Genelec 8341A SAM™ Studio Monitor Review

[Senior NEET Engineer]

So, who knows how loud this speaker actually got. There's no way to tell. Sometime this year I'm going to get a pair of 8351B, so I'll probably test the max SPL of those with and without subs when I get them. I expect they will have much, much more than I need.

I'll measure it after I'm done moving.

 

[hyperplanar]

That would result in higher SPL, but it sounds like other speakers were able to meet his expectations in mono. He is comparing apples to apples (with subjective hindsight) even though he always has oranges (i.e. Salons, C52s) on the back of his mind.

Yeah each speaker is compared under the same conditions, but let’s say this speaker does 95 dB SPL max each and another speaker does 100 dB SPL max each. If Amir’s threshold is 98 dB SPL, then this speaker wouldn’t pass his test in mono. But in stereo where it would do 101 dB SPL and the other speaker pair would do 106 dB SPL, both speakers would pass.

 

[Stephan]

Since no demos are currently available, I'm at home compiling a list of things to listen to when we're back to normal. So a quick question for those more familiar with Genelec. For a home theater setup, dedicated room, is 8351or 8341 surrounds/ceiling mixed with S360, 1237 or even 1238 for the front a good idea?

 

[andreasmaaan]

Genelec's specs for max SPL are almost comically uninformative:

^^Somebody look at those figures and tell me how loud these speakers can actually play

(All we can be sure of is IMHO that the max long term RMS SPL at 1m is going to be significantly less than 101dB,.)

 

[richard12511]

Genelec's specs for max SPL are almost comically uninformative:

View attachment 58160

^^Somebody look at those figures and tell me how loud these speakers can actually play

(All we can be sure of is IMHO that the max long term RMS SPL at 1m is going to be significantly less than 101dB,.)

101-118 is a huge range. Is long term to peak typically that huge? Makes me wonder if I've actually been pushing closer to the limits of my speakers than I'd thought. I've had several sustained listening sessions above 110db at almost 4m, and the speakers I own just list peak spl, so I really have no clue of their long term capabilities.

 

[andreasmaaan]

101-118 is a huge range. Is long term to peak typically that huge? Makes me wonder if I've actually been pushing closer to the limits of my speakers than I'd thought. I've had several sustained listening sessions above 110db at almost 4m, and the speakers I own just list peak spl, so I really have no clue of their long term capabilities.

It's not so much the range IMHO, but all the qualifiers.

This speaker can produce 101dB at 1m long-term but only when we restrict the output to 100-3000Hz, and then take an average SPL from within that frequency band.

So perhaps this speaker can output 107dB long-term at 3000Hz, but only 95dB long-term at 100Hz (with the average across the whole band in between being 101dB).

Frankly, who knows?

That's why I say that the only thing that's guaranteed IMHO is that the long-term 1m average at 100Hz is less than 101dB.

 

[Sancus]

Genelec's specs for max SPL are almost comically uninformative:

(All we can be sure of is IMHO that the max long term RMS SPL at 1m is going to be significantly less than 101dB,.)

We do have the S&R test of the 8351a though, which is probably similar if perhaps a little louder below the woofer crossover of 470hz. Hard to say though, the 8341a is newer and has more power, despite having smaller woofers.

Like I've said before, these speakers seem bottlenecked in SPL by their output below 100hz more than anything else. I'm sure that's why the 8361A has 700W of woofer amplification, so that's the one you should go with if you need high SPL without subs.

E: I also found the S360A and 8331a

8331a

Spoiler

S360A

Spoiler

 

[hege]

Dunno how the limiter in Ones work, but Genelec's protections are generally very conservative and designed not to mess up the sound at all. So I don't know how Amir managed to get a glitching/ticking sound.. I can play my 1032C pair long term at around 104dBZ@2m with 30-40hz heavy material (music, not sines) before overheat protection (yellow led) kicks in and then it simply lowers the volume without any distortion or side effects at all. If I try stupid hard, I can get red led (overload protection) activated, but it doesn't mess up the sound either. Maybe you could get distortion by feeding +0dB digital or overloading analog connections or something.

 

[onion]

Does anyone use these with differently branded subs? If so, how well do these integrate? Does the GLM software work below XO frequencies or is it a moot point?

I've found that using room correction software (Lyngdorf Roomperfect) across the full range does subjectively improve subwoofer integration for stereo playback in a 2+2 setup

 

[Stephan]

Is that sudden dip in SPL on the 8351 at ~3kHz intentional or a limitation of technology? It's still there on the 8331 and S360, but smoother. Some Geithain speakers show similar dips for higher frequencies, while others like Adam and HEDD just keep going. Or is that because of the AMT tweeter?

 

[Sancus]

Is that sudden dip in SPL on the 8351 at ~3kHz intentional or a limitation of technology? It's still there on the 8331 and S360, but smoother. Some Geithain speakers show similar dips for higher frequencies, while others like Adam and HEDD just keep going. Or is that because of the AMT tweeter?

Well there's no dip it's just output capability. The 8331a and 8341a both cross over to the tweeter at 3khz, and the tweeter is clearly less powerful than the midrange. That's fine, and not exactly uncommon, since the energy in all content falls off pretty quickly as you go up in frequencies from the midrange.

I don't see any sharp drop in the S360A graph, it's a 2-way with a crossover at 1.4khz and that is also where you see the output capability peak and fall off.

 

[Stephan]

Sorry, dip is what I meant with less SPL output. The S360 isn't sharp, but smoother above 3kHz.
In comparison, if you look at something like the Adam S3V (reviews by S&R), it's different:

Am I correct to assume that's due to tweeter technology? Or could it be tuning by the DSP? On the other hand, the Adam doesn't really go much over 110dB above 500Hz. The high frequency output just seems flatter or more constant.

