Hello everyone. Complete amateur when it comes to audio equipment here.
Trained musician, just looking for accurate and honest pair of studio monitors for classical music critical listening.
If you think I could get a pair of great passive speakers for that price, I am open to suggestions.
The models I read about:
Focal Alpha 65
Presonus Eris 7 xt and 8 xt
Mackie MR624 and MR824
Adam Audio T5V and T7V
Tannoy Gold 7 and 8
Thank you in advance! Looking forward to your suggestions.
+1 for the 8" mid-woofers.
I happend to own/used to own some of the monitors you have listed.
Focal Alpha 65. I wanted to like them as they were nicely built nearfields but the sound, natively, was not ok. They had bit muffled mids and the low end was not right to my ears. I do not know if there are any measurements for those.
Presonus Eris 8. I own some of their gear and i have a respect for Presonus as they are making great value for money gear, i 've recently switched to their DAW and i find it great, especially for the price, considering the price pro-tools sells for.
The problem with the Eris was that -even though the local distributor sent me two separate pairs- they had a loud and annoying hissing from the HF amp chip. If you are looking for those, audition them in a store, not all make the same hiss as the chip internal noise has some tolerance, and make sure you buy the exact same pair that you have listened. I did not have that luxury. Even though the two of the four i had in my hands were undoubtly less noisy, the hiss was still annoying.
Mackie MR624/824. I still have both of them (i am listening from the 624's while i am writing this). I just love them. They are good for Near field use and MR824 are also good as midfields. I use the 824's on a treated home studio room L:10m x W: 6m x H: 3.5 m along with a pair of KS Digital A200 -as mains-. I bought them three years ago and even though i do not switch them off when they are idle, are still good (always a bit hot on the backplate though). For 400e (824s) you can have really decent speakers.
The 824's were measured by a German pro-audio magazine. Search the forum, i think someone provided the link.
Adam T5. They are excellent for nearfield, they measure well, they need a subwoofer to go low, they are good for nearfield (again!)
I keep a pair of those for nearfileds as i trully like them.
Longevity. Well this is a factor to concern at this price range. You will never know where every manufacturer will cut corners to reach the lower price. Do not expect to have the same quality for Speakers+Amplifiers+DSP with Genelecs, Adam S series, KS, or Neuman. They need to cut corners be it the quality/implementation/power of the amps, the passives (switches, connectors etc). Not saying that you will not find good 500e speakers -already proposed the Mackies-, all i am saying is that at a price range of 5K for my KSD's you are expecting to buy not only features, but serious built quality and top quality control.
I trust that both the Mackies and the Adams will last me for at least 5+(?) years !!!
Frankly the nicest sound you will hear is after treating your room and using compensation software. People here are proposing Room EQ Wizard as it is free and very powerful, or Dirac. I use sonarworks as i am lazy and it is cheaper than Dirac.
As it was mentioned before, try to buy locally -if u can nowadays, i can't-. I know Thomann and Musik Produktiv are convenient but nothing like the personal involvement and interaction you have in a physical store.