This is a review, listening tests and detailed measurements of the Ascilab A6B Stand-mount speaker with Purifi woofer and passive radiators. I purchased this from the company. The US cost is $1,955 each. Price varies in different countries due to tariff, local taxes, etc.
Please excuse the tapes. They are holding the magnetic rings in for shipping. I plan to sell these speakers after review so wanted to keep them in as new condition. On that front:
NOTE: My company, testedaudio.com, is the exclusive distributor for Ascilab products in North America. While objective tests remain the same as for any other speaker, subjective remarks may have business bias.
The A6B manages to act serious and stately at the same time. The rounded corners and invisible fasteners give it an elegant look. And the solid weight, an impression of quality.
I am not a fan of the wrinkles in the Purifi woofer surrounds. However, in the A6B when seen in normal lighting, they mostly disappear so were not an issue for me. The review picture however, highlights them to the max.
Speaker has dual Purifi passive radiators on opposing sides and are a nice indicator of when the speaker is being pushed by their excursion.
The bottom of the speaker is lined with some kind of neoprene which I much appreciate as it acts as some level of damping. To wit, I did not have to employ my elastic material for its measurements on top of Klippel Near-field scanner.
Ascilab A6B Speaker Measurements
As usual, we start with our all important, anechoic "CEA/CTA-2034" standardized frequency response and directivity measurements:
We have a very nice on-axis response (black). There is a bit of a drop in bass but then again, it extends way below to nearly 30 Hz with reasonable output!
The early window, and for that matter, sound power, track the on-axis extremely well indicating good directivity which we will examine more later.
We can see the bass extension comes from passive radiator tuning being on the low side:
The peak is around 40 Hz. As noted, resonances from the woofer is highly controlled. And given the fact that we don't have a port, there is not much to worry about with respect to enclosure resonances bleeding out. You pay a lot more for the radiator as opposed to just a port but this is the benefit it brings.
Early window sum looks very good, encouraging a room without much "treatment:"
With the resulting prediction of in-room response being what we look for:
Beamwidth is highly controlled, all the way to upper registers, courtesy of computer optimized waveguide:
The small penalty there is narrower beam width which translates into more focused imaging and less diffusion. Don't treat the side walls as to let that do its thing to widen the source image.
Vertical directivity is what it is for a 2-way speaker:
Stay at the tweeter axis.
Let me give you my usual distortion charts and then something new:
I have been on a mission to better correlate distortion measurements to audibility. Here, I could hear the start of very low frequency distortion at 96 dBSPL and heard the speaker nearly completely run out of excursion at 101 dBSPL. How can we better figure out from the graphs. Check this work in progress:
These are THD% levels charted below 200 Hz. That is where I heard the distortion. Above that, we are overdriving the speaker anyway relative to music.
We see a more or less plateau above 100 Hz indicating we have made the right choice regarding cut off at 200 Hz.
Below that we see different slopes in distortion. We see two distinct new distortion sources coming into play which I have marked as secondary and tertiary. I have placed a circle at the knee of those events. What this says is that you can play down to 42 Hz at 96 dBSPL whereas if you crank up to 101 dBSPL, you best stop at 65 Hz! This matches my hearing of the sweeps where I heard slight distortion at the very start of the 96 dBSPL sweeps. Whereas with 101 dBSPL, that lasted quite a lot longer and at much higher levels of audible distortion.
Going the other way, if you are playing at 81 dBSPL, you can essentially take advantage of the full response down to 30 Hz. We will see if this and the above prediction proves to be the case in listening test section.
Assuming above is correct, you don't need a subwoofer for 81 dBSPL and possibly 86 dBSPL. Above that, a subwoofer would be needed for those playback level and the frequency for that crossover is on the chart.
Finishing our measurements, we see some traces of resonances in waterfall graph:
Step response of the woofer is very smooth/clean:
Edit: impedance and phase:
Ascilab A6B Listening Tests
I paired the A6B with Topping LA90 amplifier which has modest amount of power. I did this to see how much power is needed given the fact that the sensitivity of A6B is a couple of dBs lower than average. I was pleasantly surprised that in near and mid-field listening, there was plenty of power available, albeit with one channel being driven.
First impression was quite a surprise: there was impressively clean and deep bass even in tracks that don't sport that spectrum! Research indicates 30% of our enjoyment comes from bass and there is no better example of this. The extra warmth, especially when it is this clean, balances tonality and creates butterflies in your stomach. I am not used to such a compact speaker being able to deliver such a bass.
I quickly skipped to my reference track for deep bass. This sized speakers either faintly reproduce the sub-bass, or distort it at slightly higher levels. The A6B in sharp contrast, reproduced the low energy like it was a full range speaker!!! It is one thing to see frequency response down to nearly 30 Hz, it is another to experience it with real music.
Excited, I cranked up the volume and bam! Massive distortion set it, just like the 101 dBSPL. You hear a static and see the dual radiators try to detach themselves as the fly out left and right!