 

[q3cpma]

We do have the S&R test of the 8351a though, which is probably similar if perhaps a little louder below the woofer crossover of 470hz. Hard to say though, the 8341a is newer and has more power, despite having smaller woofers.

Like I've said before, these speakers seem bottlenecked in SPL by their output below 100hz more than anything else. I'm sure that's why the 8361A has 700W of woofer amplification, so that's the one you should go with if you need high SPL without subs.

E: I also found the S360A and 8331a

8331a

Spoiler

S360A

Spoiler

Wow, that 8331A/8351A difference is staggering. The first gen "racetrack" woofers must have been quite bad. Makes you wonder how the third gen (8351B) performs.

 

[Sancus]

m I correct to assume that's due to tweeter technology? Or could it be tuning by the DSP? On the other hand, the Adam doesn't really go much over 110dB above 500Hz. The high frequency output just seems flatter or more constant.

I dunno, I would guess that it's just due to the chosen drivers and possibly limitations of the coaxial arrangement. I'm far from an expert, but I suspect even output capability across all 3 drivers is not a high design priority. Here you can see in the Neumann KH420 the same 'midrange has the highest output' situation even though it's a completely different speaker.

KH420 max SPL

Spoiler

If you DSP-limited your output more, of course, you could get a pretty graph -- but at the expense of real-world overhead.

 

[soundwave76]

Since no demos are currently available, I'm at home compiling a list of things to listen to when we're back to normal. So a quick question for those more familiar with Genelec. For a home theater setup, dedicated room, is 8351or 8341 surrounds/ceiling mixed with S360, 1237 or even 1238 for the front a good idea?

Personally I would use 8330s for surround and use the saved money to MAX the fronts monitors and/or consider subs.

 

[Music1969]

Since no demos are currently available, I'm at home compiling a list of things to listen to when we're back to normal. So a quick question for those more familiar with Genelec. For a home theater setup, dedicated room, is 8351or 8341 surrounds/ceiling mixed with S360, 1237 or even 1238 for the front a good idea?

What surround processor are you planning to use?

 

[Stephan]

Personally I would use 8330s for surround and use the saved money to MAX the fronts monitors and/or consider subs.

Interesting, I started considering the Adam S-series, but then figured I may want something with wider dispersion for the ceiling, so I thought about pairing them with KSD coax speakers. That led me to the idea of having coax for the surrounds as well, for wider coverage of the seating area, so I ended up with the idea of Genelec. I'll have to look at some measurements for dispersion for the 83x0 series. I'm just compiling a demo list for now, but multiple subs (front and back) are a must have. Had those in my last room too.

What surround processor are you planning to use?

Trinnov Altitude 32, that's set in stone.

 

[jhaider]

I agree with you personally, but I think what @infinitesymphony was pointing out was that, even if you are absorbing the first lateral reflections, another advantage of wide-directivity speakers may be that a wider sweet spot is possible.

That's not my experience. What I've consistently noticed is that narrower pattern speakers, when crossfired, have a wider area where they sound more or less the same. There's a paper out there (don't remember the author; not Geddes but influenced by him) positing time-intensity trading as the cause.

That said, assuming you don't ruin the space acoustically and aesthetically with wall fluff, I do think generally wider directivity speakers produce a larger and more vivid acoustic scene in the sweet spot. They also usually project a wider soundstage, regardless of first reflection points. I've gone back and forth a few times in my own use. I think in a shoebox room with no openings in the walls ahead of first reflection points, I prefer a narrower directivity. But I haven't had a room like that since the mid 2000s, so that's just a guess.

 

[andreasmaaan]

That's not my experience. What I've consistently noticed is that narrower pattern speakers, when crossfired, have a wider area where they sound more or less the same. There's a paper out there (don't remember the author; not Geddes but influenced by him) positing time-intensity trading as the cause.

That said, assuming you don't ruin the space acoustically and aesthetically with wall fluff, I do think generally wider directivity speakers produce a larger and more vivid acoustic scene in the sweet spot. They also usually project a wider soundstage, regardless of first reflection points. I've gone back and forth a few times in my own use. I think in a shoebox room with no openings in the walls ahead of first reflection points, I prefer a narrower directivity. But I haven't had a room like that since the mid 2000s, so that's just a guess.

Is this the study you're talking about?

In that case, the researchers arrived at a maximum intensity difference of 4 to 5dB in a reflective room for subjects positioned at extreme off-centre angles. This translated into a 9-10dB difference in ideal output between the speaker's loudest and softest axis, shown here (the graph is 10dB/division):

That translates to a beamwidth of wider than 120°, which is not what's normally meant by "narrow" IME.

 

[napilopez]

That's not my experience. What I've consistently noticed is that narrower pattern speakers, when crossfired, have a wider area where they sound more or less the same. There's a paper out there (don't remember the author; not Geddes but influenced by him) positing time-intensity trading as the cause.

That said, assuming you don't ruin the space acoustically and aesthetically with wall fluff, I do think generally wider directivity speakers produce a larger and more vivid acoustic scene in the sweet spot. They also usually project a wider soundstage, regardless of first reflection points. I've gone back and forth a few times in my own use. I think in a shoebox room with no openings in the walls ahead of first reflection points, I prefer a narrower directivity. But I haven't had a room like that since the mid 2000s, so that's just a guess.

By crossfired, do you mean what I call extreme toe in?

Not gonna lie. While that does wonders for expanding the sweetspot and widening the soundstage on narrower speakers, I cannot personally abide by it aesthetically. Even if I recommend people try it all the time.