Focal Celestee Review (Headphone)

[don'ttrustauthority]

It insane how Planar is killing it in the Mid priced area, It fun watching TOTL audiophile struggle to admit you can a lot of bargains for $350 these days.

As a TOTL audiophile, wtf are you talking about?

 

[don'ttrustauthority]

That's true, I wouldn't buy a headphone knowing it could have channel imbalance that bad....so it's a kinda practical moot point knowing whether or not equalising the channels would have improved Amir's listening experience. Would have been interesting from a technical exercise point of view though.

Then you should never buy any headphone ever again, any headphone sold at retail can be badly manufactured, damaged in shipping or any number of problems can occur. Focal tests all headphones so this probably happened after it left their shop.

 

[Rja4000]

@amirm
Naive question:
Would that be a lot of additional work to also check freq response with EQ ?

(Not for this one, obviously, but in the future)

 

[Rja4000]

Then you should never buy any headphone ever again, any headphone sold at retail can be badly manufactured, damaged in shipping or any number of problems can occur. Focal tests all headphones so this probably happened after it left their shop.

I wonder what the sample to sample variability is, in that area...

 

[mkawa]

@amirm
Naive question:
Would that be a lot of additional work to also check freq response with EQ ?

(Not for this one, obviously, but in the future)

probably. he runs EQ through roon, which is less than ideal for doing FR sweeps etc. stick with oratory's measurements for that data.

 

[don'ttrustauthority]

I wonder what the sample to sample variability is, in that area...

I think it's safe to assume (so yes, going out on a bit of a limb here) that since we rarely see that much variability in reviewed samples, it is outside their acceptable range. But who knows.

 

[don'ttrustauthority]

Sure, channel mismatch below 80Hz is barely acceptable at this price point. Still:
I beg to differ: K371 mismatch post-5Khz will be much more significant and audible.
.

You can't trust high frequency measurements on Amir's rig. I don't know why you would.

I wouldn't trust channel mismatch off of sampling one unit. Unless it was sent by the manufacturer. Even then, I'd ask for a second unit.

 

[Robbo99999]

Exactly.
We have a case where measurements are OK but experience is not.
So that would have helped to understand why and to emphasize what's important here.

Yeah, I agree with that in terms of it would have helped in our technical understanding of the headphone and how that relates to a listening impression (Amir's), although I probably wouldn't describe the measurements as "OK".......that channel mismatch for one, and I don't really like what's going on in the treble, too jagged for my taste (sharp peaks & dips).

Then you should never buy any headphone ever again, any headphone sold at retail can be badly manufactured, damaged in shipping or any number of problems can occur. Focal tests all headphones so this probably happened after it left their shop.

Sure there can be problems in manufacture & bad luck, but chances are that if a randomly picked headphone unit is measured of a particular model & it measures badly then the chances are high that it's the model of headphone that doesn't measure well or that they have a high variation between units, neither of which is worth the risk, so I'd skip poorly measuring headphones even if only based on one sample measured. You take the information you have and move on to make a choice, if there are better options you take them rather than dilly dallying on the off chance that it's an unrepresentative sample being measured. (Sure it makes sense though to compare measurements from different sources though, if they are the same measurement apparatus, eg GRAS......and in some cases you can interpret measurements done on other apparatus but that is more of a minefield to consider).

 

[Racheski]

You can't trust high frequency measurements on Amir's rig. I don't know why you would.

I don't know why you wouldn't.

I wouldn't trust channel mismatch off of sampling one unit. Unless it was sent by the manufacturer. Even then, I'd ask for a second unit.

I don't know why you wouldn't.

 

[don'ttrustauthority]

I don't know why you wouldn't.

I don't know why you wouldn't.

Because Amir said not to.

Regarding the second: respect. It's disrespectful to the manufacturer not to give them a chance to respond to something so obviously aberrational.

 

[VintageFlanker]

You can't trust high frequency measurements on Amir's rig. I don't know why you would.

I wouldn't trust channel mismatch off of sampling one unit. Unless it was sent by the manufacturer. Even then, I'd ask for a second unit.

I trust that your alias has been wisely chosen.

