AsciLab F6B Bookshelf Speaker Review

[Purité Audio]

There are two speakers in the box, shipping weight is around 18 kilos.
Keith

 

[Hunter Mike]

I decided to wait on my AsciLabs speaker order. They were responsive to cancelling my order and refunded me right away. Of course right away in Korea is later at night in the US. I’m hoping they will have US distribution soon so I can give them a try. Looks great but a bit too much of a gamble if I don’t like them. I’m going to try a set of KEF Q Concerto’s since that seems to be a very comparable speaker. Found a set at Crutchfield for $1189 and I have 60 days to try them out, risk free.

 

[SMen]

I decided to wait on my AsciLabs speaker order. They were responsive to cancelling my order and refunded me right away. Of course right away in Korea is later at night in the US. I’m hoping they will have US distribution soon so I can give them a try. Looks great but a bit too much of a gamble if I don’t like them. I’m going to try a set of KEF Q Concerto’s since that seems to be a very comparable speaker. Found a set at Crutchfield for $1189 and I have 60 days to try them out, risk free.

just to be first!

New Collaboration with Ascilab!

Hello everyone, I’m excited to announce an important collaboration with Ascilab. As many of you know, Ascilab has delivered an incredible range of speakers that embody the best in engineering and science — all at amazingly affordable prices. Even better, the company actively listens to ASR...

www.audiosciencereview.com

 

[eyke]

I decided to wait on my AsciLabs speaker order. They were responsive to cancelling my order and refunded me right away. Of course right away in Korea is later at night in the US. I’m hoping they will have US distribution soon so I can give them a try. Looks great but a bit too much of a gamble if I don’t like them. I’m going to try a set of KEF Q Concerto’s since that seems to be a very comparable speaker. Found a set at Crutchfield for $1189 and I have 60 days to try them out, risk free.

make your desire known here: https://www.audiosciencereview.com/...ascilab-speakers-are-you-interested-in.63737/

 

[John760]

I have both the HSU ccb-8 and now the C6b. The HSU is decent but it does sound a little "cup your hands around your mouth" shouty. I believe the F6b will give you a more accurate representation of the source material.

Angled properly should give you a good phantom center and cohesive soundstage with either option, though HSU recommends you use time-intensity trading (basically crossing the speakers in front of the listening position) which I didn't care for.

Crossing the speakers in front of the listening position works exceptionally well to produce a phantom center, and also a wide sweet spot. I have used this method with multiple stand mounted bookshelf speakers. YMMV, but try it.

 

[jEDGEc0m]

Crossing the speakers in front of the listening position works exceptionally well to produce a phantom center, and also a wide sweet spot. I have used this method with multiple stand mounted bookshelf speakers. YMMV, but try it.

I currently have waveguided JBL's crossing pretty aggressively in front of listening position, in a small room (~3.5mx3.5m - yep, sadly it's pretty much square). Seems to me to be decent result - though I haven't really tried them otherwise in this room. I still intend to end up getting a pair of AsciLab F6B or maybe C6B , and will surely try them like this. Sure is a cheap n easy thing to try!

Maybe a tonally wide sweet-spot is enhanced with aggressive toe-in, but i find the "phantom centre" is only good when listening from right in the central sweet spot.

Would aggressive toe-in, in front of listening position likely be particularly beneficial in a small room? The sidewalls should effectively only be getting quite attenuated signal...

ps: Will this thread be an appropriate place for people to post in-room measurements of the F6B?

Even though the spin-data is what matters, I do find it interesting to see how things really play out in practice in real rooms.

 

[amirm]

ps: Will this thread be an appropriate place for people to post in-room measurements of the F6B?

Sure. Go ahead.

 

[jEDGEc0m]

If I ever find myself looking for passive bookshelf speakers these (or maybe C6B) will be at the top of the list. The tilt looks a little steep for me but that's easily corrected with EQ if it is. These compete with top studio monitors in their size class for a bit more than half the money. Crazy!

