Buchardt A500 Powered Bookshelf Speaker Review (by Erin)

[abdo123]

Some one needs to make a wisa adapter/receiver for non wisa speakers and subs

There are solutions by SVS btw.

 

[Wicky]

Undefeatable loudness correction sounds like a downside to me because, in my experience, loudness correction has to be manually configurable to not be annoying with at least some content depending on the levels. It's not really possible to detect the right amount of correction just based on the signal.

I looked at the manual and it doesn't appear to say anything about this either... is it not configurable at least?

The only thing that is "configurable" is your selection of Master Tunings published by the manufacturer and the ability to manually EQ via the app. My understanding is that if you want to tweak your EQ you should use the "The Theoretical - Flat (new)" and then set your preferred EQ. From Buchardt's website:

"With the introduction of the manual EQ feature of the Platin hub, we have given the users full control of the speakers output. However – the one thing manual EQ cannot adjust – is the philosophy with which the drivers are mixed, crossed and controlled. To allow everybody a ‘blank sheet’ for performing their own EQ’s, these new MT’s have been made, where the systems are trimmed to perfection to achieve very flat response – with regard to on-axis, sound power and listening window performance. This means anybody can trim and adjust with these starting points – and do it exactly to their own preference."

I don't know if they intend to open up/add additionally user functionality to their DSP for enthusiasts to play with, but I'd certainly welcome it

I do think it's also worth remembering that there is undoubtably a philosophy and price/performance/functionality trade-offs in the design of the A500. These are not directly competing with the likes of Genelec, Nueman etc... as I'm sure you would agree. They are supposed to be somewhat plug-and-play with the ability to be a functionally extensible all-in-one platform.

<edit>
Disclosure: I'm am a happy owner of the A500's

 

[thewas]

The interesting question to me with these settings is that they are obviously capable of EQing the speaker dead flat. If I wanted a "warm" tuning, I'd still want the curve to be dead flat, just tilted or perhaps something like a combnation of shelf filters with a tilt through part of the range and the rest of it still flat. This is, for example, how Genelec implements curve alterations in GLM.

Yet some of these tunings seem to have pretty large variations introduced. So it kinda begs the question: Why?

Not that I am saying it's your responsibility to investigate or anything lol. But maybe a question for @Mads Buchardt

Was just wondering the same when seeing that some of the tunings seem optimised to flatish targets while others are full of dips and peaks, hope there will be an answer from Mads.

 

[fineMen]

Discuss!

I wonder why Buchardt keeps the high x-over frequency for the tweeter with this active design. A limiter, protecting the delicate 19mm driver was obviously at hand. In comparison to Genelec for instance, I do not see that much of innovation to justify the price tag. We all know, how cost effective the drivers actually are, and how effortlessly a digital x/o can be designed.

cc

 

[HooStat]

This speaker offers the opportunity to do some validation on the "Olive" score. One could elicit preferences for several different tunings and also measure the different tunings to calculate the score. I think that would be a relatively doable, interesting set of results.

Perhaps the A700 might be a better option simply because it is more full-range and one could adjust bass settings over a wider range.

 

[napilopez]

I wonder why Buchardt keeps the high x-over frequency for the tweeter with this active design. A limiter, protecting the delicate 19mm driver was obviously at hand. In comparison to Genelec for instance, I do not see that much of innovation to justify the price tag. We all know, how cost effective the drivers actually are, and how effortlessly a digital x/o can be designed.

cc

For me the thing is that nothing out there really does what buchardt is doing here at it its price, especially with the easy room correction. Genelec speakers might be better in some senses, but Imo require significantly more elbow grease to get the most out of it (you'll need a sub and a way to integrate it, deal with GLM and extra cables). The A500 are for people who don't want to deal with that And IMO I don't care how good a speaker is -- if you can't hear the lowest frequencies, it's not going to sound as a good as a speaker in which you can.

