Binaural blind comparison test of 4 loudspeakers - II

[oivavoi]

Thanks to @ctrl for a very fun experiment once again!
I think it's very interesting that there once again was a clear favorite. Vox populi seems to work!

I went with the majority and chose D. I really don't think I can explain too well why, though. As I wrote in the thread I thought this was a difficult test. Seems like that wasn't the case for everybody, but it was for me - and maybe some others, given that there are less votes this time around? There are probably ways of doing such preference tests easier for stupid folks like me. If I get the time I might read up and see what the pros do with such tests

To arrive at an answer I basically had to listen to track 3 over and over, and in the end it was just that loudspeaker D sounded most "right". It may partly have been about the tonal balance, I think, but also some vague feeling of just being more correct in its presentation generally.

I'm curious to know if it's indeed the case that all of these speakers had some suckout in the lower midrange (edit: due to acoustic cancellation), as I wrote in a previous comment. I thought that particularly the piano piece sounded timbrally different from the original file - it felt thinner and less full, in a way. But that may also be the reflections in the room which altered my perception of the direct sound, as my brain can't filter out the reflections that are present in such a recording.

Looking forward to seeing the loudspeakers revealed!

 

[PierreV]

I voted with the crowd... D - listened on HD600 and on Audio Technica ATH RDG1X
Given the comments above about the impact of the recording technique on the overall tonal balance, I just hope D isn't a B&W now

 

[LTig]

Same here. A and D are very close, B was too muffled and C sounded hollow. My guesses:

• A: it has a smaller loss of mids (compared to B and C) and similar bass as the original. For my ears it has the smallest difference from the original so I chose it for the poll.
  I think it's a smaller bookshelf which does not excite low frequencies so prevents room problems.
• B: a dip in the mids, bad for snare.
  Could be a B&W floorstander or a bigger BBC style monitor, or a large magnetostatic panel?
• C: Hollow sound.
  Maybe something exotic like Zu or Devore? Not my beer.
• D: similar to A but with resonances in the bass (bass drum slam) which were not audible in the original clip. That was my main criterium to not choose it because the differences were gross (my hearing is probably not good enough to judge higher frequencies reliably). I might have chosen it for preference (I like bass) but that was not the question. EDIT: would probably be my favorite with room EQ.
  I think it's either a floorstander or a bigger standmount with active equalization to get a lower f3 in the bass.

 

[ctrl]

I just hope D isn't a B&W now

That's funny, or is it a nightmare?

I think it's a smaller bookshelf which does not excite low frequencies so prevents room problems.

As I said, all speaker are not bookshelf speaker, but somehow the statement is also true.

C: Hollow sound.
Maybe something exotic like Zu or Devore? Not my beer.

As I said, no exotic speaker concepts, but again somehow it comes close to the truth.

D: similar to A but with resonances in the bass (bass drum slam) which were not audible in the original clip. That was my main criterium to not choose it because the differences were gross

Interesting analysis that makes perfect sense if you know the speaker models.

 

[Blumlein 88]

to recap, I purchased a cheap set of binaural microphones, Roland CS10-EM and used my own head.
Edit: I think @Blumlein 88 suggested potentially better microphones but they weren't available locally.

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These are some that put the microphone pretty deep in your ear canal. They are the ones used by Mitchco which is where I got the idea. His binaural recordings seem among the least colored I've heard. You can read some of his reviews with the recordings over at AudiophileStyle.

 

[pkane]

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These are some that put the microphone pretty deep in your ear canal. They are the ones used by Mitchco which is where I got the idea. His binaural recordings seem among the least colored I've heard. You can read some of his reviews with the recordings over at AudiophileStyle.

Same ones I use to EQ headphones. They are great, except for the need for battery phantom power supply (48v will kill them).

 

[Hugo9000]

I began with the short samples. Picked D as closest, ruled C out as 'obviously wrong/garbage can coloration' (lol, perhaps exaggerating a tad), and B as 'clearly flawed but not altogether horrible,' and A as 'meh.' But then I thought perhaps it was unfair to the 'meh' speaker that it was the first one I listened to after the original music file, so it may have been judged more harshly based more on the switch from original recording to the oddity of binaural recording and/or room effects, rather than a greater flaw in the speaker itself compared to the others. So at that point, I figured I should listen to the longer samples, and try switching the order around a few times.

I did end up rating the 'meh' speaker (A) as a bit better than I had originally, but my original impressions of the other three speakers held up, and my front runner actually increased its lead of the pack for me. It will be interesting to see what the speakers were. When I voted, my top choice, D, was shown as leading the poll, and my second choice was ahead of the remaining two by a single vote. I see that A got a few more votes later on.

So that was fun, even if the music isn't what I'd choose for auditioning gear. If any of the speakers that I judged to be acceptable turn out to be from brands I despise, I have a number of disclaimers available to me, so I'm okay with that. LOL

I used my Sennheiser HD 660S for my listening.

 

[Andreas007]

I used a Beyerdynamic DT880 Pro for listening and did a very quick evaluation just before I went to bed.
My approach was: Which sound is the most natural and are there any things that annoy me?
So, not a very scientific method, but I ended up with D. It was the speaker “I could live with…”.

