Elac Adante AS-61 Speaker Review

[Abe_W]

I simply made a prediction - not a conclusion - based on the available data. I did say "it seems really hard to believe." I didn't mean to imply it was a certainty the pioneers would win.

Also note I said within the pioneer's "comfort" zone. It seems they can quickly deteriorate with SPL, for instance. I get where you're coming from, but we're here to talk about measurements, right?

I mean, a pair of Infinity bookshelves once beat a pair of revel salons in a blind test organized by Harman itself, according to Andew Robinson, who participated in one. I once enjoyed listening to some mid-range Focals more than their flagship $220,000 grand Utopias back-to-back.

I don't doubt your personal impressions, but that doesn't negate what the measurements tell us. Occasoinally I like a speaker that appears to measure worse than another. There are any of a myriad of reasons that could be the case. It happens, and I'm fine with that.

Some of the other speakers i auditioned before i picked the Adantes, Focal 948 (6k/pair), B&W 702 (5k/pair), Revel F228be (10k/pair), Micintosh XR100 (10k/pair), Klipsch Ak6 (15k/pair), Sonus Faber Olympica (13.5k/pair), Sonus Faber Cremonese (45k/pair).

The only speaker i audited that sounded (to my ears) a notch above the Adantes and everything else i audited was the Yamaha NS 5000. If i had heard the NS 5000 before i bought these, i might have tried to get my hands on those. Eitherways, my ears may not be sht because whoever gave the EISA award to the Adantes picked it over speakers that cost many magnitudes more than what they sell for these days (2.5k to 3k/pair)

On a side note, Andrew R is a lying snake who sings louder in praise for whoever pays him the most. He is also a non-techie numbnut and I could give a rat sass about what he thought (w.r.t anything in life).

 

[WonderBoy]

<snip>
EDIT: Also, very notably, Jones' own super cheap pioneer BS22 beats the Andante in the preference department, even without ignoring LFX. Not by an insignificant margin either 4.0/5.9 to 4.8/7.4 - Ouch.
</snip>

LOL, can I please have a hit of what you're smoking? BS22's are fine for what they are, but way limited & a tinge of plastic-y timbre. The 4" driver has a vented pole and large magnet made those good back in the day– vs Adante yeah, no -- also adantes are not expensive speakers in the grand scheme of things, there's a lot of meat there even in raw materials. I'm all for giant killers!

Aside: I had the BS22's for a year or 2, know them well.

 

[napilopez]

LOL, can I please have a hit of what you're smoking? BS22's are fine for what they are, but way limited & a tinge of plastic-y timbre. The 4" driver has a vented pole and large magnet made those good back in the day– vs Adante yeah, no -- also adantes are not expensive speakers in the grand scheme of things, there's a lot of meat there even in raw materials. I'm all for giant killers!

Aside: I had the BS22's for a year or 2, know them well.

I'm not smoking anything . I simply quoted what the actual numbers said, which are a reflection of what the measurements look like.

As I said before, I don't doubt anyone's personal impressions and it seems really hard to believe the pioneers would win against the Andantes. And it's practically a given the Andantes would handle higher SPL levels and likely have better dynamics, etc.

I'd almost say I doubt the pioneers would win, but the whole point of the measurements being tied back to double blind testing is that sometimes people are deceived by expectations and appearances, even when it seems obvious a particular speaker will win. Familiarity has little do with it - even when Harman's own designers participate in blind tests, they can't pick out their own speakers all the time, and sometimes the much cheaper models win.

All I said in my original post was that the Pioneers measure better than the Andantes by a significant margin according to the numbers, and I'd be curious to see how they compare in a double blind test within the Pioneer's comfort zone -- reasonable output or crossed with a sub.

I do not think that is an outlandish train of throught. If the Andantes win, it will be in spite of worse measurements, not because of them.

(Note also I'm talking about the preference score's assessment of the measurements. My personal interpretation of the measurements does not necessarily put the Pioneers ahead, at least not by any margin).

 

[Abe_W]

I'm not smoking anything . I simply quoted what the actual numbers said, which are a reflection of what the measurements look like.

