ELAC DF63 Floor standing Speaker Review

[YesChickenNuggets]

I've been accused of Andrew Jones Snobbery in the past but, well, well, you see, Hifi Companies in general don't know wtf they're doing, they're mostly liars and cheats.

Andrew Jones is among the last genuine no-nonsense audio scientists alive. There are 20 such persons in the world, they're all fat and old, once they're gone, they're gone.

We only have all these junk speakers and GR research type idiots to look forward to, the Future of HIFI is bleak.

 

[Henryk]

* half of ASR seems to not see the forest for the trees and nitpick the research to death ( see the single speaker eval tread ) more research is certainly needed but the broad picture it paints is very likely correct ? Why is this so triggering for some people .

I believe it triggers the people who can't stop thinking.

They place all their time, energy and faith into analysis, data, and knowledge.
To them, it is of supreme importance and the fundament of psychological life.

Show them how limited human intellect is and they take it as an attack on something sacrosanct.

 

[YesChickenNuggets]

Detailed and good measurements (spin pir etc ) of speakers don't predict the whole performance my guess is about 70% i think others used that ballpark figure ? I cant cite the source of that. But's its pretty good .

* half of ASR seems to not see the forest for the trees and nitpick the research to death ( see the single speaker eval tread ) more research is certainly needed but the broad picture it paints is very likely correct ? Why is this so triggering for some people .

We can agree that many things fall into the flavor category, and maybe it's true that there's no absolute right vs wrong.

But some basics are inviolable. If your PREVIOUS speaker which cost about the same or less, performed without distortion, and your New speakers distorts. You done messed up.

In this case, the problem is SEVERE. Elac either doesn't care, or even worse, they're incompetent.

 

[tw 2022]

I've been accused of Andrew Jones Snobbery in the past but, well, well, you see, Hifi Companies in general don't know wtf they're doing, they're mostly liars and cheats.

Andrew Jones is among the last genuine no-nonsense audio scientists alive. There are 20 such persons in the world, they're all fat and old, once they're gone, they're gone.

We only have all these junk speakers and GR research type idiots to look forward to, the Future of HIFI is bleak.

Not entirely true, but close..... There are guys like Dave F. at ascend that are still going strong..... Let's hope forums like this spawn the interest to continue ....

 

[dfuller]

We can agree that many things fall into the flavor category, and maybe it's true that there's no absolute right vs wrong.

But some basics are inviolable. If your PREVIOUS speaker which cost about the same or less, performed without distortion, and your New speakers distorts. You done messed up.

In this case, the problem is SEVERE. Elac either doesn't care, or even worse, they're incompetent.

well, let's not get carried away here. Another specimen did not show the distortion measured here. Like, at all.

So one of two things happened as I stated earlier (and multiple times in the thread): either Amir's sample *is* indicative of normal performance and Erin was sent a golden sample, or Erin's sample is behaving correctly and Amir got a defective or damaged speaker.

My money is on the latter. Neither has any reason to lie or massage their measurements.

What this does make Elac is either unaware of or unwilling to fix quality control or shipping damage issues.

 

[tw 2022]

well, let's not get carried away here. Another specimen did not show the distortion measured here. Like, at all.

So one of two things happened as I stated earlier (and multiple times in the thread): either Amir's sample *is* indicative of normal performance and Erin was sent a golden sample, or Erin's sample is behaving correctly and Amir got a defective or damaged speaker.

My money is on the latter. Neither has any reason to lie or massage their measurements.

What this does make Elac is either unaware of or unwilling to fix quality control or shipping damage issues.

QC stuff happens , bad days happen to people all the time , that can equate to bad product runs, or bad packaging, delivery issues ...lets see if it turns out to be chronic or the exception....

 

[Art of sound]

This is a review, listening tests, and detailed measurements of the ELAC DF63 Debut 3.0 Tower speaker. It was kindly drop shipped and donated by a member. It costs US $649 each.
View attachment 474472
The DF63 looks no worse or better than I expected which means, it is fine. Nothing exciting in the back other than the two ports:

View attachment 474473
I appreciated close to the ground terminals as there is less chance of speaker wire resonating against the cabinet. And rear ports means that their high frequency distortion is less likely to be audible.

As usual, if you are not familiar with my speaker measurements, please watch this video first:

ELAC DF63 Speaker Measurement
As usual, we start with our family of anechoic frequency response graphs generated by Klippel Near-field Scanner:
View attachment 474474
If you stand back (or filter the graph), the on-axis response generally looks level. Closer examination shows something untoward happening around 900 to 1000 Hz. And a few resonances at 90 and 180 Hz. Treble response also has some variability. But again, at high level, this is not bad.

