Are studio monitors a better buy than passive hifi speakers?

[olds1959special]

Studio monitors with built-in optimized amps seem to cost less than buying passive speakers plus and amp. If serious music listeners are going for hearing it "like the engineer intended," what could be better than using studio monitors? And on the higher end of the scale you have speakers like Genelec SAM that can automatically calibrate the EQ for your room. Are products made for the pro market a better value than those made for home listening?

 

[kharan]

Studio monitors with built-in optimized amps seem to cost less than buying passive speakers plus and amp. If serious music listeners are going for hearing it "like the engineer intended," what could be better than using studio monitors? And on the higher end of the scale you have speakers like Genelec SAM that can automatically calibrate the EQ for your room. Are products made for the pro market a better value than those made for home listening?

No, there aren't serious amplification benefits for active amplification in the context of home audio, there may be some edge cases, but most of the time amplification is a solved issue.

There are advantages to active speakers, but they mostly reside in making the crossover as part of a DSP chain, and that often results into designs that integrate active amplification, but the advantage isn't optimised amps.

 

[Deleted member 89782]

I don‘t think that studio monitors are active for quality but for the ease of integration into the studio.
They certainly have their advantages in many applications. In a main system in a living room I don‘t see that though. Actives require require even more wiring than passive speakers.

 

[DVDdoug]

Are studio monitors a better buy than passive speakers?

Some are, some aren't. They both have the same job of reproducing the sound accurately. I think it was Floyd Tool who said the main difference with studio monitors is that they are designed to be played very loudly and reliably 24/7.

There are theoretical advantages to active speakers/monitors. The main thing is that EQ can be built-in to improve-flatten frequency response to perform better than the same speaker built as a passive model. But there is a cost to that and when economics and cost are involved there are trade-offs and something else has to give. Of course EQ can be done externally too, while taking room acoustics-measurements into account.

There are a lot "small cheap monitors" mostly sold to people with bedroom studios. Make a small active speaker without a grill and it's magically a "monitor".

 

[EERecordist]

The greatest improvement in a home environment is room conditioning. Pro speakers are designed to find flaws in tracking and mixing. I like that, some do not. Active speakers have a lot of advantages. Long term maintainability/service is lacking. It's a Hobbesian bargain. As for "better buy" you can look at resale value, and even buy used,

 

[Somafunk]

I don’t see the point in ever using anything other than active monitors/speakers,

 

[Bleib]

Read tests on some of the so called pro stuff, it's certainly not all great. And if the speakers are great then the amp inside might not be the best either, some have hissing sound

 

[olds1959special]

Read tests on some of the so called pro stuff, it's certainly not all great. And if the speakers are great then the amp inside might not be the best either, some have hissing sound

Mine have a slight hissing sound, but it's not loud enough to be an issue unless on the medium or high gain settings.

 

[olds1959special]

Pro speakers are designed to find flaws in tracking and mixing. I like that, some do not.

I like this too!

 

[Bleib]

Mine have a slight hissing sound, but it's not loud enough to be an issue unless on the medium or high gain settings.

If it's Dynaudio BM5A Mk2. So it's even version 2. They should have placed a cleaner amp inside it. My Denon AVR 1800h has 7 channels and has no hissing whatsoever (with normal sensitivity speakers). I paid 440 euro for it.

 

[olds1959special]

I think it was Floyd Tool who said the main difference with studio monitors is that they are designed to be played very loudly and reliably 24/7.

I want my home speakers to play very loudly and reliably 24/7 too!

 

[RexrothPigeon]

Bruno Putzeys sure thinks so:

Active Speakers—The Second Wave, by Bruno Putzeys, Part 1 of 2

What can active speakers do that passive ones can’t? Impulse response, impulse response, impulse response, says Bruno Putzeys. That, and their sheer practicality, makes them the wave of the future.

pmamagazine.org

Active Speakers—The Second Wave, by Bruno Putzeys, Part 2 of 2

Bruno Putzeys concludes his two-part series that explains why active speakers are inherently better than passive ones.

pmamagazine.org

We’ve identified several techniques that become possible when a speaker is made active—many of which improve transient response across different frequency ranges, for different reasons:

• Sealed cabinets become viable, delivering tighter, more tuneful bass.
• DSP can correct the phase shifts introduced by crossover filters, yielding an electrostat-like transient response out of a multiway speaker. The sound becomes extraordinarily light on its feet, with more precise timing and more powerful “slam”—all at once.
• Directivity control mitigates the influence of room acoustics. Bass and lower midrange become much more highly resolved.

The remaining benefits contribute to a smaller, more practical design that more people can use and enjoy.

 

[olds1959special]

If it's Dynaudio BM5A Mk2. So it's even version 2. They should have placed a cleaner amp inside it. My Denon AVR 1800h has 7 channels and has no hissing whatsoever (with normal sensitivity speakers). I paid 440 euro for it.