As I said before, I don't doubt anyone's personal impressions and it seems really hard to believe the pioneers would win against the Andantes. And it's practically a given the Andantes would handle higher SPL levels and likely have better dynamics, etc.

I'd almost say I doubt the pioneers would win, but the whole point of the measurements being tied back to double blind testing is that sometimes people are deceived by expectations and appearances, even when it seems obvious a particular speaker will win. Familiarity has little do with it - even when Harman's own designers participate in blind tests, they can't pick out their own speakers all the time, and sometimes the much cheaper models win.

All I said in my original post was that the Pioneers measure better than the Andantes by a significant margin according to the numbers, and I'd be curious to see how they compare in a double blind test within the Pioneer's comfort zone -- reasonable output or crossed with a sub.

I do not think that is an outlandish train of throught. If the Andantes win, it will be in spite of worse measurements, not because of them.

(Note also I'm talking about the preference score's assessment of the measurements. My personal interpretation of the measurements does not necessarily put the Pioneers ahead, at least not by any margin).

Dude, as far as speakers go, these speakers are just a tad bit complicated than your 3 drivers/crossover in a damn box, ok? I'll boss man talk about it himself.

You're taking a set of run of the mill measurements done on this review with an ass amp to note that you understand a whole lot more about them than you do. Can his "measurements" declare anything about the benefits of the coupled cavity in these speakers? Nada! These speakers image ungodly and can his "measurements" say anything about it? NO. These speakers resolve ungodly, but, which graph explains that exactly? Nada! But, here, i am sitting around listening to it everyday dude. I'll show you some monitors that measure flat as fck, but, sound like complete ass. But, i bet guys on this forum would declare that these ass monitors are godlike because they saw a flat line somewhere! I hung on to a pair of Pioneer S-1EX floorstanders for many years for dear life before i sold it (he literally flowed down everything from the 80k TAD Reference on the S-1EX which is why they were called the baby TADs). For me, the Adantes were an upgrade from the S-1EX. But, here you are comparing the Adantes to a pair of BS22's (so silly). Amir should go hangout with AJ in ELAC's test lab for a week or two and learn a few things.

I design military aircraft for a living dude. We spend so much freaking money on large subsystem field tests over and over an over till we are blue in the damn face....because there are a whole lotta things we can't measure quite well or simulate. FEM, multibody, component level tests, system identification, whoop di doo, whatever can only get me so far. You can't measure every fcking thing in the world of engineering, ok? The more you learn in life, the more you're illuminated about how very little you know in life. God bless!

 

[amirm]

Dude, as far as speakers go, these speakers are just a tad bit complicated than your 3 drivers/crossover in a damn box, ok? I'll boss man talk about it himself.

You're taking a set of run of the mill measurements done on this review with an ass amp to note that you understand a whole lot more about them than you do. Can his "measurements" declare anything about the benefits of the coupled cavity in these speakers? Nada! These speakers image ungodly and can his "measurements" say anything about it? NO. These speakers resolve ungodly, but, which graph explains that exactly? Nada! But, here, i am sitting around listening to it everyday dude. I'll show you some monitors that measure flat as fck, but, sound like complete ass. But, i bet guys on this forum would declare that these ass monitors are godlike because they saw a flat line somewhere! I hung on to a pair of Pioneer S-1EX floorstanders for many years for dear life before i sold it (he literally flowed down everything from the 80k TAD Reference on the S-1EX which is why they were called the baby TADs). For me, the Adantes were an upgrade from the S-1EX. But, here you are comparing the Adantes to a pair of BS22's (so silly). Amir should go hangout with AJ in ELAC's test lab for a week or two and learn a few things.

I design military aircraft for a living dude. We spend so much freaking money on large subsystem field tests over and over an over till we are blue in the damn face....because there are a whole lotta things we can't measure quite well or simulate. FEM, multibody, component level tests, system identification, whoop di doo, whatever can only get me so far. You can't measure every fcking thing in the world of engineering, ok? The more you learn in life, the more you're illuminated about how very little you know in life. God bless!