 

[YSC]

For me the thing is that nothing out there really does what buchardt is doing here at it its price, especially with the easy room correction. Genelec speakers might be better in some senses, but Imo require significantly more elbow grease to get the most out of it (you'll need a sub and a way to integrate it, deal with GLM and extra cables). The A500 are for people who don't want to deal with that And IMO I don't care how good a speaker is -- if you can't hear the lowest frequencies, it's not going to sound as a good as a speaker in which you can.

true, my 8030C really get to another level with a single 7040A in my tight space, the A500 could do so also with similar extension and accuracy. but too bad it's more expensive (almost double), and the 280mm depth is a bit too much for extremely close up desktop usage

 

[VintageFlanker]

 

[Buddelpudding]

@VintageFlanker
Don't you have some experience with the Kef R-series?
I am currently running KEF R5s with your old RME dac and an Apollon Purifi amp. Very happy with the system, but due to WAF-concerns, I am thinking about switching to the A500s.
What is your guess - will this be a better speaker overall or is it worth keeping the coaxial drivers and the super clean amp in the current setup?

 

[Mads Buchardt]

The interesting question to me with these settings is that they are obviously capable of EQing the speaker dead flat. If I wanted a "warm" tuning, I'd still want the curve to be dead flat, just tilted or perhaps something like a combnation of shelf filters with a tilt through part of the range and the rest of it still flat. This is, for example, how Genelec implements curve alterations in GLM.

Yet some of these tunings seem to have pretty large variations introduced. So it kinda begs the question: Why?

Not that I am saying it's your responsibility to investigate or anything lol. But maybe a question for @Mads Buchardt

sorry for the late response here. not that often I log in here.

our warm tuning, or the stock for that matter looks pretty similar to each other, and when only looking at measurements, it's looking kind of "off" which I agree with. this is work done by a completely different designer compared to the theoretical tunings. these are done without that much processing, FIIR filter and such. they are designed and tuned more by ear and experience if you will, and listing to them, gives you a different picture. we have close to 1500 users on the a500 speakers, and from those that are reporting back, I would say around 8/10 prefer this. looking at the measurements, it should in theory be the other way around...

I have thought about doing an small experiment with my customers base to dig a bit further into this (for those who wish), as this have been extremely interesting knowledge for us.

FIY the a500s point to where much larger speakers perform better (mainly spl, THD and such) would be "solved" with the release of the a500 signature that would use purifi woofers

 

[abdo123]

sorry for the late response here. not that often I log in here.

our warm tuning, or the stock for that matter looks pretty similar to each other, and when only looking at measurements, it's looking kind of "off" which I agree with. this is work done by a completely different designer compared to the theoretical tunings. these are done without that much processing, FIIR filter and such. they are designed and tuned more by ear and experience if you will, and listing to them, gives you a different picture. we have close to 1500 users on the a500 speakers, and from those that are reporting back, I would say around 8/10 prefer this. looking at the measurements, it should in theory be the other way around...

I have thought about doing an small experiment with my customers base to dig a bit further into this (for those who wish), as this have been extremely interesting knowledge for us.

FIY the a500s point to where much larger speakers perform better (mainly spl, THD and such) would be "solved" with the release of the a500 signature that would use purifi woofers

It could be very well the case that ‘Warm’ sounds much better to the ear than ‘Theoritical Flat’.

 

[fineMen]

For me the thing is that nothing out there really does what buchardt is doing here at it its price, especially with the easy room correction. Genelec speakers might be better in some senses, but Imo require significantly more elbow grease to get the most out of it (you'll need a sub and a way to integrate it, deal with GLM and extra cables). The A500 are for people who don't want to deal with that And IMO I don't care how good a speaker is -- if you can't hear the lowest frequencies, it's not going to sound as a good as a speaker in which you can.

The A500 as a sealed design would't deliver louder or deeper bass than the previous single driver / passive drone variant.

Of course my argument was stated from the perspective of a knowledgeable consumer. I'm capable to do my part of the optimisation targeting exactly my room and listening position and, not the least listening objectives. How I want to enjoy my stereo besides of 'critical listening'.

