Genelec 8030C Studio Monitor Review

[tifune]

Not necessarily, but I won't go into the details.

I don't understand your last few replies - many claims, light on specifics. This is literally the place people come to "go into the details" so why hold back?

 

[Bjorn]

Look at this:

https://www.audiosciencereview.com/...itor-review.14795/#lg=attachment74150&slide=0

Well, I don't think the DI is erratic now. The problem again is that you are always reading numbers, but you don't give a reference, don't have any definitions for words and so on.

Under these circumstances you can always use everything as evidence for your own statements.

On the other hand, it seems to be true that the measurements presented do not distinguish between the first but quite strong reflections and the reverberation. According to Toole (without proof) the first reflections should not generate a tonal shift. But the reverberation. Now it becomes difficult! So what to do? It's best to just ignore this part and discuss further. If this makes the discussion worthless, so what! With the spinorama we are hovering in an idealized "average" room anyway. Is it actually possible to average room acoustics? I'm not asking how meaningful that is, God forbid! But how do you do it anyway?

I'm sharing numbers based on the measurements here. Look at the polars regarding the directivity.

It's not really called reverberation. It's called early and late specular reflections. Reflections arriving at different time. Measurements that aren't showing the whole picture and leaving out a lot, isn't that interesting to me to be honest. We know that a speaker with great changes in directivity can have strong deviations in spectral content. I've measured this several times in small rooms comparing it to more constant directivity speakers. But obviously it will depend on the room and dimensions. If you have an expectional wide and high ceiling, the issues will clearly be reduced. Most, however, place the speaker fairly close to the side walls and the coloration and tonal shift is strong when you have these kind of directivity deviations.

No, I don't believe you can average a room dimension or acoustics because small rooms vary a lot. I'm interested in the final result and not what some measurements that overlook several areas and often end up with little relevance to the actual result. Take look at several indoor measurements of speakers that are considered to be good according to the Spinoroma but has a collapsing polar quite high in frequency, and you'll generally see a quite uneven frequency response compared to better designs.

 

[Bjorn]

I don't understand your last few replies - many claims, light on specifics. This is literally the place people come to "go into the details" so why hold back?

It's better to send amirm some speakers that he can measure and you can see data based on a third party.

 

[VBSurrey]

Hi Bjorn,

Thanks for your response. I did not realise that was the way the review process worked.

A bit difficult to ship from the UK. I will leave it up to the US members to take this forward if they think it has merit

Thanks again

 

[test1223]

I'm sharing numbers based on the measurements here. Look at the polars regarding the directivity.

It's not really called reverberation. It's called early and late specular reflections. Reflections arriving at different time. Measurements that aren't showing the whole picture and leaving out a lot, isn't that interesting to me to be honest. We know that a speaker with great changes in directivity can have strong deviations in spectral content. I've measured this several times in small rooms comparing it to more constant directivity speakers. But obviously it will depend on the room and dimensions. If you have an expectional wide and high ceiling, the issues will clearly be reduced. Most, however, place the speaker fairly close to the side walls and the coloration and tonal shift is strong when you have these kind of directivity deviations.

No, I don't believe you can average a room dimension or acoustics because small rooms vary a lot. I'm interested in the final result and not what some measurements that overlook several areas and often end up with little relevance to the actual result. Take look at several indoor measurements of speakers that are considered to be good according to the Spinoroma but has a collapsing polar quite high in frequency, and you'll generally see a quite uneven frequency response compared to better designs.

Hello,

I think a lot of people here can't follow, because the focus of the work of the later loudspeaker research was more shifted toward dismiss bad designs and there were a lot of bad designs. If you want to distinguish good and very good speaker the room and the shape of the DI becomes much more important.

The little speaker here like the 8030 are not bad but not great. The difference becomes much more obvious at higher listening distances. If you have a look at stereo, there is a amount of later reflections necessary otherwise you will not get the feeling of a "surround sound". If you have no later reflections you have more like a line or bar of sound, no one really likes that. But in typical applications you will have an amount of reflections which is to high in comparison with the direct sound. You will get the feeling of "surround sound" (dependent of the placing and room acoustic) but everything becomes "blurry" because of the lack of direct sound. Think of an omnidirectional speaker which gives you a great feeling of space but you can not hear all the details and think of a headphone which let you hear all the details but will lack of "space" (if you consider a stereo mix and leave out binaural recordings and such stuff). And somewhere between these extremes is a sweet spot have a look at the EBU recommendations. For typical listening distances this means you need higher DI.
In detail it becomes much more complicated as @Bjorn tries to communicate. You always have a frequency dependent DI and shifts in the DI are typical not good but the room and at which angle the first reflections occur and a lot of other stuff plays another big role here.

