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Buchardt A500 subjective review

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Instar

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Nice write-up @Instar, thanks :)

Do we know which woofers are used in this speaker? I would have hoped for slightly better bass performance from 2x 6” woofers. But other than that, and the very narrow vertical listening window, it looks like a quality design.

Also @Instar, how does the R3’s bass distortion performance compare to the A500, if you happen to have measured it under similar conditions (and notwithstanding that it rolls off much higher in frequency ofc)?

I don't know the details, but I heard you use a woofer unit that goes into Wilson's Audio.
R3's woofer unit is very good.
R3 plays in my room up to the early 30 Hz band (-10 db).
When the 25 hz band of R3 was boosted to Q factor : 2 by +10 db, the distortion was significantly lower than the A500.
Rather, I thought it would be better to boost the sub-low of R3 compared to the A500.
 

echopraxia

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Personally, I think you have to decide "are subjective reviews worth it at all?" If you believe they hold at least some value, they are naturally going to say things that don't jive with the measurements. People aren't precision instruments.
I think subjective reviews definitely have value, at least up to a certain threshold of absurdity. When I see long and elaborate prose describing how a $10k DAC vs a $5k DAC makes big audible improvement in the sound from fully digital active speakers (specifically the Genelec 8341’s in this case) vs just using digital inputs directly (which he describes as intentionally avoided), I consider that well beyond the territory of salvageable credibility.

I’d not be surprised if he gets 50% of his advise or so right (as the saying goes, a broken clock is correct twice a day), but I personally draw the line when any reviewer recommends people spend $10k on DACs for active digital speakers with non-bypassable DACs built in. That advise is just so utterly absurdly bad, that it can’t help but call into question the reliability of his other subjective impressions as well, IMO.
 
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andreasmaaan

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I don't know the details, but I heard you use a woofer unit that goes into Wilson's Audio.
R3's woofer unit is very good.
R3 plays in my room up to the early 30 Hz band (-10 db).
When the 25 hz band of R3 was boosted to Q factor : 2 by +10 db, the distortion was significantly lower than the A500.
Rather, I thought it would be better to boost the sub-low of R3 compared to the A500.

Thanks, very interesting :) I wonder why they chose those woofers for the A500...
 

AudioJester

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I think subjective reviews definitely have value, at least up to a certain threshold of absurdity. When I see long and elaborate prose describing how a $10k DAC vs a $5k DAC makes big audible improvement in the sound from fully digital active speakers (specifically the Genelec 8351B’s in this case) vs just using digital inputs directly (which he describes as intentionally avoided), I consider that well beyond the territory of salvageable credibility.

I’d not be surprised if he gets 50% of his advise or so right (as the saying goes, a broken clock is correct twice a day), but I personally draw the line when any reviewer recommends people spend $10k on DACs for active digital speakers with non-bypassable DACs built in. That advise is just so utterly absurdly bad, that it can’t help but call into question the reliability of his other subjective impressions as well, IMO.

You seem pretty hung up on this. Someone else pointed out to me on here that it is still worth doing dsp with vinyl as a source as ADC-DAC is pretty transparent these days. Not arguing the merits/faults of said dac, but a "flavoured/coloured" source is not negated by an active speaker??
 

echopraxia

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You seem pretty hung up on this. Someone else pointed out to me on here that it is still worth doing dsp with vinyl as a source as ADC-DAC is pretty transparent these days. Not arguing the merits/faults of said dac, but a "flavoured/coloured" source is not negated by an active speaker??
There is nothing wrong with DSP, including using it to flavor the sound to your taste. But it does not cost even $1k to accomplish this, let alone $10k. So it’s hard to read recommendations of any such $10k scam/snakeoil products as anything but advertisements.
 

AudioJester

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Ok, so your not a fan of the dac recommendation. Fair enough. I dont particularly like that dac or think there is much value in it either. I dont follow every recommendation either - just move on. There are lots of people though who do like the Chord Dave subjectively. Maybe its a recommendation they can relate to.
Its all subjective not a universal truth. People will make up their own minds.
"Terrible advice" - maybe to you, but not to others. Play the game not the man - feel free to disagree with the recommendation, but why so disparaging?

Oh, and to many of us there is a big difference between $10k and $50k. Some may wonder who was being deceitful......
 

echopraxia

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There are lots of people though who do like the Chord Dave subjectively. Maybe its a recommendation they can relate to.Its all subjective not a universal truth. People will make up their own minds.
"Terrible advice" - maybe to you, but not to others.
A site called “Audio Science Review” is not going to be very receptive to anti-scientific arguments like these, since this is firmly objectivist territory here. The debate of silly anti-scientific subjectivist claims like “to my ears, this audiophile USB cable really gave my bass more impact, and improved the PRaT dramatically!” is generally frowned upon here, because we know these claims about cables (and some claims about DACs) are nonsense placebo/nocebo effects. And yes, we know this objectively.