Was interesting doing a tilt comparison in spinorama.org between some other decent candidates (Revel M16, Revel M105, Neumann KH120 II, some genelecs, HDI-1600, Dutch&Dutch 8c...). Some are perhaps surprisingly similar. But yeah, the AsciLab's have quite a tilt. I suspect I will like this/will work well in smallish rooms..?

The good ol' "Circle of confusion" and the variability of music recordings will mean using bass n treble shelves "To taste" may still enhance enjoyment sometimes, in practice.

 

[Robbo99999]

Crossing the speakers in front of the listening position works exceptionally well to produce a phantom center, and also a wide sweet spot. I have used this method with multiple stand mounted bookshelf speakers. YMMV, but try it.

I've got JBL 308p Mkii speakers and I don't need to toe in the speakers so that it crosses in front of me - just have the speakers facing me and the phantom centre is perfect, maybe because of the good horizontal dispersion (which should be the same for the AsciLabs).

 

[antisuck]

I currently have waveguided JBL's crossing pretty aggressively in front of listening position, in a small room (~3.5mx3.5m - yep, sadly it's pretty much square). Seems to me to be decent result - though I haven't really tried them otherwise in this room. I still intend to end up getting a pair of AsciLab F6B or maybe C6B , and will surely try them like this. Sure is a cheap n easy thing to try!

Maybe a tonally wide sweet-spot is enhanced with aggressive toe-in, but i find the "phantom centre" is only good when listening from right in the central sweet spot.

Would aggressive toe-in, in front of listening position likely be particularly beneficial in a small room? The sidewalls should effectively only be getting quite attenuated signal...

ps: Will this thread be an appropriate place for people to post in-room measurements of the F6B?

Even though the spin-data is what matters, I do find it interesting to see how things really play out in practice in real rooms.

That arrangement is often recommended for waveguide/horn speakers with well-controlled directivity, especially among the home theater crew. It's possible to end up with a markedly wider "sweet spot" by virtue of time/intensity trading (if you aren't seated dead center, the speaker you are farther away from is pointed more directly toward you, leading to a more balanced presentation than you might get otherwise).

But yes, sitting in the central sweet spot gets you everything at the same time (equal time/equal intensity), with the best results as far as a convincing central image. Not everyone hears it, I gather, but it's difficult to un-hear

 

[jEDGEc0m]

I've got JBL 308p Mkii speakers and I don't need to toe in the speakers so that it crosses in front of me - just have the speakers facing me and the phantom centre is perfect, maybe because of the good horizontal dispersion (which should be the same for the AsciLabs).

I imagine the room + listening distance may be a factor - if listening nearfield, I understand we have to decipher less of the room's effect.

From farther away, the room is probably more part of the experience to decipher, and maybe toeing in-front of listening position directs a lower intensity of sound at the side walls. Could be of some perceived benefit sometimes, maybe.

 

[Robbo99999]

I imagine the room + listening distance may be a factor - if listening nearfield, I understand we have to decipher less of the room's effect.

From farther away, the room is probably more part of the experience to decipher, and maybe toeing in-front of listening position directs a lower intensity of sound at the side walls. Could be of some perceived benefit sometimes, maybe.

Maybe. My comments are based on two different rooms these speakers have been in (& three different listening positions). First one was a 2m listening position and that was perfect equilateral triangle arrangement, and that had a strong phantom centre that was absolutely fine. Second one was after moving house and listening position is about 1.5m (bit less) and that's at nearly perfect equilateral triangle listening position albeit one speaker is 17cm closer to me than the other one which I've calibrated out by measuring SPL differences between the speakers and accounting for that using a miniDSP as well as putting a time delay into the nearest speaker that equates to 17cm (again inputted through miniDSP), and that setup has a strong phantom centre too. Third is the same room but listening position in farfield at 3.8m and the speakers are definitely not anywhere near a perfect equilateral triangle in this configuration, as the speakers are still only about 1.5m apart, so that's too close to really make big distinctions when listening at 3.8m, but I'd still say there's a phantom centre. So I'd expect the AsciLab speakers to behave in the same way in terms of having strong phantom centres (as both speakers have good horizontal dispersion), as long as you're doing the equilateral triangle thing. I've always had my speakers just directly toed in to face me, so listening position would be the theoretical crossover point of the two speakers.

