Any opinions on Genelec 8341a vs March Audio Sointuva?

[dasherzx]

The genelecs were in another league compared to the kefs, which isnt surprising as there is a big difference in price too.

Ah, I wondered if that's what it could be.

how much of an improvement percentage wise would you give coming from the march bookshelves? for my case i moved from the elac dbr62s to neumann 150s and that was definitely a 100% improvement. i then had a pair of kh310s which go abit lower and that was at best a 15% improvement.
im considering between the buchardt a700, march audio ukkonen or genelec 8361s for my living room

 

[Mutsu]

I didn't get chance to do a direct comparison in the same listening position, so it's hard to say.

I have the Genelec on my desk now due to them looking too tempting for my toddler to poke at. I'll continue to use the Sointuvas at my TV as I have a working setup again now.

My current sointovas are the none AWG version, Im waiting on receiving the AWG version.

But my impression between the 2 is that they both are close to equal give or take a couple of wins and losses in certain aspects on each side. I think the biggest difference subjectively speaking imo is the genelec have more impressive imaging, but the sointuva seems to have more clarity/refinement. They are both the best speakers I've heard, just they do sound different.

Im not sure I could get much improvement from either apart from room treatment or subs. I'll likely get a sub for the genelecs.

 

[Mutsu]

So I had a chance to listen to the 8341 at a Genelec experience center comparing it against 7350a and 7360a.

This was in a treated room, all level matched.

Unfortunately for me (because of price and space) the 7360a sounded noticeably flatter and controlled in overall response compared to the 7350a. Both subs made a noticeable difference in clarity to the 8341 when there was a lot going on in the music.

I also got to compare level matched digital vs analogue outputs from the RME ADI 2/4 Pro vs Genelec 9320 and takeaway was that the 9320 via analogue sounded noticeably worse than it's digital output. With the RME the difference was much less apparent. The 9320 vs ADI digital output required switched things around so was harder to tell and I was unsure, but the Genelec guy thought the RME sounded better.

Looks like I'll be getting the 7360a to pair with them based on this...

 

[oldmatee]

for what it's worth I was able to compare theGgenelec 8331s (no room correction enabled - apparently people want to hear them raw?!) with the Kef r3 meta. Room was moderately treated, and listing distance was 2m - 2.5m. My observations:

• listing to a solo acoustic instrumental music violin, flute etc, the genetics sounds much closer to the real thing than the R3s, in that the timbre and articulation were very accurate.
• On "big" tracks like symphonic music or prog rock, the genetics wern't able to keep up and these tracks took on a "muffled" character.

Overall I much preferred the Kefs. I guess this is why folks recommend the 8361, or 8341/8351 plus sub for mid field+ listening.

 

[Mutsu]

Yea I'd understand that.

At higher SPL I could hear some port whoofing on the 8341 at certain frequencies that became more obvious when cycling the sub on and off. That was at about 3m distance. I don't ever really listen at volumes that cause it at my listening position though and everything is still coherent with whatever song I throw at it.

 

[dfuller]

for what it's worth I was able to compare theGgenelec 8331s (no room correction enabled - apparently people want to hear them raw?!) with the Kef r3 meta. Room was moderately treated, and listing distance was 2m - 2.5m. My observations:

• listing to a solo acoustic instrumental music violin, flute etc, the genetics sounds much closer to the real thing than the R3s, in that the timbre and articulation were very accurate.
• On "big" tracks like symphonic music or prog rock, the genetics wern't able to keep up and these tracks took on a "muffled" character.

Overall I much preferred the Kefs. I guess this is why folks recommend the 8361, or 8341/8351 plus sub for mid field+ listening.

Yep - if there's anything relatively easy to critique with the Ones, they just do not have headroom until you get to the 8361s. At which point, you have to start considering the conventional stuff at that price point (S360s, KH420s, 1237s... you get the idea).

 

[Mutsu]

Received the 7360a sub to go with the 8341a and actually quite surprised how big of an improvement it's made not just to the bass depth and quality, but the perception of the mids and upper frequencies. When I demoed the 7360a at Genelec, I can't recall the difference with and without the sub to be such a huge improvement, an improvement, but not like I'm hearing at my home.

I'm guessing this is likely due to the Genelec room having pretty good acoustic treatment, so the sub had less troughs to fill in sub 100hz. I had a fairly significant one around 100hz and 50hz which the sub has mostly taken care of.

I was happy with the 8341a before - but now this is the best system I've listen to in my own home by quite a big margin.

Highly recommend pairing the 8341a with a sub even if they go as low as 35hz in your room, especially if you have dips below 100hz.

 

[srrxr71]

I ended up auditioning the 8341 and purchasing for my desktop setup based on it.

With the GLM correction, they are amazing. Going to a Genelec experience center next week to listen to them with a sub.

My measurements go as low as 35hz though so will have to see if it's worth it. I also only have space for one sub.

One stand out thing vs other speakers I've used is how natural the vocals sound. Which was a bad thing when listening to some of my own vocal recordings! Not sure what about how they measure is ticking that box for me though.

Congratulations! Now you can forget about buying any more audio stuff (except maybe a sub) for a decade at least. It was the best audio decision of my life.

 

[srrxr71]

Received the 7360a sub to go with the 8341a and actually quite surprised how big of an improvement it's made not just to the bass depth and quality, but the perception of the mids and upper frequencies. When I demoed the 7360a at Genelec, I can't recall the difference with and without the sub to be such a huge improvement, an improvement, but not like I'm hearing at my home.

I'm guessing this is likely due to the Genelec room having pretty good acoustic treatment, so the sub had less troughs to fill in sub 100hz. I had a fairly significant one around 100hz and 50hz which the sub has mostly taken care of.

I was happy with the 8341a before - but now this is the best system I've listen to in my own home by quite a big margin.

Highly recommend pairing the 8341a with a sub even if they go as low as 35hz in your room, especially if you have dips below 100hz.

One other thing I started with 8341 and one 7360 off to one side. I felt it was better when adding another 7360 to the other side or probably just moving it to the middle would have done a similar thing. This is even when crossed at 80Hz. If at all possible try to center the sub.