Crank it down a bit and you get a bit of roughness in bass. A bit more and you are back in business.
Note that the above test track has some of the lowest frequency energy track I have. On music with milder version of it, the A6B produced clean and authoritative bass that I could feel in my stomach (from 2 meters/6 to 7 feet away) and feel the air brushing against my face! I could get to mild distortion with cranking up the volume up again but not as bad as my reference track.
With general music tracks, no worries where there whatsoever with bass distortion and frankly any distortion. The high frequency notes would stand out in the midst of bass notes like nobody's business. Even tracks I have that don't sound very good on speakers (I use them for headphone testing), sounded nearly excellent here! The rest, wow, I kept smiling in disbelief! This is the most perfect speaker I have heard in this size. It just can't blast out its beautiful very low frequency beyond medium levels of loudness.
I am stunned....
Of course, at no time did I feel the need to EQ anything.
Nicely so, very little vibration was coupled to my desk where I had it -- unlike many speakers that uncover all kind of resonances in this setup (my far field listening space is down).
Imaging is rather focused as predicted. You hear the sound come from a circle close to the speaker.
As a side effect of my testing in near and mid-field, these speakers will also make an excellent studio monitor. I checked for horizontal directivity and it is excellent across 2 to 3 chair widths. Even after that, the drop off in high frequencies is rather small.
Conclusions
What a shame that I have started to sell these speakers and hence, my personal experience may not be trusted much. If you at all value my ethics, I am telling you, this is a speaker you have to experience. It will easily blow away any expectations you have.
Going into this review, I was kind of depressed. I an not into, "more expensive parts mean more performance" as some of you no doubt know. Those parts have pushed the price of this speaker rather high. What Ascilab has done with its tuning to deliver very low bass response that is ultra clean, is what justifies its cost. Yes, laws of physics can't be broken. It can't shake the house but if you are just a hair less power hungry than I am, you will be fully satisfied without having to mess with subwoofers and such.
As noted, I would give the A6Bs a serious consideration for mixing and mastering in smaller rooms. Pair it up with an ultra quiet amplifier like I did and you don't have none of the hiss issues of active monitors.
Please note that as of this writing, there is no production available of the A6B. Earliest time is May which means we will get them in June. I am going to put up my pair on Tested Audio but I have to say, I am so tempted to just keep them for myself! They are that good.
Needless to say, I am going to recommend the Ascilab A6B speakers. Objectively and subjectively, they have left me without pants.
-----------
As always, questions, comments, recommendations, etc. are welcome.
Any donations are much appreciated using: https://www.audiosciencereview.com/forum/index.php?threads/how-to-support-audio-science-review.8150/
Please excuse the tapes. They are holding the magnetic rings in for shipping. I plan to sell these speakers after review so wanted to keep them in as new condition. On that front:
NOTE: My company, testedaudio.com, is the exclusive distributor for Ascilab products in North America. While objective tests remain the same as for any other speaker, subjective remarks may have business bias.
The A6B manages to act serious and stately at the same time. The rounded corners and invisible fasteners give it an elegant look. And the solid weight, an impression of quality.
I am not a fan of the wrinkles in the Purifi woofer surrounds. However, in the A6B when seen in normal lighting, they mostly disappear so were not an issue for me. The review picture however, highlights them to the max.
Speaker has dual Purifi passive radiators on opposing sides and are a nice indicator of when the speaker is being pushed by their excursion.
The bottom of the speaker is lined with some kind of neoprene which I much appreciate as it acts as some level of damping. To wit, I did not have to employ my elastic material for its measurements on top of Klippel Near-field scanner.
Ascilab A6B Speaker Measurements
As usual, we start with our all important, anechoic "CEA/CTA-2034" standardized frequency response and directivity measurements:
We have a very nice on-axis response (black). There is a bit of a drop in bass but then again, it extends way below to nearly 30 Hz with reasonable output!
The early window, and for that matter, sound power, track the on-axis extremely well indicating good directivity which we will examine more later.
We can see the bass extension comes from passive radiator tuning being on the low side:
The peak is around 40 Hz. As noted, resonances from the woofer is highly controlled. And given the fact that we don't have a port, there is not much to worry about with respect to enclosure resonances bleeding out. You pay a lot more for the radiator as opposed to just a port but this is the benefit it brings.
Early window sum looks very good, encouraging a room without much "treatment:"
With the resulting prediction of in-room response being what we look for:
Beamwidth is highly controlled, all the way to upper registers, courtesy of computer optimized waveguide:
The small penalty there is narrower beam width which translates into more focused imaging and less diffusion. Don't treat the side walls as to let that do its thing to widen the source image.
Vertical directivity is what it is for a 2-way speaker:
Stay at the tweeter axis.
Let me give you my usual distortion charts and then something new:
I have been on a mission to better correlate distortion measurements to audibility. Here, I could hear the start of very low frequency distortion at 96 dBSPL and heard the speaker nearly completely run out of excursion at 101 dBSPL. How can we better figure out from the graphs. Check this work in progress:
These are THD% levels charted below 200 Hz. That is where I heard the distortion. Above that, we are overdriving the speaker anyway relative to music.