Take caution in your tone. We don't speak to each other this way in this forum. If your position is so weak as to require anger to bolster it, then I suggest you rethink them.

 

[q3cpma]

Dude, as far as speakers go, these speakers are just a tad bit complicated than your 3 drivers/crossover in a damn box, ok? I'll boss man talk about it himself.

You're taking a set of run of the mill measurements done on this review with an ass amp to note that you understand a whole lot more about them than you do. Can his "measurements" declare anything about the benefits of the coupled cavity in these speakers? Nada! These speakers image ungodly and can his "measurements" say anything about it? NO. These speakers resolve ungodly, but, which graph explains that exactly? Nada! But, here, i am sitting around listening to it everyday dude. I'll show you some monitors that measure flat as fck, but, sound like complete ass. But, i bet guys on this forum would declare that these ass monitors are godlike because they saw a flat line somewhere! I hung on to a pair of Pioneer S-1EX floorstanders for many years for dear life before i sold it (he literally flowed down everything from the 80k TAD Reference on the S-1EX which is why they were called the baby TADs). For me, the Adantes were an upgrade from the S-1EX. But, here you are comparing the Adantes to a pair of BS22's (so silly). Amir should go hangout with AJ in ELAC's test lab for a week or two and learn a few things.

I design military aircraft for a living dude. We spend so much freaking money on large subsystem field tests over and over an over till we are blue in the damn face....because there are a whole lotta things we can't measure quite well or simulate. FEM, multibody, component level tests, system identification, whoop di doo, whatever can only get me so far. You can't measure every fcking thing in the world of engineering, ok? The more you learn in life, the more you're illuminated about how very little you know in life. God bless!

"Hey buddy, I think you got the wrong door, the leather club is two blocks down."

 

[tecnogadget]

Wow looks like somebody needs to chill

 

[Liberal Democracy]

Take caution in your tone. We don't speak to each other this way in this forum. If your position is so weak as to require anger to bolster it, then I suggest you rethink them.

 

[napilopez]

Dude, as far as speakers go, these speakers are just a tad bit complicated than your 3 drivers/crossover in a damn box, ok? I'll boss man talk about it himself.

You're taking a set of run of the mill measurements done on this review with an ass amp to note that you understand a whole lot more about them than you do. Can his "measurements" declare anything about the benefits of the coupled cavity in these speakers? Nada! These speakers image ungodly and can his "measurements" say anything about it? NO. These speakers resolve ungodly, but, which graph explains that exactly? Nada! But, here, i am sitting around listening to it everyday dude. I'll show you some monitors that measure flat as fck, but, sound like complete ass. But, i bet guys on this forum would declare that these ass monitors are godlike because they saw a flat line somewhere! I hung on to a pair of Pioneer S-1EX floorstanders for many years for dear life before i sold it (he literally flowed down everything from the 80k TAD Reference on the S-1EX which is why they were called the baby TADs). For me, the Adantes were an upgrade from the S-1EX. But, here you are comparing the Adantes to a pair of BS22's (so silly). Amir should go hangout with AJ in ELAC's test lab for a week or two and learn a few things.

I design military aircraft for a living dude. We spend so much freaking money on large subsystem field tests over and over an over till we are blue in the damn face....because there are a whole lotta things we can't measure quite well or simulate. FEM, multibody, component level tests, system identification, whoop di doo, whatever can only get me so far. You can't measure every fcking thing in the world of engineering, ok? The more you learn in life, the more you're illuminated about how very little you know in life. God bless!

That's nice, but it doesn't negate anything I said. In fact, I said:

Occasoinally I like a speaker that appears to measure worse than another. There are any of a myriad of reasons that could be the case. It happens, and I'm fine with that.

Emphasized for clarity. Cheers!

 

[jhaider]

You're taking a set of run of the mill measurements done on this review with an ass amp to note that you understand a whole lot more about them than you do.

While I wish Klippel NFS scans of loudspeakers were so prevalent that "run of the mill" is an accurate characterization, unfortunately in the real world that is not accurate.