Best
Thomas

 

[Bjorn]

Just to add something. While late arriving reflections help with liveliness and feeling of space, they are also detrimental to several areas in regards to accuracy. You win some and you loose some. That's why a critical listening environment will diffuse late arriving energy. That way, you deal with the detrimental effects but remain the liveliness and also create an even more spacious sound field with a late lateral exponential diffuse tail similar to the best concert halls. Something Toole never explored by the way.
http://www.aes.org/e-lib/browse.cfm?elib=5242

 

[daftcombo]

@Bjorn , can you please name a few speakers that respect the constant directivity down to 500 Hz or so?

 

[Hiilari]

Great review, great discussion. Pleasant reading also as a Finn. We're kinda proud of Genelec here.

 

[thewas]

I don't know what you're referring to when saying: "You can't compare different rooms and placements".

That refered to your comment "That's exactly what the measurements shows. It's very uneven compared to some older JBL speakers" meaning you can't compare LP measurements done in different rooms and placements.

And I don't what you have in mind with this either: "and still the LP measurements I showed (which you still haven't provided) weren't really so much better below 1 kHz"

That the D&D 8c I measured in the same room next to the Neumann KH 310 didn't really show better LP measurements then the latter below 1Khz despite having constant directivity down to 100 Hz, contrary to what you claim.

The directivity of the Dutch & Dutch seems better, but the graph is rough with very low resolution. I've told Dutch & Dutch this and recommended them to use the standard we have. Vertically, this speaker suffers in several areas.

Well, you still haven't shown some so much measuring loudspeakers...

Directivity that's doesn't go as low as is possible

In the famous blind test Revel Salon 2 vs. JBL M2 the Revel with the lower and higher starting directivity was preferred by more listeners and that result is also in accordance to Toole's experiments.

front firing drivers have much higher distortion than horn loaded ones

The M2 has no real distortion problems, not to talk about the problems of large multiway horn loudspeakers...

Few have heard great sound and have really no clue what they are missing out on.

That is just your arrogant personal opinion without any scientific proof...

 

[Bjorn]

@Bjorn , can you please name a few speakers that respect the constant directivity down to 500 Hz or so?

Some of the larger Genelec models are fairly constant to 500 Hz. Kef probably has some. Both Kii Three and Dutch & Dutch are horizontally but they suffer from vertical polar lobing and combing due to superposition. I'm personally not fond of that because it wrecks coherency and "big" sound.

Some CBT speakers would be constant vertically to 300 Hz and horizontally to 500 Hz. They would also avoid floor reflections and minimize ceiling reflections greatly, resulting in a far more even response in almost every room compared to most other speaker designs. But PartsExpress doesn't sell the kits anymore.

 

[thewas]

I think a lot of people here can't follow, because the focus of the work of the later loudspeaker research was more shifted toward dismiss bad designs and there were a lot of bad designs.

That's also just a claim of people who cannot provide better or actually any research that proves their claims...

 

[thewas]

Both Kii Three and Dutch & Dutch are horizontally but they suffer from vertical polar lobing and combing due to superposition. I'm personally not fond of that because it wrecks coherency and "big" sound.

That is funny as you seem to recommend big multiway horn systems that usually have eben bigger vertical problems.

 

[Bjorn]

That refered to your comment "That's exactly what the measurements shows. It's very uneven compared to some older JBL speakers" meaning you can't compare LP measurements done in different rooms and placements.

They are anechoic!

Well, you still haven't shown some so much measuring loudspeakers...

I showed a polar earlier. Take a look here:
https://www.audiosciencereview.com/...udio-monitor-review.14795/page-10#post-461968

In the famous blind test Revel Salon 2 vs. JBL M2 the Revel with the lower and higher starting directivity was preferred by more listeners and that result is also in accordance to Toole's experiments.

The M2 has no real distortion problems, not to talk about the problems of large multiway horn loudspeakers...

That is just your arrogant personal opinion without any scientific proof...

I could care less about some mediocre speakers being blind tested by some people. No, modulation distortion to a front firing woofer is huge compared to a horn loaded driver. Well known. "Multiway horns" have no relevance to that. Your stuck in misunderstanding and asking for proof that the world is flat.

 

[Bjorn]

That is funny as you seem to recommend big multiway horn systems that usually have eben bigger vertical problems.

Horns can avoid vertical problems. It's a matter of the design and how its' implemented.