I wonder if they fixed it in the Mk3 version. These are older now and use class D amps that have gotten better in recent years. The hissing is basically a non-issue because it's so quiet on the low gain setting and they get plenty loud in my setup.

 

[Rick63]

I've had the Sweetwater exclusive BM5 MKIIIs for 2 years and I absolutely love them. I have never heard the MKIIs to compare, but the MKIII has very low hiss. Much less than the JBL and Kali Audio monitors I've owned. Personally, I think they are a good value at $1k pr.

I originally mated them with a Topping DX3 Pro, and recently swapped it out for the not so good measuring Yamaha RX-V6A via its front preouts and I haven't noticed any difference in sound or hiss. I also have an RSL Speedwoofer 10S MKII and what a great pairing!!

 

[olds1959special]

I've had the Sweetwater exclusive BM5 MKIIIs for 2 years and I absolutely love them. I have never heard the MKIIs to compare, but the MKIII has very low hiss. Much less than the JBL and Kali Audio monitors I've owned. Personally, I think they are a good value at $1k.

I originally mated them with a Topping DX3 Pro, and recently swapped it out for the not so good measuring Yamaha RX-V6A via its front preouts and I haven't noticed any difference in sound or hiss. I also have an RSL Speedwoofer 10S MKII and what a great pairing!!
View attachment 478974

View attachment 478972

Nice! I'm lovin' my Mk2's with the BM9S sub and I use the 80 Hz high pass on the sub (sub connects to speakers) and run the speakers full-range. Mine are the rare "I ripped off the outer covering and rubbed a wax coating on the mdf" finish. They actually look really nice this way. I use an Apogee Duet 3 as a source since I don't need a remote control for the volume and it's for a computer setup.

 

[Palladium]

From my limited experience, yes.

 

[Pearljam5000]

If hi fi "audiophile" speakers were better I assume the professionals would have used them in the studio instead of the pro studio monitors
Actually Abbey Road Studios use the B&Ws but I don't know of many other studios that do the same

 

[Bleib]

If hi fi "audiophile" speakers were better I assume the professionals would have used them in the studio instead of the pro studio monitors
Actually Abbey Road Studios use the B&Ws but I don't know of many other studios that do the same View attachment 479009View attachment 479010View attachment 479011

Ok, so are they actually very audiophile, like a proper frequency response? I've seen quite a lot of tests on B&W and they too come short despite high prices.
During the 80s a Yamaha monitor was often used and it had this frequency response:

Yamaha NS-10M Studio Speaker Review

Yamaha NS-10M Studio Review

www.erinsaudiocorner.com

Quite rubbish

Edit: The 801 D4 Signature from Stereophile measurements

Not exactly sure what they use at Abbey but this is not stellar in terms of neutrality

So, it's worth repeating. Amir has tested some pro-gear here on ASR, a lot of them are not great. And quite a bit are made for near field listening, not something you'd want in the living room.

 

[dfuller]

I don‘t think that studio monitors are active for quality but for the ease of integration into the studio.
They certainly have their advantages in many applications. In a main system in a living room I don‘t see that though. Actives require require even more wiring than passive speakers.

It's both, really. Active confers meaningful advantages - no damping factor loss from the crossover, no ferrous-core inductors to saturate, more precisely matched filters (easily trimmable at factory to very tight tolerances, too). Plus you have the advantage of being able to run a bunch of EQ as part of the crossover.

 

[skankhobag]

A few thoughts;

• While there are a lot of dubious monitor designs for the “semi-pro” market, once you start spending the type of money a real studio would on active monitors, Return On Investment is a big consideration. Flowery marketing terms and snake oil isn’t going to sway a veteran engineer’s buying decisions.

With that in mind, real, professional monitors will, in general, offer the best sound quality for your money. Like with any speaker, though, proper acoustical design of the listening room is paramount to attain the best sound from your system.

• Really good active monitors are made to be used 12+ hours every day of the year. If you think they’re going to use cheap amplifiers in pro speakers that cost $10k/pair, you haven’t given much thought to how a company needs to build a reputation in the pro market.

• The latest trend is to not only offer fully DSP optimized performance of the speakers, but also integrate full room correction into it as well. You only use a computer for initial setup.

• Given the last point, your in-room performance can be as perfect as is technically possible today. Also, the monitor’s phase and frequency response can be very close to perfect.

• Some monitors incorporate optimized cardioid response which makes placement in room even easier

• Pro monitors offer extra features such as being software upgradable and multiple digital inputs

• People forget that passive crossovers trim 3-6dB off the speaker’s efficiency. That’s a huge waste of amp power. That means that at least 50% of the power sent to the speaker is wasted in heat dissipation by the crossover. That’s why big, multi-way tower speakers generally need a lot of power to perform at their best.