It's disrespectful to the manufacturer not to give them a chance to respond to something so obviously aberrational.

Absolutely nothing new there. Manufacturers had always been welcome to respond or send second units for re-measurements...

Not Amir's problem if they don't.

 

[don'ttrustauthority]

I trust that your alias has been wisely chosen.

fMaybe not. In the first instance, I'm repeating what the authority said about his own gear.

in the second, I'm saying to allow the corporation to dictate what Amir can publish.

how is that questioning authority?

 

[Racheski]

Because Amir said not to.

Regarding the second: respect. It's disrespectful to the manufacturer not to give them a chance to respond to something so obviously aberrational.

I know Amir has said not to trust high frequencies on prior reviews, but I don't see that here. Is that always applicable?

If a member sends in the gear, Amir has no responsibility to contact the manufacturer. If the manufacturer send in the gear for testing, then I agree.

Edit: OK I see where Amir says HF can be quite variable in this thread.

 

[VintageFlanker]

how is that questioning authority?

Indeed, I was more focused on the "Don't trust" part.

 

[Ron Texas]

$990 and it's just so-so. Thank you for warning us @amirm

 

[Racheski]

Also Headphones.com showed a channel imbalance as well

 

[don'ttrustauthority]

I know Amir has said not to trust high frequencies on prior reviews, but I don't see that here. Is that always applicable?

If a member sends in the gear, Amir has no responsibility to contact the manufacturer. If the manufacturer send in the gear for testing, then I agree.

The measurement unit is flawed at high frequencies. Read his 'explaining headphone measurements' for details.

I think Amir's site is more powerful than most of us appreciate. Schiit has seen a huge increase in sales, several times if I understand correctly. I have no doubt that Amir's first articles and the Schiit storm that ensued is responsible for 2x Schiit's sales from what they were before (other factors have had as big an impact).

When you have that big a potential market impact (won't happen here, Focal will ignore it as they're already a big fish), you should do the right thing and make certain that something that is OUTSIDE THE NORM of expected results would be checked.

I trust Focal not to be stupid enough to release such a headphone with such a channel imbalance.

 

[Racheski]

I trust Focal not to be stupid enough to release such a headphone with such a channel imbalance.

They built a headphone with chronic driver failures in the Elex. They are definitely stupid enough, or they just don't care.

 

[don'ttrustauthority]

I trust that your alias has been wisely chosen.
Absolutely nothing new there. Manufacturers had always been welcome to respond or send second units for re-measurements...

Not Amir's problem if they don't.

Not Amir's problem unless he wants to be scientific. When you have something that measures outside of manufacturer's spec, is it scientific to ignore that fact? I'm assuming without looking Focal would not sell a $1000 headphone with specifications that put channel imbalance at over _+2 db. Fine, I'll look. Wait here. They don't publish any specs within a frequency range.

I just think, knowing Focal makes their own drivers, this doesn't get sold by them. Not 5 db off at 20 hz.

 

[Robbo99999]

I know Amir has said not to trust high frequencies on prior reviews, but I don't see that here. Is that always applicable?

If a member sends in the gear, Amir has no responsibility to contact the manufacturer. If the manufacturer send in the gear for testing, then I agree.

Edit: OK I see where Amir says HF can be quite variable in this thread.

Regarding measurements at higher frequencies, they become less reliable & relevant the higher you go up the frequency bands - in the treble area. This is for a number of reasons. Firstly headphone position on your head (and also on the measurement device) can greatly affect high treble above 10kHz. Secondly, the differences between individuals (you & me) vary greater the higher the frequency goes, in terms of how a headphone interacts with your anatomy but also in HRTF differences. So all-in-all, the measurements become less useful, less reliable, and less repeatable the higher you go up the frequency range, which is why during EQ you don't want to use high Q (narrow) filters the higher you go up the frequency range. Up to 1kHz measurements really quite reliable & representative, measurements up to 5kHz still ok and representative but variation increasing, between 5-10kHz increasingly unreliable and therefore use low Q filters in EQ, above 10kHz really quite unreliable measurements & use very low Q filters and/or High Shelf Filters for EQ. That's how I'd characterise the situation.