Can his "measurements" declare anything about the benefits of the coupled cavity in these speakers?

Yes, as well as the drawbacks thereof.

I design military aircraft for a living dude. We spend so much freaking money on large subsystem field tests over and over an over till we are blue in the damn face....because there are a whole lotta things we can't measure quite well or simulate.

There's a lot more going on in an aircraft than in a loudspeaker. Also, loudspeakers present comparatively nonexistent safety concerns.

 

[amirm]

Amir should go hangout with AJ in ELAC's test lab for a week or two and learn a few things.

I have known Andrew for years. At every audio show I would go and hang out at least half hour if not more in his suite while he played music and explained his designs. And he knows me. I shared this review with him when it came out. I suggest you spend some time in a real acoustic research lab and learn what these measurements mean and why they are important. You would not allow me to comment on your airplane designs. Not sure why you want us to accept your speaker evaluation when you haven't learned the science behind these tests. Decades of research are behind them.

 

[amirm]

I design military aircraft for a living dude. We spend so much freaking money on large subsystem field tests over and over an over till we are blue in the damn face....because there are a whole lotta things we can't measure quite well or simulate. FEM, multibody, component level tests, system identification, whoop di doo, whatever can only get me so far. You can't measure every fcking thing in the world of engineering, ok? The more you learn in life, the more you're illuminated about how very little you know in life. God bless!

I wonder how far you would get in your profession if you ignored all the science you just listed and instead went by what someone "likes" about a design. Hey, this airplane wing looks good to me let's go with that! Why do we need to simulate it with FEA? Just build it. I "know" it will be good and all these people explaining the science otherwise have no idea.

There are people who have spent a lifetime trying to correlate speaker preference with objective measurements. Don't dismiss it out of hand by telling us your qualifications in determining if a speaker sounds good or not is designing aircraft. Reminds me of my ex-partner in another audio forum who was a doctor. When we disagreed, he would always say, "I make life and death decisions every day; you think I don't know the answer to this business question???"

It may come as a shock to you but countless designers including Andrew follow this research as well. It is just that they have to create a differentiated products and live within strict cost targets and marketing plans. So that leads to different choices than necessarily the optimal ones.

The speaker you love has been discontinued. If it is so good, then why that?

 

[dinglehoser]

Guy, chill. No one is questioning your taste or reasons for owning what, in the end, is just a *thing*. Yet you're coming across as if the mere existence of measurements that don't entirely comport with your experience is tantamount to a personal attack, or at least an attack on your judgment. If you like it, that's all that matters. Who cares if the numbers say something different? Also, who cares that others don't see it the same way as you?

 

[Abe_W]

I wonder how far you would get in your profession if you ignored all the science you just listed and instead went by what someone "likes" about a design. Hey, this airplane wing looks good to me let's go with that! Why do we need to simulate it with FEA? Just build it. I "know" it will be good and all these people explaining the science otherwise have no idea.

There are people who have spent a lifetime trying to correlate speaker preference with objective measurements. Don't dismiss it out of hand by telling us your qualifications in determining if a speaker sounds good or not is designing aircraft. Reminds me of my ex-partner in another audio forum who was a doctor. When we disagreed, he would always say, "I make life and death decisions every day; you think I don't know the answer to this business question???"

It may come as a shock to you but countless designers including Andrew follow this research as well. It is just that they have to create a differentiated products and live within strict cost targets and marketing plans. So that leads to different choices than necessarily the optimal ones.

The speaker you love has been discontinued. If it is so good, then why that?