 

[Sancus]

we have close to 1500 users on the a500 speakers, and from those that are reporting back, I would say around 8/10 prefer this. looking at the measurements, it should in theory be the other way around...

Thanks for the response! It's honestly not uncommon to prefer added bass, so that doesn't surprise me too much. Even Amir added some bass when he did the 8361A review, despite declaring them amazing.

The real question, to me, would be whether folks prefer a "warm" tuning that still tries to keep the curve smoother and with less seemingly unnecessary variation -- not whether they prefer a warmer curve in general. And of course, the name itself no doubt introduces some bias.

I have no idea how fast/easy it is to switch tunings or update the speakers with new ones, but if it's not too hard, it seems to me like Buchardt has an opportunity to run actual blind tests with unlabeled curves "Tuning A/B/C/D" to test different hypotheses. That could be very interesting!

FIY the a500s point to where much larger speakers perform better (mainly spl, THD and such) would be "solved" with the release of the a500 signature that would use purifi woofers

Nice!

 

[Buddelpudding]

the release of the a500 signature

Any hints as to when this is likely going to happen?

 

[Mads Buchardt]

Thanks for the response! It's honestly not uncommon to prefer added bass, so that doesn't surprise me too much. Even Amir added some bass when he did the 8361A review, despite declaring them amazing.

The real question, to me, would be whether folks prefer a "warm" tuning that still tries to keep the curve smoother and with less seemingly unnecessary variation -- not whether they prefer a warmer curve in general. And of course, the name itself no doubt introduces some bias.

I have no idea how fast/easy it is to switch tunings or update the speakers with new ones, but if it's not too hard, it seems to me like Buchardt has an opportunity to run actual blind tests with unlabeled curves "Tuning A/B/C/D" to test different hypotheses. That could be very interesting!



Nice!

yeah we for sure sit with an golden opportunity to blind test and let people judge in known involvements as fast or slow they would like. it's about 20 sec to swap mastertunings.

the warm tuning does have some more bass in some areas, but generally it have less as it does cut off sooner than the theoreticals as it does not use as dramatic cut offs. also worth mentioning that the theoretical tunings uses very high order crossovers where the order designer uses 2. orders.

 

[Mads Buchardt]

Any hints as to when this is likely going to happen?

Soon!. we have everything ready, it's just a question of building them, and tuning which have been in the works for some time already

 

[biglebowski]

Soon!. we have everything ready, it's just a question of building them, and tuning which have been in the works for some time already

And can you already confirm if a kind of “driver upgrade kit” will be available for the current A500 owners ?

 

[tifune]

Soliciting opinions from the veterans in the room: how bad, in the real world, is that dip around 2.5kHz? Wondering if measurements make it look worse than it is but -10dB in range where hearing is most sensitive, "on paper", is a tough pill to swallow

 

[ernestcarl]

Soliciting opinions from the veterans in the room: how bad, in the real world, is that dip around 2.5kHz? Wondering if measurements make it look worse than it is but -10dB in range where hearing is most sensitive, "on paper", is a tough pill to swallow

You’ll notice it the more you go vertically off-axis (esp. in the nearfield), but the horizontal (much more important) is very good. However, note that some of that energy is also going to be filled-in by room reflections — so I do not think you’d hear the level difference as something that is so unbearably obviously “bad” akin to a black-hole. Noticeable if you really pay attention, but probably — no, rather more than likely, audibly “benign” for the most part.

 

[Chromatischism]

Soliciting opinions from the veterans in the room: how bad, in the real world, is that dip around 2.5kHz? Wondering if measurements make it look worse than it is but -10dB in range where hearing is most sensitive, "on paper", is a tough pill to swallow

All non-coaxial speakers have an off axis phase cancellation like that in the vertical plot, and this is actually better than many. It is usually regarded as not audible unless you put your head directly in that spot. Which you won't.

It is more of a problem with horizontal speakers like those used for center channels because it affects listeners sitting in the side seats.