:
View attachment 69053

(Black trace is with grilles on. Bass curve for Evoke is with and without port plug)

Also keep in mind @Eetu that the R3 has pesky 1K dip that's present on the majority of R3 measurements available, but not present in Amir's R3 for whatever reason.

With my measurements, the preference score sans LFX for the R3 is a 7.8 vs a 7.7 for the Chora, 7.8 for both if you use the listening window instead of the on-axis. My data of course is not anechoic, but it at least suggests that for the specific samples I tested and heard, it's not at all unreasonable I'd have preferred the Chora.

 

[tomstoll]

@amirm is your reference track list published somewhere? i tried searching the forums but maybe i missed it

 

[Ron Texas]

@VintageFlanker finish is completely a matter of taste. I'm happy with piano black on my LS50's. Besides, it avoids cutting down beautiful walnut trees. As for R3 vs 906, again it's budget and taste. The science behind it is good, but I wouldn't go overboard over the R3's preference index.

 

[VintageFlanker]

Besides, it avoids cutting down beautiful walnut trees.

Don't worry about that: the "Dark Walnut" finish on 906s is nothing but vinyl!

But, there's also some "Prime Walnut" finish, which is claimed to be real wood:

 

[vavan]

@amirm is your reference track list published somewhere? i tried searching the forums but maybe i missed it

iirc asked at least couple of times to no avail

 

[GelbeMusik]

When measuring the harmonic distortion, ... remain within acceptable limits.

Of course, since the harmonic content is way off human perception frequency wise. One could be concerned about the generating process taking away from the energy, but that's again not valid, because the distortion rise is due to exceeding efficiency

Ja, there's a lot of confusion. Not so much of an anecdote, but related:

I've got tweeters with badly rising HD4 at about 3kHz. Question is, would I hear that, because the HD product it's somewhere at the edge of humanly perceptible frequency range: 12kHz.

Sure, because the mechanism that produces the HD also generates intermodulation. So I designed a critical signal, and there they were. IM were at least 4 times higher in level as with another driver. A full spectrum of shiit contaminated my air. Crackling, rough, crying sharp, just awful.

Such is not: "not" to be expected with these spikes from far away resonances. They do not: "not" copy down into the audible band.

Two measures are available, to save Your day. (1) do the IM test (2) mostly bad behavior culminates at some frequency, so that HD2 / HD3 / HD4 etc peak at the same frequency; in the far less critical case the HDx peaks appear all at different frequencies

 

[stren]

Thanks Amir - I've been super interested to see data on the focals. I heard the sopra 1's once in store and they were beautiful. I was wondering how well the hand off between the 6.5" driver and that tweeter would go, and given that the same drivers are reused in the towers that seems extra important to get right. Interestingly though yet again despite the same drivers the crossover frequency is different in the towers- 2.4Khz in the 926 vs 2.8KHz in the 906. Does anyone know why this would be? My guess is that the 926 has the budget for a more expensive crossover design - perhaps higher order? It always makes me wonder if things will improve or get worse on the tower.

 

[Aerith Gainsborough]

True: only 65 Hz at -3 dB. Very few with 6 1/2" and bass-reflex!

Hmm in room with Dirac doing it's thing according to REW mine fall off the cliff at 36Hz. And boy what a cliff it is: -15dB @ 30Hz.
I wonder whether that measurement is accurate in practical use or whether I need to take it with a lump of salt, considering that during real music the driver has to do more than render a single frequency.

Any thoughts?

As far as I'm concerned, I won't buy piano black finish never ever again. Pretty damn good looking, but on the other end: just horrid dust/micro-scratches magnet, whatever how much you take care of it (with mircofiber or so)...

I suspected as much which is why I went with the dark brown "noyer" version, despite liking the looks of the black ones. High gloss surfaces are always problematic in real life use. Esp when the sun comes into play. These glass plates are a menace, I swear I dusted them off just 2 minutes ago! ._.

 

[VintageFlanker]

These glass plates are a menace, I swear I dusted them off just 2 minutes ago! ._.

I swear I believe you!