ATC speakers / Monitors

[Torbachkristensen]

Thanks. But I think there is not much more to discuss. This link to carefully crossed and DSP optimized setup, was the perfect illustration of the differences of approach and experience - I can look at that (reasonably good) FR, great SR, great GD and overall very impressive measurements, and then take one look at the room pictures and instantly deduct that this was a setup solely made to measure flat at LP, and nothing else. It is all for show, and has nothing to do with proper interest in music reproduction. You take one look at the RT60 you see what is wrong - this is an acoustically mediocre room, with unbalanced decay time, and all this flat response is just for show. The sound in room will be nothing like what most of the measurements indicate, and any kind of constant directivity advantages have been ruined by the scattered sources, that will only work in relation to 1 measuring point in the room, and hence is not really practically useable. Much like what Klaus Heinz points out.

I will not engage in further discussion here, as I find the disregard of bigger ATC’s as valid designs on the basis of 1 compact 3-way model (the problems can be deducted just from looking at the front driver layout and cabinet design), and low interest in what creates great room integration, and why Constant Directivity and DSP is not the only tool to mediate room problems, and certainly shouldn’t be the first. The ATC110 measurements posted are completely raw in-room, without a single EQ move to flatten the response, and completely free of room modes, from just turning on the speakers and measuring. Whenever I have the time to do proper measurements, I will certainly get back and post them so the OP has some valid and up-to-date info to base an opinion on. I suspect directivity to quite a lot better on ATC50/100/110/150. I will measure and find out at some point. Maybe Amir will have a pair on the bench in the meantime.

And to expand on what some others here have stated, a lot of pro users, especially mixing engineers, ultimately do purchase speakers based on what they make them do to the audio material, and not how they ultimately sound or measure. Yes, it should be an attribute for studio monitors to have relatively even FR, but probably the most popular mix speaker has been the NS10, followed by the Proac Studio 100, both of which are not very accurate or extended, but appreciated for how they present music, at least by older generations. ATC's have in recent years gotten quite popular as a mixing tool, and used to be seen primarily in mastering for it's fast and accurate lowend and how wide a spectrum the Mid dome covers, without compromising dynamics. Whether they are good are not, I think has been debated enough.

Thanx for a lively discussion - very… informative And BTW, the JBL M2 is a freakin awsome speaker!

 

[Ilkless]

Maybe a general reset on the antagonism would be good all around.

I'll remove the thread ban for @Torbachkristensen as well, but will ask if we can please dial the snark back a bit.

All I'm seeing is people who can't accept when their completely unsubstantiated subjective waffle is challenged with evidence, can't accept that their sighted anecdotal listening impressions are demonstrably unreliable because non-sound attributes invariably taint what they pass off as purely impressions of ATC's sonic attributes in sighted conditions, and lots of goalpost shifting where ATC is somehow both engineering-driven and also has some mystical unquantifiable properties that down to large primitive drivers within a stagnant design paradigm.

These are usually quite uncontroversial points here on ASR but ATC fetishisation seems to be particularly strong and deep seated in practically all audio circles.

I doubt @Ilkless means that's the conscious reason they are deciding on something, as if they were trying on clothes and seeing what what they looked best in, but rather that buying into the "story" about a brand is a very strong subconscious influence that also retroactively strengthens itself to justify the past decision.

I could be reading too much into him though...



Are you talking about final sales to the consumer? How could you possibly determine the cause of the sales?

The point about story is correct. But I think it's also about how ATC users are presented as some aspirational, enlightened clique. So there is also an element of status signalling.

 

[maverickronin]

But I think it's also about how ATC users are presented as some aspirational, enlightened clique. So there is also an element of status signalling.

Is that a thing at Gearslutz or something broader?

 

[dfuller]

Is that a thing at Gearslutz or something broader?

I have no idea where he's gotten thsi idea. Even at Gearspace there's plenty of people who hate ATCs.

 

[Freeway]

There is just something about my ATCs
Like going home.
A dear old friend.
A favorite pair of well worn shoes.
Happens every time I think to plug them in, which this thread prompted me to do. Most of the time they get little love around here anymore.
Yep, it happened again.
Probably never get rid of them.
That's my story and I'm sticking to it.
Party down.

 

[YSC]

well after all these debates I do think both sides have the same fact:

ATC are good/ok, but it's only great/SOTA at the, say, good old 70s-80s or even 90s. they didn't go backwards from those era but also didn't move forward a lot like some other new/old brands did. So are they good? of course, a ton of really annoying sounding/measuring speakers literally litters the world, for @Torbachkristensen room, it of course is a well integrated room with all those old fashioned room treatments and design into a new room, it surely is good (or the designer will get killed starving).