We see a more or less plateau above 100 Hz indicating we have made the right choice regarding cut off at 200 Hz.
Below that we see different slopes in distortion. We see two distinct new distortion sources coming into play which I have marked as secondary and tertiary. I have placed a circle at the knee of those events. What this says is that you can play down to 42 Hz at 96 dBSPL whereas if you crank up to 101 dBSPL, you best stop at 65 Hz! This matches my hearing of the sweeps where I heard slight distortion at the very start of the 96 dBSPL sweeps. Whereas with 101 dBSPL, that lasted quite a lot longer and at much higher levels of audible distortion.
Going the other way, if you are playing at 81 dBSPL, you can essentially take advantage of the full response down to 30 Hz. We will see if this and the above prediction proves to be the case in listening test section.
Assuming above is correct, you don't need a subwoofer for 81 dBSPL and possibly 86 dBSPL. Above that, a subwoofer would be needed for those playback level and the frequency for that crossover is on the chart.
Finishing our measurements, we see some traces of resonances in waterfall graph:
Step response of the woofer is very smooth/clean:
Edit: impedance and phase:
Ascilab A6B Listening Tests
I paired the A6B with Topping LA90 amplifier which has modest amount of power. I did this to see how much power is needed given the fact that the sensitivity of A6B is a couple of dBs lower than average. I was pleasantly surprised that in near and mid-field listening, there was plenty of power available, albeit with one channel being driven.
First impression was quite a surprise: there was impressively clean and deep bass even in tracks that don't sport that spectrum! Research indicates 30% of our enjoyment comes from bass and there is no better example of this. The extra warmth, especially when it is this clean, balances tonality and creates butterflies in your stomach. I am not used to such a compact speaker being able to deliver such a bass.
I quickly skipped to my reference track for deep bass. This sized speakers either faintly reproduce the sub-bass, or distort it at slightly higher levels. The A6B in sharp contrast, reproduced the low energy like it was a full range speaker!!! It is one thing to see frequency response down to nearly 30 Hz, it is another to experience it with real music.
Excited, I cranked up the volume and bam! Massive distortion set it, just like the 101 dBSPL. You hear a static and see the dual radiators try to detach themselves as the fly out left and right!
Crank it down a bit and you get a bit of roughness in bass. A bit more and you are back in business.Note that the above test track has some of the lowest frequency energy track I have. On music with milder version of it, the A6B produced clean and authoritative bass that I could feel in my stomach (from 2 meters/6 to 7 feet away) and feel the air brushing against my face! I could get to mild distortion with cranking up the volume up again but not as bad as my reference track.
With general music tracks, no worries where there whatsoever with bass distortion and frankly any distortion. The high frequency notes would stand out in the midst of bass notes like nobody's business. Even tracks I have that don't sound very good on speakers (I use them for headphone testing), sounded nearly excellent here! The rest, wow, I kept smiling in disbelief! This is the most perfect speaker I have heard in this size. It just can't blast out its beautiful very low frequency beyond medium levels of loudness.
I am stunned....
Of course, at no time did I feel the need to EQ anything.
Nicely so, very little vibration was coupled to my desk where I had it -- unlike many speakers that uncover all kind of resonances in this setup (my far field listening space is down).
Imaging is rather focused as predicted. You hear the sound come from a circle close to the speaker.
As a side effect of my testing in near and mid-field, these speakers will also make an excellent studio monitor. I checked for horizontal directivity and it is excellent across 2 to 3 chair widths. Even after that, the drop off in high frequencies is rather small.
Conclusions
What a shame that I have started to sell these speakers and hence, my personal experience may not be trusted much. If you at all value my ethics, I am telling you, this is a speaker you have to experience. It will easily blow away any expectations you have.
Going into this review, I was kind of depressed. I an not into, "more expensive parts mean more performance" as some of you no doubt know. Those parts have pushed the price of this speaker rather high. What Ascilab has done with its tuning to deliver very low bass response that is ultra clean, is what justifies its cost. Yes, laws of physics can't be broken. It can't shake the house but if you are just a hair less power hungry than I am, you will be fully satisfied without having to mess with subwoofers and such.
As noted, I would give the A6Bs a serious consideration for mixing and mastering in smaller rooms. Pair it up with an ultra quiet amplifier like I did and you don't have none of the hiss issues of active monitors.
Please note that as of this writing, there is no production available of the A6B. Earliest time is May which means we will get them in June. I am going to put up my pair on Tested Audio but I have to say, I am so tempted to just keep them for myself! They are that good.
Needless to say, I am going to recommend the Ascilab A6B speakers. Objectively and subjectively, they have left me without pants.
-----------
As always, questions, comments, recommendations, etc. are welcome.
Any donations are much appreciated using: https://www.audiosciencereview.com/forum/index.php?threads/how-to-support-audio-science-review.8150/
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