Sensitivity is specified at 87.5 dB and it gets there, making it about 1 to 2 dB better than average (can get louder with the same amplification power). This is a common benefit of tower speakers with multiple woofers.

Directivity is reasonably smooth although doesn't follow a monotonic trend. This messes (badly) with early window reflections:
View attachment 474475

And as a result, in predicted in-room frequency response:
View attachment 474476

Showing just one port and woofer, we see the reason for some of the anechoic frequency response errors:
View attachment 474477

While this is a 3-way rather than (messy) 2.5 way speaker, it still suffers from multi-sourced interference including a port/cabinet resonance.

Back to directivity, we see very well controlled one horizontally above 1 kHz:
View attachment 474478
View attachment 474479

Vertical is messy despite the midrange:
View attachment 474480

See the messiness around 1 kHz in both graphs.

Distortion test generated very surprising results:
View attachment 474481
View attachment 474482

I have not ever seen such a massive jump in distortion with 10 dB in this class speaker! We go from better than average to worse than average. Here is a comparison with 5 dB increments:
View attachment 474483

I could hear some audible distortion at 96 dBSPL which got highly exaggerated at 101 dBSPL, rattling the entire structure of the Klippel NFS. In other words, what there is, is amplified by the cabinet.

Impedance is on the low side:
View attachment 474486

Waterfall and step responses are as expected:
View attachment 474484

View attachment 474485

ELAC DF63 Speaker Listening Test
Listening tests were made in our massive (volume wise) living room as you kind of see in the review picture. Immediate impression was that of (pleasant) warmth and full range response I don't expect to hear in this class of speaker. Fidelity was good enough that I started to question what I had measured. So I jumped right into my sub-bass test tracks to chase down the distortion there:

Sub-bass was reproduced better than this speaker has any business delivering! I almost stopped there but glad that I did not. At 30 seconds, there are some high frequency (strings?) that normally don't bother any speaker I have tested. Oh boy. Did it upset the DF-63. Massive, and I mean massive resonance set into tweeter, creating screeching sound that was nearly as loud as the notes themselves! I reduced the volume down to some -10 dB but I could still hear it. My wife was next to me so I asked her if she could hear it at around -5 dB and she could! This is a flat out failure in my book and reminds of another ELAC speaker with the same problem although here, it is far worse.

I tried to detect the problem in other clips and it was much harder. I could hear strangeness in high notes in other tracks but wouldn't bet my salary on it and nowhere as clear as the above track. I can't imaging it not being there in other clips though.

As an aside, above is a great example of using carefully selected audio tracks for speaker testing, than whatever you normally listen to.

On bass, the deep notes were very satisfying. As I cranked up the volume, I could tell they would start to get distorted and muddy but this was at rather elevated levels.

On EQ, I filled in the 1 kHz hole and it opened the sound fair bit, making the stock sound wooly and too warm and closed without it.

Conclusions
The DF63 seems to have a different recipe than many other speakers I have tested. It seems to aim for deeper bass at the expense of higher distortion/lower SPL playback. There is also some interference around 1 kHz which EQ seems to paper over. The main issue as you can imagine, is that tweeter. I don't mind gradual distortion or power limited but not this kind of massive and sudden break up. Yes, I was listening kind of loud. But once I got sensitized to it, even playback at moderate levels was audible.

On the positive front, the deep bass is extremely satisfying, making the speaker nearly full range which is remarkable in this price class. Sensitivity is higher than normal, meaning less demand on the amplifier.

I am sad to give a failing grade to ELAC DF63. Some technical flaws I can't get over and such is the case with tweeter response here.
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As always, questions, comments, recommendations, etc. are welcome.

Any donations are much appreciated using: https://www.audiosciencereview.com/forum/index.php?threads/how-to-support-audio-science-review.8150/

I find it weird that the distortion under 90db is below 3% but amir could tell resonances within the tweeter response. however he did mention it was for this particular song only. So this was a wild case where he could hear something that the measurements don't indicate but also for only one song. I don't know what to do with this but id say this speakers ticks most of the boxes wrt good design given the bookshelf version being a hit.

 

[Bernard23]

Send it to @Ageve !

No, send it to Erin. And vice versa.

