理性派HiFi X5 Speaker Review

[Talisman]

Chinese producers really need to review their design choices.
That woofer and that tweeter are good together like the cabbage with ice cream

 

[Cars-N-Cans]

Patent law is a LAW. It has nothing to do with social respect to principals of whatever. Sadly, CCP does not even respect the law they themself make. That is the problem.

One aspect to having principals is, you know, following the law

 

[Cars-N-Cans]

He did not design that horn speaker. As someone mentioned before, Lei Gu designed that one.
Here: https://www.zhihu.com/people/94f35d50c3837dd71321e09b4b112041

Post #49 seems to indicate he was a former employee of Harman, though. A thumb drive before hitting the exit interview is all that's needed to reproduce it.

 

[Berwhale]

But behind the scenes its common for that IP to have been stolen. It happens all the time, so its more "innovation" the way the Russians used to do it.

The analysis by ASPI relates to original research publications. Are you suggesting that all of this research was stollen from the US and published by Chinese academics before the US academics got a chance to publish it?

 

[sarieri]

Post #49 seems to indicate he was a former employee of Harman, though. A thumb drive before hitting the exit interview is all that's needed to reproduce it.

He claimed himself a former senior acoustic engineer of JBL Professional. I know this person is good at simulation. He gave out “Lectures” about simulations as well.

 

[badspeakerdesigner]

Whenever I see tweeters with poor response I struggle to get why. You can grab an off the shelf peerless tweeter like a bc25, toss it on a typical bookshelf baffle and bam, you should be able to achieve pretty dang linear on axis response. I'm not even a good speaker designer and I've made stuff much better than this for about the same price if not less.

 

[lilin]

It's the designer's response (Google Translate):

Someone asked me what I think of ASR's evaluation of the X5, and I did not evaluate it.
But we know who bought this speaker, so at the time, the test data and delivery information were specifically preserved. Because it is a desktop speaker, we will eventually conduct multi -angle tests on the desktop.Aside from low frequency interference, the test results of the intermediate frequency are different from ASR.
But why do I say that I do n’t evaluate, because it is indeed that ASR is unlikely that there is a problem in testing the data itself.This speaker was shipped half year ago, it is not clear what happened in the past six months, it is possible that the speakers are damaged during transportation. Because we will also check the box resonance. In the process of transportation to customers, there will be problems occasionally.
The more important thing is the NFS test instrument itself. I repeatedly reported to Klippel last year that they had the question of their test instruments, but I never got a positive answer. I will explain the problems of Klippel when I have time. (It's really busy recently)

Simply put, we have done more than ten tests and records before this speaker is shipped. Some of the problems in ASR tests did not exist at least when we shipped. Others have tested it, and there is no. As for what happened in the past six months, it is not clear. If there is a problem within seven days, we can return the goods without reason. But it has been a long time. If there is a problem, we can repair or exchange. If the detection is caused by human factors, we can repairs paid repairs.

 

[Gatordaddy]

Mods can y’all do something to curtail the anti Chinese speculation going on in this thread? This is one of the only audio websites I spend any time on because not every thread devolves into CCP paranoia.

 

[amirm]

Indeed. Please stop.

 

[somebodyelse]

Yes but is there IP on the waveguide profile? How extensive is it? Harman indicates they have been at least persuing it. And yes, reality will naturally dictate certain shapes to things since that is a natural byproduct of physics. But, is the profile a generic one like those on dome tweeters, or is it from, as someone indicated earlier, his prior work at Harman? There is a difference.

Read the fine patent linked above and make your judgement. To me it looks like a fine example of much that's wrong with the patent system - it covers a broad range of possible shapes without disclosing detail as to how to pick the beneficial ones from the poor ones, pretty much exactly counter to the original intent of a patent. The claims may or may not be valid as the examiner gets very limited time and scope to reject, but you'll need >$1M to take it to court to find out. Meanwhile we don't have enough info on the details of the profile to say whether it's a direct copy of the JBL or not. Given how broad the patent claims are there's a good chance it's covered, but the same probably applies to most if not all shapes ATH4 produces.

 

[amirm]

Fair enough, but its not anti-Chinese speculation, but rather lamenting their business practices.

Such topics are not review specific so please let's move on. Last thing we need is folks thinking the review is because we have some bias toward such companies.

 

[Cars-N-Cans]

Such topics are not review specific so please let's move on. Last thing we need is folks thinking the review is because we have some bias toward such companies.

Serious question: Do you still plan to do the tear-down? Given what we have seen from the outside re: the woofer, it might be a stone better left unturned if we want to not continue down this avenue as you say.