IMO are ATC crap? surely not, are they STOA and champs most other pro solutions? Um~ almost surely not either. The whole pro thing is as stated before, completely irrelevant, going pro gear usually is just some more widely available/adopted brands, with performance enough to get the job done. look at those pro rack mounted amps measured here, I can't recall any one really competitive in performance to great consumer amps, but the fit in the rack, have the connectors needed, and performs good enough, with maybe a loud cooling fan which the whole thing is placed in another room so won't bother.

the non-sota was believed to be so is that when I applied my own, untreated gaming room with a pair of genelecs, not using any dip sswitches or EQ above 400hz, using the same smoothing (1/3) as @Torbachkristensen setup. that's how close the tonalitty of a pair of contempary speaker in a 1.2m (W) * 3m (L) gaming room built by concrete and literally figures and books or other crap just put around the speakers can go.

 

[Chrise36]

well after all these debates I do think both sides have the same fact:

ATC are good/ok, but it's only great/SOTA at the, say, good old 70s-80s or even 90s. they didn't go backwards from those era but also didn't move forward a lot like some other new/old brands did. So are they good? of course, a ton of really annoying sounding/measuring speakers literally litters the world, for @Torbachkristensen room, it of course is a well integrated room with all those old fashioned room treatments and design into a new room, it surely is good (or the designer will get killed starving).

IMO are ATC crap? surely not, are they STOA and champs most other pro solutions? Um~ almost surely not either. The whole pro thing is as stated before, completely irrelevant, going pro gear usually is just some more widely available/adopted brands, with performance enough to get the job done. look at those pro rack mounted amps measured here, I can't recall any one really competitive in performance to great consumer amps, but the fit in the rack, have the connectors needed, and performs good enough, with maybe a loud cooling fan which the whole thing is placed in another room so won't bother.

the non-sota was believed to be so is that when I applied my own, untreated gaming room with a pair of genelecs, not using any dip sswitches or EQ above 400hz, using the same smoothing (1/3) as @Torbachkristensen setup. that's how close the tonalitty of a pair of contempary speaker in a 1.2m (W) * 3m (L) gaming room built by concrete and literally figures and books or other crap just put around the speakers can go.

View attachment 225497

Are not the Genelec eq'd from the manufacturer? Btw their fr looks like a w and the ATC harman(ish) while most believe and accuse ATC of the opposite go figure...

 

[goat76]

well after all these debates I do think both sides have the same fact:

ATC are good/ok, but it's only great/SOTA at the, say, good old 70s-80s or even 90s. they didn't go backwards from those era but also didn't move forward a lot like some other new/old brands did. So are they good? of course, a ton of really annoying sounding/measuring speakers literally litters the world, for @Torbachkristensen room, it of course is a well integrated room with all those old fashioned room treatments and design into a new room, it surely is good (or the designer will get killed starving).

What do you mean by "old fashion" room treatment, that's the only real way of getting the decay times down. With EQ you can basically just flatten the frequency response but the decay times will roughly stay the same or just be somewhat reduced caused by a little less energy in those areas.

When using room acoustic treatment you fix the problems where the source of the problems occurs, and that should in all circumstances (when that can be done) be the absolute first step to fix the problem, and obviously long before you reach for the EQ tool which is basically just a 2D tool trying the repair a three-dimensional room problem.

I'm sure you know all this. But calling room treatment "old fashion" indicates that you maybe think there are new modern ways of fixing the room decay times.

the non-sota was believed to be so is that when I applied my own, untreated gaming room with a pair of genelecs, not using any dip sswitches or EQ above 400hz, using the same smoothing (1/3) as @Torbachkristensen setup. that's how close the tonalitty of a pair of contempary speaker in a 1.2m (W) * 3m (L) gaming room built by concrete and literally figures and books or other crap just put around the speakers can go.

I'm not quite sure what you want to show with your comparisons between your Genelec computer setup, and Torbachkristensen's professionally treated studio setup. Tonality is just one single parameter among many, your setups will most likely not sound even remotely the same or similar.

 

[Chrise36]

well after all these debates I do think both sides have the same fact:

ATC are good/ok, but it's only great/SOTA at the, say, good old 70s-80s or even 90s. they didn't go backwards from those era but also didn't move forward a lot like some other new/old brands did. So are they good? of course, a ton of really annoying sounding/measuring speakers literally litters the world, for @Torbachkristensen room, it of course is a well integrated room with all those old fashioned room treatments and design into a new room, it surely is good (or the designer will get killed starving).