Ok, I am not a audio engineer and i wouldn't know about the nitty gritty of speaker design a.k.a. what some speaker designer is honing into. I am a aerospace systems lead (entirely different industry) and my customer base is something else. We do a whole lotta (WHOLE LOT) research in my field as well and If we screw up, people die...we get strapped with lawsuits...we lose our shirts and get tossed on the sidewalk rather quickly (high stress). But, in fact, there is a lotta research that we have done in my field that the even the audio industry could borrow, if they chose to innovate more. Too much of a plateau with guys in their comfort zone and very few designers trying something radically new. I may know somethin about aeroacoustics, aeroelasticity, composites, acoustic field tests that we do, whatever, (even has the word acoustic in it!!! lol) but, i agree it's different from three drivers and a crossover in a box that makes music. However, I did play a violin for 30 years and i do know something about music. I assume you're a computer engineer/electrical (EECS kinda guy?) I also did take my fair share of EECS electives when i turned in a disseration a decade ago. So, I can promise you, you wouldn't lose me completely if you started to describe the nitty gritty of it and i am all ears on this (willing to learn). This is precisely why i joined this forum....learn something from experts (if they are experts indeed) in a different field.

Since you mention correlations with "speaker preference to objective measurements", i wonder how far these correlations got and how many holes can be picked apart if some hawk eyed engineer started looking at it. I wonder why there are still so many different brands of speakers that sound so different then. How much do you trust it?
Either way,
a) Ahem, this is what the frequency response of the HUMAN EAR itself looks like (mas o menos). It surely isn't flat (last i checked, check attached). (Correct me if i'm wrong, or let's probe this quest for flatness a bit more).
b) Listeners have all kinds of different ears
c) Listeners listen at different levels
d) Listeners have all kinds of different rooms, placement, etc
e) Listeners have all kinds of different gear
f) Listeners listen to all kinds of different instruments, lousy recordings, different genres of music, etc etc.
g) These are not high end speakers (20k+). It would be wise to assume that folks in this price bracket may not have competent high end electronics, invested significantly in room treatments, etc.

I think Andrew Jones has the engineering aptitude to come come up with a very flat line if it's all that mattered. But, If you are a speaker designer working for a business, i.e, you are trying to capture a significant chunk of the customer base at this price bracket and make your speaker profitable, i.e., you don't wanna lose your shirt (as a business), i.e., you gotta appeal somehow to a large enough number of ears, how would you design it? You sure as heck may have the engineering aptitude to come up with a flat line (not doubting that). But what would it be? A flat line? (in consideration of 'confoundances' a, b, c, d, e, f, g and the above mentioned). Or do you live in complete trust of this "speaker preference to objective measurements" correlation data you've got. Maybe, that's the best you can do....that's all you have to go with, maybe not, enlighten me.

Thanks,

 

[Jon AA]

i wonder how far these correlations got and how many holes can be picked apart if some hawk eyed engineer started looking at it.

You seem unaware, it was the "hawk eyed engineers" testing for exactly those things--correlations between listener preference and measurements--that came up with these measurements. Nobody here is trying to take credit for inventing any of this science. We're just using it.

 

[Erik]

When "audiophiles" start to present equal loudness contours as if it's a solid argument to whatever nonsense they say, you know they are right at the top of Mt. Stupid of the Dunning–Kruger effect. A cocktail of déjà vu and empathetic embarrassment.

 

[WonderBoy]

@amirm reply to @Abe_W snip: The speaker you love has been discontinued. If it is so good, then why that?

Maybe it's just in no-man's land price wise and they are big (even the bookshelf) Probably coming from Elac corporate: ie not moving enough of them vs any actual problem or poor/good review, reviews were far and few vs the normal saturated stuff (klipsch/bucardt/smaller elacs). Still hoping Andrew chimes in on these! @amirm maybe bug Andrew again ;D

Personally I think they are good, don't really need to defend* too hard, they stand on their own. Lucky to have a set before they were toast.

*Just lightly defend, this review does make the measurements look borked to the un-initiated.

PS: oh yeah... possibly lots of returns on the 1st run? Mine had the coils rip off in shipping (twice) one set played, the replacement did not... so I bailed completely for a year+ until they fixed the issues. Current set is tight, no problems. --> could be another factor for Elac to axe them.

 

[Absolute]

....enlighten me.

This would be a good start if it had a question mark behind it. It doesn't smell like curiosity to me, after that shit-show of an arrogant post that ending smells like an invitation to the good ol' proverbial e-slap.