Thanks to Amir’s measurements, we also know objectively (to extremely high certainty) that you do not ever need to pay more than $1k or so for a provably audibly transparent DAC. But beyond that, we have the fact that Darko was recommending a $10k external DAC for a digital speaker, which will just be redigitizing the signal via internal ADC before anything is done with it. This completely defeats the purpose of a high end external DAC. With these active digital speakers, the objectively best way to connect it to the audio source (if you believe any audible difference exists at all) is via pure digital inputs (which Darko did not recommend).

And again, there’s nothing wrong with using DSP as well to flavor the sound to your liking. But since this can be achieved very inexpensively, it’s therefore objectively bad advise to convince people they need to buy a $10k product to achieve that — because this is wrong/incorrect.

I’m not saying subjectivist reviewers shouldn’t be free to recommend expensive snakeoil. But to the extent that they’re free to give objectively bad advice, we should be free to call it out as such.

Anyway, back to the original topic: subjective reviews can be helpful, but on these speakers I personally don’t lend much credibility to the ears of someone who thinks you should buy $10K DACs because: “DAVE’s tonal colour-burst is superior to both rivals but the DirectStream still gets the nod on tonal mass – it’s chunkier, chewier, meatier.”
 
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napilopez

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A site called “Audio Science Review” is not going to be very receptive to anti-scientific arguments like these, since this is firmly objectivist territory here. The debate of silly anti-scientific subjectivist claims like “to my ears, this audiophile USB cable really gave my bass more impact, and improved the PRaT dramatically!” is generally frowned upon here, because we know these claims about cables (and some claims about DACs) are nonsense placebo/nocebo effects. And yes, we know this objectively.

Thanks to Amir’s measurements, we also know objectively (to extremely high certainty) that you do not ever need to pay more than $1k or so for a provably audibly transparent DAC. But beyond that, we have the fact that Darko was recommending a $10k external DAC for a digital speaker, which will just be redigitizing the signal via internal ADC before anything is done with it. This completely defeats the purpose of a high end external DAC. With these active digital speakers, the objectively best way to connect it to the audio source (if you believe any audible difference exists at all) is via pure digital inputs (which Darko did not recommend).

And again, there’s nothing wrong with using DSP as well to flavor the sound to your liking. But since this can be achieved very inexpensively, it’s therefore objectively bad advise to convince people they need to buy a $10k product to achieve that — because this is wrong/incorrect.

I’m not saying subjectivist reviewers shouldn’t be free to recommend expensive snakeoil. But to the extent that they’re free to give objectively bad advice, we should be free to call it out as such.

Anyway, back to the original topic: subjective reviews can be helpful, but on these speakers I personally don’t lend much credibility to the ears of someone who thinks you should buy $10K DACs because: “DAVE’s tonal colour-burst is superior to both rivals but the DirectStream still gets the nod on tonal mass – it’s chunkier, chewier, meatier.”

So first, I agree completely with the DAC stuff. I just take a bit of issue with the idea that a direct subjective comparison of speakers is not worthwhile or "harmfully misleading" because of opinions on other components.

We all know people have a tendency to exaggerate or make up differences for things that perform similarly but look different, but I don't see how that applies to products that obviously sound different.

It seems most of us start out as subjectivists to some degree before we become objectivists, after all. Does the fact that I used to think I could hear a difference between two good DACs, even if I'm now certain I was wrong, mean my opinions on the different sounds between headphones/speakers were invalid as well?

Or from another perspective, of the couple of dozen speakers I've created measurements/spins for, the vast majority of the measurements have been performed after 2-4 weeks of listening. I outline or write most of the subjective portions of my reviews before I begin measurements. Not once, that I recall, have my subjective impressions been changed by the measurements. My subjective-only impressions of sound quality are arguably not much more valid than anyone else's, even if I'm more aware of the science.

As I said in another post, I think oftentimes where subjective reviewers get things wrong is in their value judgements -- is this $$$$ speaker really better than that $$ speaker? --- but I often find myself agreeing with the subjective impressions of sound characteristics (dullness in the midrange, bright highs, big soundstage, poor dynamics, etc). Measurements allow you to be more confident in those impressions, of course.
 
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q3cpma

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It seems most of us start out as subjectivists to some degree before we become objectivists, after all. Does the fact that I used to think I could hear a difference between two good DACs, even if I'm now certain I was wrong, mean my opinions on the different sounds between headphones/speakers were invalid as well?
It's a good question, as I'm sure there are lot of people here with a scientific background who never bought it fully.
 

napilopez

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It's a good question, as I'm sure there are lot of people here with a scientific background who never bought it fully.