IMO are ATC crap? surely not, are they STOA and champs most other pro solutions? Um~ almost surely not either. The whole pro thing is as stated before, completely irrelevant, going pro gear usually is just some more widely available/adopted brands, with performance enough to get the job done. look at those pro rack mounted amps measured here, I can't recall any one really competitive in performance to great consumer amps, but the fit in the rack, have the connectors needed, and performs good enough, with maybe a loud cooling fan which the whole thing is placed in another room so won't bother.

the non-sota was believed to be so is that when I applied my own, untreated gaming room with a pair of genelecs, not using any dip sswitches or EQ above 400hz, using the same smoothing (1/3) as @Torbachkristensen setup. that's how close the tonalitty of a pair of contempary speaker in a 1.2m (W) * 3m (L) gaming room built by concrete and literally figures and books or other crap just put around the speakers can go.

View attachment 225497

The problem is not that ATC is SOTA which is not just taken into account that even diyers managed to build better speakers using their driver the problem is other manufactures are considered SOTA just because they use DSP while their drivers are of unknown quality. How many drivers by genelec or KH have you seen measured independently? What about their amps and their dsp/dac how do these perform?

 

[goat76]

I have no idea where he's gotten thsi idea. Even at Gearspace there's plenty of people who hate ATCs.

It's maybe more like "repeating misinformation until it's considered to be the truth"?

 

[FeddyLost]

Free-standing ATC monitor in a heavily treated room:

View attachment 224981

Seems like the passive crossover network needs some reworking on this set. One would never know unless measurements/inspections are performed regularly.

Let me guess: is it standmount monitor over hard floor with bass trapping in corners?
Generally looks like my hifi room with big standmounts. Especially dip 100-300 hz.
It's not about ATC at all...

 

[YSC]

Are not the Genelec eq'd from the manufacturer? Btw their fr looks like a w and the ATC harman(ish) while most believe and accuse ATC of the opposite go figure...

No, these are analogue genelec 8030 which is not eqed in factory, the harmonise FR below 200 is my own EQ and subwoofer integration. Thus the upper FR wiggle or unevenness is the key, a ATC in heavily treated room vs untreated gaming desk in neutrality is the thing

 

[YSC]

The problem is not that ATC is SOTA which is not just taken into account that even diyers managed to build better speakers using their driver the problem is other manufactures are considered SOTA just because they use DSP while their drivers are of unknown quality. How many drivers by genelec or KH have you seen measured independently? What about their amps and their dsp/dac how do these perform?

well no, the others are considered SOTA because their end product, have in full spin measurements showing all of these

1) neutral anechoic within it's FR range
2) even directivity, be it with waveguide in tweeter or others or just a coaxial (don't dismiss wave guide, ATC HAVE it tin their mid dome)
3) low distortion within it's FR range, or for small ones, above the mid bass range.

A driver alone is irrelevant, overall distortion comes from various factors, and overdriven/use beyond it's "comfort zone" being the most obvious reason.

if ATC is just that, it is a SOTA driver manufacturer, not speaker manufacturer. period

 

[Chrise36]

well no, the others are considered SOTA because their end product, have in full spin measurements showing all of these

1) neutral anechoic within it's FR range
2) even directivity, be it with waveguide in tweeter or others or just a coaxial (don't dismiss wave guide, ATC HAVE it tin their mid dome)
3) low distortion within it's FR range, or for small ones, above the mid bass range.

A driver alone is irrelevant, overall distortion comes from various factors, and overdriven/use beyond it's "comfort zone" being the most obvious reason.

if ATC is just that, it is a SOTA driver manufacturer, not speaker manufacturer. period

How do you know it is low audible distortion if you have not seen IMD? Is directivity more important than SINAD or DSP artifacts? So much obsession with directivity ignoring other significant parameters what makes you think even directivity alone makes a speaker sound good look at Erins review of the Kii does the tweeter sound good? Not from what i heard.

 

[YSC]

How do you know it is low audible distortion if you have not seen IMD? Is directivity more important than SINAD or DSP artifacts? So much obsession with directivity ignoring other significant parameters what makes you think even directivity alone makes a speaker sound good look at Erins review of the Kii does the tweeter sound good? Not from what i heard.

distortion is given in the % in Amirm and Erin's measurement, with low distortion AND good directivity it is good, with Kii, I did tried once in a showroom, much better compared to SCM50. it's way better, but of course, it can be the room, or just that I listen to lower volume (I think avg was like 70-75 before my ears gets annoyingly hurt from any speaker). mind you for myself, STOA can be passive, example is KEF blade one meta.

 

[Chrise36]

distortion is given in the % in Amirm and Erin's measurement, with low distortion AND good directivity it is good, with Kii, I did tried once in a showroom, much better compared to SCM50. it's way better, but of course, it can be the room, or just that I listen to lower volume (I think avg was like 70-75 before my ears gets annoyingly hurt from any speaker). mind you for myself, STOA can be passive, example is KEF blade one meta.