 

[jEDGEc0m]

Maybe. My comments are based on two different rooms these speakers have been in (& three different listening positions). First one was a 2m listening position and that was perfect equilateral triangle arrangement, and that had a strong phantom centre that was absolutely fine. Second one was after moving house and listening position is about 1.5m (bit less) and that's at nearly perfect equilateral triangle listening position albeit one speaker is 17cm closer to me than the other one which I've calibrated out by measuring SPL differences between the speakers and accounting for that using a miniDSP as well as putting a time delay into the nearest speaker that equates to 17cm (again inputted through miniDSP), and that setup has a strong phantom centre too. Third is the same room but listening position in farfield at 3.8m and the speakers are definitely not anywhere near a perfect equilateral triangle in this configuration, as the speakers are still only about 1.5m apart, so that's too close to really make big distinctions when listening at 3.8m, but I'd still say there's a phantom centre. So I'd expect the AsciLab speakers to behave in the same way in terms of having strong phantom centres (as both speakers have good horizontal dispersion), as long as you're doing the equilateral triangle thing. I've always had my speakers just directly toed in to face me, so listening position would be the theoretical crossover point of the two speakers.

That's cool that in your ~1.5m setup, even with a pretty big % difference in the speaker distance between L & R, time and level balancing made it image well.

Trying speakers off-axis from listening position might be less about optimising the phantom centre, but may change/benefit room involvement. And the slight minor change in tonality of higher frequencies.

Does seem like the AsciLabs will be about as room-friendly as is possible, and experimenting with toe-in/out is free 'n' easy.

 

[DavidM1]

I'm curious about frequency response measurements of speakers. It's really heartening to see such a consistent response for this speaker but the comment in the review that the speaker may have a warmer signature sound due to the angle of the response got me thinking...

Most speaker reviews I've seen show a frequency response declining towards the treble. Is this manufacturers' typical preference? Is it inevitable? Is it to avoid listening fatigue? Is realism enhanced by a level frequency response or would that actually sound bright to most listeners?

Any thoughts appreciated.

 

[amirm]

Since there are no production standards in music, it is impossible to know what is precisely right in this regard. This is why you want to create and deploy your own global, in-room response with equalization. EQ is mandatory anyway to correct bass response. Might as well then use it to overlay an overall frequency response for your room and your taste.

Given the above, there is no way to say one or the other approach as far as the slope of in-room response is better than another.

 

[DavidM1]

EQ is mandatory anyway to correct bass response. Might as well then use it to overlay an overall frequency response for your room and your taste.

That wasn’t an answer I expected, having got used to the idea of less interference with the original signal the better.

I take the point that recording and mastering are not neutral processes and people making recordings have always used their ears along with a diverse array of technology. I expect a “dead” room without strong reflections is likely to be similar to most recording/ mastering studios but listening situations will vary.

Interesting. Thanks for the reply.

 

[billou5767]

So I found out how to skip the shipping costs ) = make two separate orders )

strange audiophonic write this model is stop now for them ....

 

[Grotti]

A6B is now available at AP for 3790 Euro a pair (black and white version). It's roughly 800 Euros cheaper ordering directly from AsciLab. For me in Germany that is...

 

[Bucking]

A6B is now available at AP for 3790 Euro a pair (black and white version). It's roughly 800 Euros cheaper ordering directly from AsciLab. For me in Germany that is...

With tax?

 

[Grotti]

With tax?

I checked again and I stand corrected: the price has increased since my last visit at their shop. It was (iirc) about 2950 Dollars. It is 3300 now including shipping costs. This makes 2822, 87 Euros or 3349,22 Euros including German VAT. The difference is about 420 Euro now due to the increased price at AsciLab shop.