 

[amirm]

It's the designer's response (Google Translate):



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Thank you for bringing his comment and translation here. His defense though doesn't make sense to me. He talks about calibration, reliability, etc. yet all we have from him is an in-room measurement of some sample with zero detail, let alone calibration data. My standard answer to any challenge of my measurements is simple: bring your measurements showing different data. Words don't mean anything. Any company can complain and try to create doubt with words. Data is what we need and if the manufacturer believes in audio science, then he should have already have that. Indeed, if he had published such data, this review would not have occurred.

As to calibration of Klippel NFS, it doesn't need one. The computational aspect runs in software and on a computer which naturally doesn't age. The robotic movements are closed loop, i.e. the system knows if the device is moving to where it needs to, so that is OK too. The only thing left is the microphone. For that, we can look at another speaker measurement that was performed less than 3 months ago:

That is ruler flat response. No waviness as we see here.

As to sample damage in shipping, that is possible but I put that at the feet of the manufacturer. It is not like people get this speaker by picking it up in person. But sure, let's wait until I open it up to see what is going on inside.

 

[amirm]

Serious question: Do you still plan to do the tear-down? Given what we have seen from the outside re: the woofer, it might be a stone better left unturned if we want to not continue down this avenue as you say.

I don't mind discussions related to IP of the drivers, etc. after we have it. It is the broader discussion of the country and its policies that I prefer to not see.

 

[Cars-N-Cans]

I don't mind discussions related to IP of the drivers, etc. after we have it. It is the broader discussion of the country and its policies that I prefer to not see.

I would say in the future since this is bound to come up again when we see overseas manufacturer's products that might bear resemblances to their contemporary counterparts we may want to add a short blurb in the preamble to the review stating that to some effect its strictly to discuss the objective performance irrespective of any other qualities. This is not to be flippant, but invariably such discussions will end up going down this road due to someone needing justification for why something was said, or personal experiences, etc. and probably better to cross that bridge sooner rather than later collectively so we all agree

 

[NTK]

It's the designer's response (Google Translate):



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What the guy (鬼斧神工119) wrote didn't make sense. He said his AP and GRAS are calibrated annually. AP and GRAS make electronics and mics. Annual calibration for them is mostly formalities to satisfy contractual (i.e. legal) requirements, such as to maintain your ISO9000 certification. High quality measurement mics don't drift much unless you drop them onto the floor.

The crucial part that truly needs calibration is the anechoic chamber (or its surrogate). Amir's NFS measurements have been cross-checked with other people's measurements (e.g. Neumann KH80 DSP, Erin's Audio Corner, KEF's and Harman's published data, etc.). Klippel also provides a premeasured loudspeaker with each NFS for initial setup verification.

If calibration is such a big deal to this guy, why doesn't he show the low frequency calibration certification/documentation of the setup he used to produce these results?

[Edit] What are these graphs anyway? Are they showing FR at different angles? Were the 0, 15, 30, 45 degs curves all align on top of each other until after 15 kHz ?

 

[phoenixdogfan]

At $284 pr., this will be an absolute steal if they can find a way to fix that internal cabinet resonance. Prices on high end reproduction on all other products (DACs, Amps, even DSP) are approaching or already are at commodity levels. The one lagging component to date has the the audiophile speaker. Maybe that's about to dramatically change as well.

 

[Toni Mas]

Copying the Scanspeak Revelator slit paper cones at such a low price point demonstrates a very poor way of understanding the business, the typical chinese bazar way of life...

 

[Cars-N-Cans]

Copying the Scanspeak Revelator slit paper cones at such a low price point demonstrates a very poor way of understanding the business, the typical chinese bazar...

Since it potentially makes others to want to purchase these products, some have validly stated if we even should be reviewing these products here at ASR? I would say yes, but I at the time, and now, I think we need to state at the outset that such reviews are strictly for the purposes of objective evaluation of performance, and should not be used for anything beyond that. I too agree that steering business towards such companies is indeed very bad form, and bad for the industry as a whole due to the poor practices it encourages.

 

[Cars-N-Cans]

[Edit] What are these graphs anyway? Are they showing FR at different angles? Were the 0, 15, 30, 45 degs curves all align on top of each other until after 15 kHz ?

Yeah I noticed that, too. Almost like they are not actually gated or something. There should be more separation than what is seen, there.

Edit: FWIW here are the ones from my S55's, in which the tweeter is similar in its directivity to this speaker (pardon the diffraction ripple @ 5kHz from my cheap measurement mic):

As expected they do start to deviate above about 7-8kHz.