A percentage of that is IMD which is different for every speaker and it is the worse kind of distortion audibly. An analogue design is much preferable to me passive or active if the active would be as transparent.

 

[YSC]

A percentage of that is IMD which is different for every speaker and it is the worse kind of distortion audibly. An analogue design is much preferable to me passive or active if the active would be as transparent.

Sure the least digital correction before the anechoic flatness is preferred. But then the sota claim for me is considering quite some analogue designs don’t have the dispersion flaws and flatter frequency response than the contemporary atc design. When you are going to make a full room for the speaker, with a fixed LP then yea, these flaws in directivity aren’t that important, but if you need to move around, or when there’s something in the room you can’t take away from the equation of FR anomalies, you would want a smoother directivity. SOTA in my book, is the ones that at present time can achieve the best in every measurable metric with least drawback. Which sadly, ATC seems didn’t catch up since their prime era.

And nothing wrong to spend own money on something isn’t SOTA yet you enjoys.

Personally in not Audio side, but on sports cars I enjoy the 90s-2000s full mechanical (analogue) sports cars which don’t have all those active aerodynamic, adaptive suspension and torque distribution etc. nothing wrong when that old car (say a 1994 air cooled Porsche) for my enjoyment and being my pick, but I won’t argue that the old Porsche is SOTA or goes round the track faster with a pro driver, it’s slower than a new golf

 

[Chrise36]

Sure the least digital correction before the anechoic flatness is preferred. But then the sota claim for me is considering quite some analogue designs don’t have the dispersion flaws and flatter frequency response than the contemporary atc design. When you are going to make a full room for the speaker, with a fixed LP then yea, these flaws in directivity aren’t that important, but if you need to move around, or when there’s something in the room you can’t take away from the equation of FR anomalies, you would want a smoother directivity. SOTA in my book, is the ones that at present time can achieve the best in every measurable metric with least drawback. Which sadly, ATC seems didn’t catch up since their prime era.

And nothing wrong to spend own money on something isn’t SOTA yet you enjoys.

Personally in not Audio side, but on sports cars I enjoy the 90s-2000s full mechanical (analogue) sports cars which don’t have all those active aerodynamic, adaptive suspension and torque distribution etc. nothing wrong when that old car (say a 1994 air cooled Porsche) for my enjoyment and being my pick, but I won’t argue that the old Porsche is SOTA or goes round the track faster with a pro driver, it’s slower than a new golf

Funny i am looking to buy again a bmw e36 coupe just for the analog feeling lol.

 

[thewas]

And nothing wrong to spend own money on something isn’t SOTA yet you enjoys.

Personally in not Audio side, but on sports cars I enjoy the 90s-2000s full mechanical (analogue) sports cars which don’t have all those active aerodynamic, adaptive suspension and torque distribution etc. nothing wrong when that old car (say a 1994 air cooled Porsche) for my enjoyment and being my pick, but I won’t argue that the old Porsche is SOTA or goes round the track faster with a pro driver, it’s slower than a new golf

Exactly, I enjoyed all ATC I have heard till now, they have very good drivers and honest non-effect tuning, heck I would even own some with the prices they had before 10+ years (nowadays I find them overpriced like most small UK manufactured audio). I don't think many here say they are not good loudspeakers, just that they aren't anymore SOTA and thus often hyped a bit too much in other forums.

 

[Geert]

I can look at that (reasonably good) FR, great SR, great GD and overall very impressive measurements, and then take one look at the room pictures and instantly deduct that this was a setup solely made to measure flat at LP, and nothing else. It is all for show, and has nothing to do with proper interest in music reproduction. You take one look at the RT60 you see what is wrong - this is an acoustically mediocre room, with unbalanced decay time, and all this flat response is just for show.

If you go back in this thread you'll notice I don't have a dog in this fight. I worked on ATC's whole my life and talked about the pro's and con's I experienced.

I notice there's some general misunderstanding in this thread. When people critique ATC's, especially directivity, they're talking about the speakers themselves. You counter this with a story about these speakers, sofit mounted in a heavily treated room. That's a whole different discussion. No one denies the advantage of these techniques, no one underestimates how good you're room will sound. But this is nog longer about ATC only, any speaker will benefit from such a setup.

The sound in room will be nothing like what most of the measurements indicate,

The sound in the listening position will be close to what the measurements indicate, altough RT60 is also important of course (to a lesser extend in small rooms like a living room). Not saying acoustic treatment isn't more effective.

probably the most popular mix speaker has been the NS10,

But not as a single source of truth. They're used for certain specific qualities (evaluate mid range and make a mix sound good on small speakers), just like ATC has its qualities.