ATC speakers / Monitors

[goat76]

I would trust ATC.
Keith

Next time you have an ATC loudspeaker at home, I suggest you send it to the guy you know with the Klippel NFS for measurements, just like you planned to do with the Palmer Orbit 11.

 

[Ultrasonic]

Not everyone believes their ears

Particularly with speakers, at some point everyone has to. Room interaction and personal preference necessitate the final arbiter being an individual listener's ears/brain and opinion.

If someone buys speakers with published data that they think they'll like but are ultimately unhappy with what they hear, then they will want to change them. Just as if someone buys speakers they haven't seen measured data for (or indeed have zero interest in) and like how they sound in their room then this is the reality and the reason they'll keep them.

I have personally bought two pairs of speakers based on measured performance and ended up returning them as they were not ultimately what I was looking for (Hedd Type 07 Mk2 and Kali IN-8 v2). I now own the ATC SCM40 mk2s I do after having heard them in multiple places/systems and liked them, and so bought a pair second hand to experiment with in my home. I've also applied some EQ to tweak their performance, and listen in the context of early reflection point absorbers such that the important of directivity is reduced.

Were ATC to have published data for the speakers I have I would have been interested to see it but I don't believe it would or could tell me all I'd need to be certain if I'd like them or not. For those this is a deal-breaker for it obviously makes sense to look elsewhere, but repeatedly dragging this thread off topic to lament the fact they don't or or why they don't is not helpful or interesting.

 

[DatSpeakerTho]

Yes, definitely super normal to put the burden of proof for a whole brand on a stranger on the internet

This is 2026. We may not know everything about speaker measurements, but we know a hell of a lot. ATC has the equipment and makes the measurements. How about they just share them with the potential consumers who are interested? Why the secrecy? What's there to hide? (I'll give you one guess...)

There is really one and only one reason why a company would hide data, and that is to mislead customers.

ATC missed their opportunity to capture the growing crowd of folks that value performance data, now they have to double down. They could have had a rep on this forum arguing for their products and helping users, but nah. I guess that sort of thing is only reserved for silly companies like KEF or Genelec. I mean for crying out loud KEF releases research papers on their speakers and tech for free. All the ATC defenders here, I have to wonder, how low is your bar?

 

[RexrothPigeon]

You can easily search for the measurements of pretty much any ATC loudspeaker model around the internet, and here in this thread. They are not hidden, and that way, are not forced to trust the manufacturer themselves when a third party source have done the measurements.

"Hey Bob, I got an incredibly accurate new scale and measured myself today!"

"Nice Larry, how tall are you?"

"I'm not telling you. Ask other people, they probably know."

 

[caught gesture]

 

[Atc4ever]

Hey Bob, I got an incredibly accurate new scale and measured myself today!
Nice Larry, how tall are you?
Why do you ask, Bob?
Well, I don't know if I'm taller or shorter than you.
Why is that important to you?
I'd much rather be taller than you, then I'd have a better chance with Mary than you.
Honestly Bob, taller or shorter, you don't stand a chance with Mary.

 

[Blockader]

Hey Bob, I got an incredibly accurate new scale and measured myself today!
Nice Larry, how tall are you?
Why do you ask, Bob?
Well, I don't know if I'm taller or shorter than you.
Why is that important to you?
I'd much rather be taller than you, then I'd have a better chance with Mary than you.
Honestly Bob, taller or shorter, you don't stand a chance with Mary.

I started my audiophile journey with the ATC SCM20ASL, which I bought for around $5,400 on the hype and recommendations from gearslutz.com at the time, I knew nothing about measurements. I did audition them briefly in a showroom, but 25-30 minutes of listening in an unfamiliar room tells you very little about how a speaker will actually perform in your home. After a couple of months of trying to like them, I had to admit to myself that I couldn't: the bass was weak and the treble was missing. I sold them and bought a pair of KH 120s with a KH 750. I was struck by how much better they sounded than the ATCs... while saving money in the process. It was only afterward that I learned about measurements and read Toole's book, driven by curiosity about why the cheaper speakers had won. My story is just one example, but plenty of people are making the same mistake I did.