Yeah, I think it's interesting. But you could consider that even double-blind tests are still subjective assessments. For example, the preference papers asked people to describe aspects of sound quality, and it's easy to see how these aspects correlate to the measurements (because, of course they should).

The question then becomes: are subjective impressions of sound characteristics changed significantly when listeners are sighted? We know that value judgements and rankings will change, but I'm not sure to what degree impressions of tonal balance/spatial performance change. I feel like there's some research I can point to for this but I can't recall where to look at the moment.
 

echopraxia

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So first, I agree completely with the DAC stuff. I just take a bit of issue with the idea that a direct subjective comparison of speakers is not worthwhile or "harmfully misleading" because of opinions on other components.

We all know people have a tendency to exaggerate or make up differences for things that perform similarly but look different, but I don't see how that applies to products that obviously sound different.

It seems most of us start out as subjectivists to some degree before we become objectivists, after all. Does the fact that I used to think I could hear a difference between two good DACs, even if I'm now certain I was wrong, mean my opinions on the different sounds between headphones/speakers were invalid as well?

Or from another perspective, of the couple of dozen speakers I've created measurements/spins for, the vast majority of the measurements have been performed after 2-4 weeks of listening. I outline or write most of the subjective portions of my reviews before I begin measurements. Not once, that I recall, have my subjective impressions been changed by the measurements. My subjective-only impressions of sound quality are arguably not much more valid than anyone else's, even if I'm more aware of the science.

As I said in another post, I think oftentimes where subjective reviewers get things wrong is in their value judgements -- is this $$$$ speaker really better than that $$ speaker? --- but I often find myself agreeing with the subjective impressions of sound characteristics (dullness in the midrange, bright highs, big soundstage, poor dynamics, etc). Measurements allow you to be more confident in those impressions, of course.
If Darko were to retract or correct former statements about DACs like this (even just by changing his position in recent reviews), my position on the trustworthiness of his reviews would change completely. We all say silly things in the past and even more so this is obvious for an author, as you point out.

So what matters to me is not whether someone once said a thing, but what their current position is. I could be wrong, but as far as I know Darko is still promoting the idea that $10k-$100k of DAC and amplifier gear is a worthwhile audiophile purchase. If he changes this position I’ll gladly change my position on whether I find his reviews to be trustworthy.
 

AudioJester

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The great irony in all this is that Darko concludes the Kef is better than the Buchardt in terms of value. Call it snakeoil salesmanship if you like - thats really scientific. Great objectivity here.

Anyway my concern with the Kefs is the bass response and that you need to crossover to subs well above 100hz. How do people do this in reality? Does the sub become audibly locatable?
I think I prefer the looks of the buchardt and like their hub concept as an all in one.
 

echopraxia

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The great irony in all this is that Darko concludes the Kef is better than the Buchardt in terms of value. Call it snakeoil salesmanship if you like - thats really scientific. Great objectivity here.
What is ironic? What did I say that lacks objectivity? Darko’s speaker preference here is completely irrelevant, and this is precisely the point we’re trying to make: Reviewers who continue to push snakeoil like $10k DACs (and worse) eventually lose our trust, to the point where their reviews (even on non-snakeoil products like these) lose most if not all value to us. There is no irony or lack of logical consistency or objectivity here as far as I can tell, but I certainly could be missing something I could learn, if you’re willing to elaborate.

To be clear, I’m neither disagreeing nor agreeing with Darko’s review of these speakers. A few of us just pointed out his lack of trustworthiness in general, which unfortunately triggered this off-topic debate.
 
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Adam Bernau

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Well, i don´t think that Darko is intentionally lying and deceiving his viewers, but it is obvious, that he is a believer, and he is also selling his beliefs to
his loyal crowd of other believers. I am also guessing, that there is much less (if any) money to be made from advertising of conservativelly designed and priced products, focused on transparency and measured parameters.
The best thing would just be to challenge him to blinded, and volume weighted comparing test, and let him guess the DAC sound qualities and prices again, but i don´t believe that he would agree with this challenge :)
 

AudioJester

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What is ironic? What did I say that lacks objectivity? Darko’s speaker preference here is completely irrelevant, and this is precisely the point we’re trying to make: Reviewers who continue to push snakeoil like $10k DACs (and worse) eventually lose our trust, to the point where their reviews (even on non-snakeoil products like these) lose most if not all value to us. There is no irony or lack of logical consistency or objectivity here as far as I can tell, but I certainly could be missing something I could learn, if you’re willing to elaborate.

To be clear, I’m neither disagreeing nor agreeing with Darko’s review of these speakers. A few of us just pointed out his lack of trustworthiness in general, which unfortunately triggered this off-topic debate.

You know, we actually probably have the same point of view here in regards to the gear being debated
.
My issue is people using objectivity/ASR to abuse not only other peoples subjective points of view but also their character. It makes us look bad.