Edit: I can see Erin appears to have already suggested that himself. One of the things we do in measurement is conduct inter laboratory or round Robin testing. Evaluation of the uncertainty of the measurement system is as important as the data it produces. Without this knowledge arguably the data is at best semi quantitative and you wouldn't make engineering decisions based on it, at least not ones you'd want on your CV anyway. Amir has always stated something to this effect on his measurement, and it's why you can't make a full conclusion on one set of test results.

 

[tw 2022]

No, send it to Erin. And vice versa.

this , there should be an open back and forth in regards to this sort of thing getting sorted out.. the parties needn't be friends , it's obvious they can help each other sort out discrepancies as they appear .. this is a classic case ...edit: this helps everyone including the consumer/hobbyist...

 

[Power Pop 23]

this , there should be an open back and forth in regards to this sort of thing getting sorted out.. the parties needn't be friends , it's obvious they can help each other sort out discrepancies as they appear .. this is a classic case ...edit: this helps everyone including the consumer/hobbyist...

Agreed, in the absence of a response from ELAC.

I have no idea what constraints ELAC operates under but I am puzzled that they have not contacted Amir regarding the review of his sample, given that they loaned a DF63 to Erin to measure.

 

[tmtomh]

There are also other simple explanations. Erin's sample came from the company itself (mine was bought from Amazon I think from ELAC USA direct). It could have been an earlier production sample, built locally instead of China, used different parts, etc.

Bottom line here is that we have a speaker that is in perfect condition without a single visible damage to it. Let's say I test another one and it is different. What then? How do you know which one you get if you purchase it?

Obviously you need to start testing 20 of each speaker. If at least 18 measure the same as each other, then all good.

 

[Bernard23]

Obviously you need to start testing 20 of each speaker. If at least 18 measure the same as each other, then all good.

That's what you'd expect a manufacturer to do, not the consumer. Arguably 3 data points is enough to verify a manufacturers claim or cast doubt upon their ability to manage quality. Rest is up to them to prove.

 

[Mort]

That's what you'd expect a manufacturer to do, not the consumer. Arguably 3 data points is enough to verify a manufacturers claim or cast doubt upon their ability to manage quality. Rest is up to them to prove.

Your sarcasometer needs tuning.

 

[Bernard23]

Your sarcasometer needs tuning.

Possibly, it's been a very long week, and I do this sh1t for a living.....

 

[tmtomh]

That's what you'd expect a manufacturer to do, not the consumer. Arguably 3 data points is enough to verify a manufacturers claim or cast doubt upon their ability to manage quality. Rest is up to them to prove.

Absolutely - as @Mort notes, I was kidding. It would be totally absurd for Amir to test even 3 copies of a speaker, let alone 20!

 

[Bernard23]

Absolutely - as @Mort notes, I was kidding. It would be totally absurd for Amir to test even 3 copies of a speaker, let alone 20!

Yeah I knew you weren't serious from the emoji plus that stats were random

I was being serious about the validity of the data though. So many people in the ASR community believe one data point is enough which is almost as absurd.

 

[Salt]

Yeah I knew you weren't serious from the emoji plus that stats were random

I was being serious about the validity of the data though. So many people in the ASR community believe one data point is enough which is almost as absurd.

That's a point, that evaluating one only sample may not represent the performance of all samples. But this is how it goes in audio business for decades.
Could not agree more that one sample means nothing, as in medical/clinical trials you need hundreds, if not thousands of probands, ideally in a double blinded setup, to do serious science.
But that is not manageable in Hifi.

 

[Bernard23]

That's a point, that evaluating one only sample may not represent the performance of all samples. But this is how it goes in audio business for decades.
Could not agree more that one sample means nothing, as in medical/clinical trials you need hundreds, if not thousands of probands, ideally in a double blinded setup, to do serious science.
But that is not manageable in Hifi.

Exactly, yet half this forum thinks that's how it works. One data point and it's a world full of "I'll pass" or "disappointing, glad I didn't pull the trigger" type comments.
This thread is interesting because it's thrown up the classic case of "I don't measure the same result as you do so who is right?" conundrum. The subjectivists have as much chance of being right at this point.

 

[Sokel]

Obviously you need to start testing 20 of each speaker. If at least 18 measure the same as each other, then all good.

18 is for the lazy, the ones doing it go 24:

 

[Bernard23]

18 is for the lazy, the ones doing it go 24:

View attachment 477169

That's only 40% of the story.
Typically we'd pick minimum 10 random samples, at least three people and each person measuring three times. That's for basic gauge R&R. Verification of critical features might require more including a full MSA.