 

[GelbeMusik]

I'm sharing numbers based on the measurements here. Look at the polars ... a collapsing polar quite high in frequency, and you'll generally see a quite uneven frequency response compared to better designs.

The data presented do not support your ideas. I'm not saying they're wrong. But the argument is flawed. This is because the data was not collected for the purpose of supporting your argument.

In the audio field, people have become too accustomed to accepting incomplete or partially invented chains of argumentation. The everyday nonsense. I'm sorry for the generalization.

It's just that measurements are cheap nowadays. What is "expensive" is the methods. It takes a smart plan!

Put your thesis together outside of this conversation. Then develop a series of measurements to support this thesis. No second use of found objects, just direct. If that doesn't work, then you know why you can't convince me.

... also create an even more spacious sound field with a late lateral exponential diffuse tail similar to the best concert halls. Something Toole never explored by the way.
http://www.aes.org/e-lib/browse.cfm?elib=5242

Oh, no, AES again. This is an industry association, don't you get it? By the rest the article is only indirectly related to your theses.

But first, what does "more spacious sound field" actually mean? To what scale is it related, can it be measured? Is this another "preference", define it! As I said, you always end up accepting completely undefined concepts as valid, and then start speculating on them. Try a definition. Let me guess, your objection is based on a circular argument, right? And it's always like that. You're certainly not the only one. Too much AES.

 

[thewas]

They are anechoic!

My comment and measurements at LP are of course not anechoic to disprove your claim that lower frequency constant directvity measures at LP really better below 1 kHz!

I showed a polar earlier. Take a look here:
https://www.audiosciencereview.com/...udio-monitor-review.14795/page-10#post-461968

What about its vertical directivity, distortion and more specs?

I could care less about some mediocre speakers being blind tested by some people.

That's your problem, I care more about real blind tests and documented research than the unproven claims of individuals.

No, modulation distortion to a front firing woofer is huge compared to a horn loaded driver. Well known. "Multiway horns" have no relevance to that.

The multiway horns have as said much worse vertical directivity problems.

Your stuck in misunderstanding and asking for proof that the world is flat.

Only that the flat earther that doesn't accept current research results but only his personal opinion in this case is you.

Horns can avoid vertical problems. It's a matter of the design and how its' implemented.

Isn't it time to finally fully show such a "much superior" loudspeaker in its full aspects (horizontal, vertical directivities, distortion, IMD) to at least show its "superiority" to the M2 from measurements point of view since you anyway can't show it for statistical preference (blind tests).

 

[Ilkless]

The multiway horns have as said much worse vertical directivity problems.

To be fair, the loading of the horn may allow the horn to extend low enough that the high-pass is at a low frequency (higher wavelength) where CtC spacing has a better chance of approaching quarter-wavelength of the crossover frequency, reducing vertical lobing.

 

[GelbeMusik]

... show it for statistical preference (blind tests).

The same thing I said to Bjorn applies here. What in heaven can statistical tests tell us? That the population has got used to some crap and expects it to be perfected again and again? A good box is like my old one, but better! (Depending on how bad I think my old ones are now, there can and should be more or less deviations.)

No, no. What it can only be about is the "circle of confusion". And if, as can be assumed, the audience and the producers have agreed on what "sounds good". Of course, this is a huge arc that is being drawn. But it works! At least everybody knows that (!) certain records are really great hifi. Always.

However, in terms of the result, I am completely with Björn. I like big boxes! I like the dry sound, he, it seems, does not like the dry sound the other way round. Well, what then?

What was that about? Whether the little genelecs' directivity is also suitable for home use. In any case, the DI seems to me to be seamless. Oh, one more thing. What about the reverberation time at home? It's supposed to be unpredictable from a distance. How about we measure it? I mean, yourself? Thank you very much.

 

[Bjorn]

Here's one measurement of a speaker with a constant beamwidth to 800 Hz-1000 Hz area horizontally and vertically (blue graph) compared to a speaker with a directivity lower in frequency. The crossover is at 1 KHz for both speakers. 1/24 oct. smoothing used.

Normally, the difference is larger than this though. In this case, the room is big with long distances to side walls and there's also acoustical treatment in the room. In very small rooms with little or no treatment, the difference can start to become huge.

 

[Bjorn]

To be fair, the loading of the horn may allow the horn to extend low enough that the high-pass is at a low frequency (higher wavelength) where CtC spacing has a better chance of approaching quarter-wavelength of the crossover frequency, reducing vertical lobing.

Yup. And it can also be completely avoided.