No point arguing over a subjective review - its subjective!, surely you can use your objective perspective to understand this. Its one guys interpretation, not some universal truth and it is never portrayed as based on scientific fact. Disagree by all means, but keep out the vitriol.

Let me ask you, if Mr Darko said redheads were preferable to blondes would you call him untrustworthy and a liar?? (sarcasm)
 

Emlin

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You know, we actually probably have the same point of view here in regards to the gear being debated
.
My issue is people using objectivity/ASR to abuse not only other peoples subjective points of view but also their character. It makes us look bad.

No point arguing over a subjective review - its subjective!, surely you can use your objective perspective to understand this. Its one guys interpretation, not some universal truth and it is never portrayed as based on scientific fact. Disagree by all means, but keep out the vitriol.

Let me ask you, if Mr Darko said redheads were preferable to blondes would you call him untrustworthy and a liar?? (sarcasm)

I thought that we were pushing back at someone posting a Darko video on here as if it were evidence of something.
 

AudioJester

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I thought that we were pushing back at someone posting a Darko video on here as if it were evidence of something.

Seriously?? Evidence????
They even summarised it as "His opinion"

Edit: lol, this thread was started as a subjective review and clearly stated as such
 

Emlin

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Seriously?? Evidence????
They even summarised it as "His opinion"

Edit: lol, this thread was started as a subjective review and clearly stated as such

A subjectivist review with "detailed measurements."

There, detailed measurements and comparative listening were possible.


index.php


InRoom measurements / Brown : Buchardt A500, Purple : Genelec 8351B

index.php


Buchardt A500 THD

index.php


Genelec 8351B THD


As you can see, the A500's THD was too high.

Overall, THD is high.

In this part, I felt that the details of the low range were disappointing compared to when using the KEF R3 + SVS SB1000 Dual.

Of course, even though the distortion rate of THD in the low frequency band is high,

there are parts that are difficult for people to perceive, so it may be that people feel different.

But even taking that into account, the THD seems to be too high.

We also tried to measure the many master tunings the A500 boasts.



index.php



index.php

Basic master tuning (2.5 way 25hz)



index.php



index.php

Nearfield Studio tuning



index.php



index.php


3way tuning
 

napilopez

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If Darko were to retract or correct former statements about DACs like this (even just by changing his position in recent reviews), my position on the trustworthiness of his reviews would change completely. We all say silly things in the past and even more so this is obvious for an author, as you point out.

So what matters to me is not whether someone once said a thing, but what their current position is. I could be wrong, but as far as I know Darko is still promoting the idea that $10k-$100k of DAC and amplifier gear is a worthwhile audiophile purchase. If he changes this position I’ll gladly change my position on whether I find his reviews to be trustworthy.

I don't think you will agree with me on this, but my primary point is that his opinions on DACs really has nothing to do his assessment of speakers. To me they are barely related, even if they are both about audio. One doesn't really impact the other. You might as well be discussing his taste in food or whether New York or Italian pizza is better(New York Pizza is better, obviously, but don't sleep on connecticut).

When it comes to subjective reviews, they're just that:, subjective. Of the speakers I've overlapped with Amir, for instance, I don't find I agree with him any more than any other subjective reviewer -- even though we've gotten very similar measurements. And I don't mean whether something is good or bad -- I'm in general much more positive than amir -- but whether something is bright or dull, bassy, forward, wimpy, etc.

Of course, things are different once you factor in measurements, that's where the true objectivity comes in. But even then I often disagree with the interpretation of data.

Anyway, I don't mind anyone feeling one way or the other, but I do think it's an interesting to discussion to assess what subjective reviews should be like -- what constitutes a good subjective-only review.
 

richard12511

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A subjectivist review with "detailed measurements."

There, detailed measurements and comparative listening were possible.


index.php


InRoom measurements / Brown : Buchardt A500, Purple : Genelec 8351B

index.php


Buchardt A500 THD

index.php


Genelec 8351B THD


As you can see, the A500's THD was too high.

Overall, THD is high.

In this part, I felt that the details of the low range were disappointing compared to when using the KEF R3 + SVS SB1000 Dual.

Of course, even though the distortion rate of THD in the low frequency band is high,

there are parts that are difficult for people to perceive, so it may be that people feel different.

But even taking that into account, the THD seems to be too high.

We also tried to measure the many master tunings the A500 boasts.



index.php



index.php

Basic master tuning (2.5 way 25hz)



index.php



index.php

Nearfield Studio tuning



index.php



index.php


3way tuning

Frequency response looks a little bit worse, but not by very much. Distortion is worse, and my guess is that's somewhat - but not very - audible. Considering it's half the price of the Genelec, the A500 seems like a great value. Especially so when you consider all of it's DSP modes to spice things up when you feel like it.
 
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