But instead of that, let me rephrase your post as you probably meant it;

Ok, I am not a audio engineer and i wouldn't know about the nitty gritty of speaker design a.k.a. what some speaker designer is honing into. Since you mention correlations with "speaker preference to objective measurements", i wonder how far these correlations got. Could you help enlighten me?
Thanks!

 

[amirm]

Ok, I am not a audio engineer and i wouldn't know about the nitty gritty of speaker design a.k.a. what some speaker designer is honing into. I am a aerospace systems lead (entirely different industry) and my customer base is something else. We do a whole lotta (WHOLE LOT) research in my field as well and If we screw up, people die...we get strapped with lawsuits...we lose our shirts and get tossed on the sidewalk rather quickly (high stress).

Well, in my last corporate job, I managed all the audio technologies for the company (among many other fields). If we made the wrong call about what sounded good, we would soil the reputation of this major company, and our own careers. So you better bet that we needed to be right or else the consequences would be severe. We would routinely get subjected to third-party benchmarking tests that we had to pass. We could not kid ourselves with thinking this and that is good because we developed it.

Back to this topic, after decades of being an audiophile and thinking I knew it all, I went to Harman. I sat through this presentation from Dr. Toole that made no sense to me. That a reflection from the side sounds different than the same reflection from the floor? That is an impossibility I said. But the shocker was yet to come. I got taken to a room where a curtain covered a few speakers. They would shuttle in and out and you would listen and had to score. The session finishes and the best speaker I rated was a JBL horn speaker! That couldn't be. How did I rate it over all the other speakers in there that were famous for their sound. And I had heard and thought I liked them.

It was at that point that I decided to erase everything I thought I knew about acoustics and start over. A journey that took me a few years and reading of hundreds of research papers. Meeting again and again with those researchers, until it all sank it. It was the most logical explanation of sound reproduction and what could be preferable. It all made sense in a sea of differing opinions that did not.

Fast forward years later and here we are with me spending money to buy a $100,000 measurement system to produce the data that you are saying can't possibly be useful. I hope you understand that every bone in my body thinks otherwise. That a good speaker has the characteristics we aspire to see in measurements. That they are most likely to sound good in any room and with vast majority of listeners.

I realize the above is shocking as it was to me when I was first exposed to it. But as I said, it is the best story we have about good sound in our rooms and by far better than anything else. I hope you take it slow from here on, and let this revelation sink in. As it did for me....

 

[richard12511]

I'm not smoking anything . I simply quoted what the actual numbers said, which are a reflection of what the measurements look like.

As I said before, I don't doubt anyone's personal impressions and it seems really hard to believe the pioneers would win against the Andantes. And it's practically a given the Andantes would handle higher SPL levels and likely have better dynamics, etc.

I'd almost say I doubt the pioneers would win, but the whole point of the measurements being tied back to double blind testing is that sometimes people are deceived by expectations and appearances, even when it seems obvious a particular speaker will win. Familiarity has little do with it - even when Harman's own designers participate in blind tests, they can't pick out their own speakers all the time, and sometimes the much cheaper models win.

All I said in my original post was that the Pioneers measure better than the Andantes by a significant margin according to the numbers, and I'd be curious to see how they compare in a double blind test within the Pioneer's comfort zone -- reasonable output or crossed with a sub.

I do not think that is an outlandish train of throught. If the Andantes win, it will be in spite of worse measurements, not because of them.

(Note also I'm talking about the preference score's assessment of the measurements. My personal interpretation of the measurements does not necessarily put the Pioneers ahead, at least not by any margin).

Looking at the scores, they're almost exactly 1.6 apart(which I think is 2 standard deviations?). I think these two speakers are far enough apart to say that most people (say 80%+) would probably prefer the Pioneers over the Adantes in a double blind scenario crossed to subs. It's illogical due to the same designer and the huge difference in price points, but it's what the data says. To say that the Adantes would win, you'd almost have to believe that measurements don't matter at all. I'm sure it's a hard pill to swallow for Adante owners, and that's why we see so much pushback, but it really is what the data says. How much faith do we put in the data? That is the question.