Genelec specs are actually more conservative than they look, so "written by PR department" is barking up the wrong tree.
Show me a measure of peak level that can't be discussed. Even electrical peak level of time-variant signals isn't readily definable, and then we add transducers and a room. The "peak level" spec is there partly for a reader to understand how "short term" SPL is not peak.
Considering "short term" and "long term" specs, they are anechoic measurements, and a conservative room gain is added, based on directivity, to estimate half space. We only use 1-2 dB to estimate half space where others may apply 6 dB.
Thanks for confirming that these are accurate specs and not a PR fantasy. I've mentioned already that I understand the specs to be very accurate.
Perhaps I'm not Genelec's intended customer base but, firstly, I would like to know the speaker's capacity under anechoic conditions so that I can translate that into data about my own listening environment.
Secondly and more importantly, I'd like to know the speaker's capacity where it's at its weakest, i.e. (1) in the bass and (2) in the frequency band above which it would be crossed to a subwoofer. This information is unclear in the specs Genelec publishes because the figures are all averaged across a wide bandwidth (100Hz-3kHz). Although accurate, this is not useful as far as I'm concerned.
If you need a speaker than can produce X decibels under given conditions (either short or long term) when crosses to a sub, for example, you need a speaker that can do that in the 100-300Hz range. It won’t matter that it can do better than that 500-3000Hz if it can’t do it across the whole band (and especially not given the typical spectrum of music).
Anyway, please take this as feedback rather than criticism. I appreciate that Genelec at least gives accurate/conservative information in the specs you do provide, and that you provide a lot more detail than most other manufacturers.