C was clearly the worst. The difference between the others were not so easy to detect, however.

 

[Vuki]

Too late to vote, but... used AKG k371.
Listened mostly to track 3 - b&c ruled out - too colored, muddy, prefered d over a because it was cleaner, more dynamic.

 

[Thomas_A]

Pretty impressive specs, almost too good - better than a Class 1 mic.
The frequency response shown seems to me to be the free field frequency response, I can't see the diffuse field frequency response anywhere.

The difference between free and diffuse field frequency response (calibration files) looks like this for my microphone (normalized to free field frequency response)
View attachment 159967

I will try to see if I can get the DF as well.

 

[Thomas_A]

I went against the crowd this time and chose B. It had the most natural timbre of piano. I noted that it was a bit bass heavy on other tracks though. Listening on the other speakers, the piano was just wrong. There must be some errors either distortion or in frequency response causing this.

 

[Triliza]

I was between speaker B and D, went for B in the end. If it was bass heavy, it must have been canceled by HD650 being light in the bass without EQ.

 

[ctrl]

It could be that one or the other does not like the results. Therefore, right from the start, there is no conspiracy and the data were not manipulated by me.

The result of the poll:

Speaker A - Heco Direct (3000€)



Speaker B - KEF Reference 3 (9000€)


Speaker C - Bowers & Wilkins 802 D3 (22000€) (No manufacturer link found)


Speaker D - Grimm Audio LS1 (22000€) with subwoofer modul


Source of the frequency response measurements is hifitest.de.
Source of the binaural recordings is German magazin lowbeats soundcloud.com database..

The current binaural recordings (by lowbeats.de) are made in an EBU-Tech 3276 compliant studio. The older recordings, used in our poll, were made in their own acoustically treated listening room (here is the link to the translation or use the translator of your choice). In the pictures you can see the typical setup.

Two MBHO small-diaphragm condenser microphones with free-field equalized omnidirectional characteristics in AB configuration were used for the binaural recording.
The current binaural recordings are performed with a KU100.
More details about their binaural recordings can be found here (here is the link to the translation or use the translator of your choice).

 

[Thomas_A]

I was between speaker B and D, went for B in the end. If it was bass heavy, it must have been canceled by HD650 being light in the bass without EQ.

I listen through modified DT150 and these are not bass light.

 

[oivavoi]

It could be that one or the other does not like the results. Therefore, right from the start, there is no conspiracy and the data were not manipulated by me.

The result of the poll:
View attachment 160089


Speaker A - Heco Direct (3000€)
View attachment 160090 View attachment 160094


Speaker B - KEF Reference 3 (9000€)
View attachment 160091 View attachment 160095

Speaker C - Bowers & Wilkins 802 D3 (22000€) (No manufacturer link found)
View attachment 160092View attachment 160096

Speaker D - Grimm Audio LS1 (22000€) with subwoofer modul
View attachment 160093 View attachment 160100

Source of the frequency response measurements is hifitest.de.
Source of the binaural recordings is German magazin lowbeats soundcloud.com database..

The current binaural recordings (by lowbeats.de) are made in an EBU-Tech 3276 compliant studio. The older recordings, used in our poll, were made in their own acoustically treated listening room (here is the link to the translation or use the translator of your choice). In the pictures you can see the typical setup.
View attachment 160102
Two MBHO small-diaphragm condenser microphones with free-field equalized omnidirectional characteristics in AB configuration were used for the binaural recording.
The current binaural recordings are performed with a KU100.
More details about their binaural recordings can be found here (here is the link to the translation or use the translator of your choice).

Very interesting! Thanks! Need to process this a bit My listening-based analysis was off - there are clear differences in baffle design (and thus acoustic cancellation) between these models! Wide baffles FTW though.

Once again the best-measuring loudspeaker seems to be preferred by the majority. Cool.

 

[thewas]

The result of the poll:

Thank you for the great loudspeaker choices, am glad that it seems I could discern some tonal particularities quite well, also a nice confirmation that loudspeakers with linear deep freefield frequency response usually have too much bass without room correction, interestingly the Grimm with sub setup doesn't seem to suffer from that as much as the KEF, maybe as the sub is placed directly on the floor and/or the appropriate correction or "dip switch" setting was used?

 

[Thomas_A]

Would be nice to see spectrum of the recordings vs original for the three music pieces.

 

[oivavoi]

That Heco Direkt is actually an interesting speaker, at least with some eq. Haven't thought too much about that speaker previously. Looks good (IMO), decent measurements, and now I know that I don't perceive it to be that far behind the LS1, which I have perceived as absolutely fantastic in sighted in-person listening...

 

[Vuki]

Very entertaining test. Would be quite interesting to see listening position FR measurements too.

 

[Nicolaas]

That Heco Direkt is actually an interesting speaker, at least with some eq. Haven't thought too much about that speaker previously. Looks good (IMO), decent measurements, and now I know that I don't perceive it to be that far behind the LS1, which I have perceived as absolutely in sighted in-person listening...

Maybe the results make the Heco a steal at € 1600 a pair (current price)