I understand the skepticism toward buying speakers based on measurements alone. No one wants to reduce something as personal as listening to a spec sheet. But the opposite extreme is worse. Dismissing measurements entirely and relying on the confirmation-bias-driven recommendations of gearslutz and other nonscientific forums is exactly how I ended up $5400 deep in speakers I didn't enjoy.

 

[Hansie]

Exactly this! Too many nice words on the net which I fell for.
Only difference was the scm19 and the fact my new dynaudio xd60’s where not cheaper .
Although it was a demo set with 50% off and selling the amp and dac reduced the gap.
Wife was happy too with the reduces stack of components and wires.

 

[Rettica]

I started my audiophile journey with the ATC SCM20ASL, which I bought for around $5,400 on the hype and recommendations from gearslutz.com at the time, I knew nothing about measurements. I did audition them briefly in a showroom, but 25-30 minutes of listening in an unfamiliar room tells you very little about how a speaker will actually perform in your home. After a couple of months of trying to like them, I had to admit to myself that I couldn't: the bass was weak and the treble was missing. I sold them and bought a pair of KH 120s with a KH 750. I was struck by how much better they sounded than the ATCs... while saving money in the process. It was only afterward that I learned about measurements and read Toole's book, driven by curiosity about why the cheaper speakers had won. My story is just one example, but plenty of people are making the same mistake I did.

I understand the skepticism toward buying speakers based on measurements alone. No one wants to reduce something as personal as listening to a spec sheet. But the opposite extreme is worse. Dismissing measurements entirely and relying on the confirmation-bias-driven recommendations of gearslutz and other nonscientific forums is exactly how I ended up $5400 deep in speakers I didn't enjoy.

Well, they have specs on their website where you can see that bass is -6db at 55hz. Of course the bass is weak. Regarding the highs though I bet the measurement won’t show any problems apart from dispersion maybe

 

[goat76]

Exactly this! Too many nice words on the net which I fell for.
Only difference was the scm19 and the fact my new dynaudio xd60’s where not cheaper .
Although it was a demo set with 50% off and selling the amp and dac reduced the gap.
Wife was happy too with the reduces stack of components and wires.

And as many stories go the other way, what one prefers subjectively should always be the final call.

It’s always great to hear when someone has found the loudspeakers that works best for them, then the focus can go towards optimizing the listener position, the loudspeakers positioning, and do what can be done to the room acoustics.

 

[Atc4ever]

...25-30 minutes of listening in an unfamiliar room tells you very little about how a speaker will actually perform in your home.

Exactly!
If you knew that, you shouldn't have bought the scm20 (or any other speaker) under those conditions. Everything that followed was a consequence of that mistake of yours.
When I was buying scm50, (second hand) I had much better luck. I went several times to the seller, whom I knew from before, and stayed for several hours listening and evaluating the scm50.
I concluded that the scm50 had serious potential, but that I wouldn't pay for what I heard. That's what I told the seller. I gave up on the purchase.
But the seller, estimated that I might still be the buyer and offered to take the scm50 to my home. That was a very clever move on his part.
Because in my room the scm50 worked incomparably better than in his! After about 10 days of listening, in my system, with my music, I decided to buy the scm50. Since then, I love this speaker more and more. It realy opened the gate of music wider than any other before.
My point is that you can't spend on an expensive speaker, be it an atc or any other, just based on a superficial 25 min listen, or just based on measurements. It can easily happen that you will waste money.
You have to try harder.

 

[Blockader]

Exactly!
If you knew that, you shouldn't have bought the scm20 (or any other speaker) under those conditions. Everything that followed was a consequence of that mistake of yours.
When I was buying scm50, (second hand) I had much better luck. I went several times to the seller, whom I knew from before, and stayed for several hours listening and evaluating the scm50.
I concluded that the scm50 had serious potential, but that I wouldn't pay for what I heard. That's what I told the seller. I gave up on the purchase.
But the seller, estimated that I might still be the buyer and offered to take the scm50 to my home. That was a very clever move on his part.
Because in my room the scm50 worked incomparably better than in his! After about 10 days of listening, in my system, with my music, I decided to buy the scm50. Since then, I love this speaker more and more. It realy opened the gate of music wider than any other before.
My point is that you can't spend on an expensive speaker, be it an atc or any other, just based on a superficial 25 min listen, or just based on measurements. It can easily happen that you will waste money.
You have to try harder.

I hadn't listened to the KH 120s before buying them, but I ended up liking them more than almost any ATC speaker I've heard. To be fair, the sound quality of speakers with excellent directivity tends to change very little from room to room. I did not listen to 8361's before buying them too.

 

[dfuller]

Exactly!
If you knew that, you shouldn't have bought the scm20 (or any other speaker) under those conditions. Everything that followed was a consequence of that mistake of yours.
When I was buying scm50, (second hand) I had much better luck. I went several times to the seller, whom I knew from before, and stayed for several hours listening and evaluating the scm50.
I concluded that the scm50 had serious potential, but that I wouldn't pay for what I heard. That's what I told the seller. I gave up on the purchase.
But the seller, estimated that I might still be the buyer and offered to take the scm50 to my home. That was a very clever move on his part.
Because in my room the scm50 worked incomparably better than in his! After about 10 days of listening, in my system, with my music, I decided to buy the scm50. Since then, I love this speaker more and more. It realy opened the gate of music wider than any other before.
My point is that you can't spend on an expensive speaker, be it an atc or any other, just based on a superficial 25 min listen, or just based on measurements. It can easily happen that you will waste money.
You have to try harder.

The problem is there are a lot of speakers you can't listen to in person without buying. I live in a fairly major city in the US and there just isn't anywhere to listen to these speakers without buying them.

 

[Atc4ever]

I hadn't listened to the KH 120s before buying them, but I ended up liking them more than almost any ATC speaker I've heard. To be fair, the sound quality of speakers with excellent directivity tends to change very little from room to room. I did not listen to 8361's before buying them too.

When you say you are happy with the speakers you bought without listening, I have no reason not to believe you.

Although it is an unimaginable idea for me personally.

Is there any particular reason why you couldn't or didn't want to hear them before buying? I assume that every seller will offer that possibility.

 

[Ultrasonic]

To be fair, the sound quality of speakers with excellent directivity tends to change very little from room to room.

Take a speaker with 'perfect' directivity from a room with a lot of soft furnishings to one with none and it will sound brighter. Similarly the bass will be heavily be influenced by differences in room dimensions.

 

[dfuller]

To be fair, the sound quality of speakers with excellent directivity tends to change very little from room to room.

This is not my experience. It's less than one that is more uneven, but it's certainly not "very little".

 

[Blockader]

Take a speaker with 'perfect' directivity from a room with a lot of soft furnishings to one with none and it will sound brighter. Similarly the bass will be heavily be influenced by differences in room dimensions.

You are oversimplifying by focusing only on soft furnishings when the entire room system shapes absorption characteristics. For example, the reflectivity of walls can increase relative sound power energy of treble.

Most hard building materials are spectrally tilted reflectors. Glass, drywall, thin wood paneling reflect treble almost perfectly while simultaneously absorbing bass through panel resonance. So a room with hard surfaces can tilt the reverberant field bright, it eats LF and recycles HF. In other words, there are surfaces in a room that can balance the absorption of soft materials. It's hard to make a conclusion without taking measurements.

Also the total absorption coefficiency of the room matters mostly for sound power. For early reflections, absorption/reflectivity of the materials of the first reflection points only matter.(except LF)

When you say you are happy with the speakers you bought without listening, I have no reason not to believe you.

Although it is an unimaginable idea for me personally.

Is there any particular reason why you couldn't or didn't want to hear them before buying? I assume that every seller will offer that possibility.

I could return if I did not like them, I chose not to.

 

[Ultrasonic]

You are oversimplifying by focusing only on soft furnishings

Yes, for brevity as it was all that was required to make the point that good directivity doesn't make speakers sound the same in all rooms.

 

[Blockader]

Yes, for brevity as it was all that was required to make the point that good directivity doesn't make speakers sound the same in all rooms.

Sure, show me where I said, 'good directivity makes speakers sound same in all rooms.' I will send you my 8361's for free. I did not even say 'sound', I said sound quality. Because the HF tilt of speakers is influenced by the room too.

 

[Ultrasonic]

Sure, show me where I said, 'good directivity makes speakers sound same in all rooms.' I will send you my 8361's for free. I did not even say 'sound', I said sound quality. Because the HF tilt of speakers is influenced by the room too.

I quoted exactly the section of your post I was responding to. You wrote "very little" which is what I was explaing why I didn't agree with.