Genelec 8341A SAM™ Studio Monitor Review

[HairyEars]

Peak SPL
≥118 dB

Maximum peak acoustic output per pair in a listening room with music material at 1 m.



Short term max SPL
≥110 dB

Maximum short term sine wave acoustic output on axis in half space, averaged from 100 Hz to 3 kHz at 1 m.



Long term max SPL
≥101 dB

Maximum long term RMS acoustic output in the same conditions with IEC weighted noise (limited by driver protection circuit) at 1 m.

Same sustained as the 705p. I can see these not going loud enough. Hell, at this point, I feel the 708p are marginal. I understand why some would spring for the m2.

Place them 1.5 meters away and crank it up---to find out your paper based calculations, along with your eardrums, are shredded to pieces.

 

[echopraxia]

I agree with the distinction you make, but 99% of music is a blend of many frequencies, which the 8341 can play achingly loud.

I think you should have a firsthand experience with these monitors to realize how mighty their 110db is.

Yeah but like you say, it depends on the music. There’s a lot of really bass heavy music out there. I was able to get my Genelec 8351B’s limiter light to flash at around 106db at a distance of 15 feet or so (IIRC) with really bass heavy music. I consider this a hugely impressive feat BTW, given the powerful deep sound it was producing.

Granted, it was so loud that I had to cover my ears (this was a medium room SPL test as requested by some here). For me, the 8351B’s are capable of excessive SPL for my needs in the small room I usually have them in. Even in a medium room, they’re extremely impressive and IMO more than enough as (nearly) full range speakers for 99% of people. And with subwoofers, I bet they’d be more than enough for anything you could ever want.

But without subs, I can’t imagine they’d be able to keep up with e.g. the 3x 8” woofers from each Salon2 tower, obviously. I’m sure the smaller 8341’s are pushed even harder to increase bass extension despite their tiny size, at the expensive of max SPL for those frequencies obviously.

 

[beefkabob]

I listen to bass heavy music much of the time. I'd have to go bigger. If you can't do the volume at least down to 80, go home.

 

[echopraxia]

I listen to bass heavy music much of the time. I'd have to go bigger. If you can't do the volume at least down to 80, go home.

I listen to plenty myself, and I have to say my 8351B’s can push way beyond any volume I can tolerate. Like I said, even in a medium/large room, they can push 106db of bass heavy content, which is very impressive.

Of course, you will still want a subwoofer for really deep and powerful bass response, but that’s almost always the case regardless.

 

[Xyrium]

I think we're confusing the design intent of the product under review here. At the distance you're supposed to be listening to these from, they will blow your eardrums out. If they don't, then perhaps you already have hearing damage?

 

[echopraxia]

I think we're confusing the design intent of the product under review here. At the distance you're supposed to be listening to these from, they will blow your eardrums out. If they don't, then perhaps you already have hearing damage?

Generally speaking, yes — but again, this depends so much on frequency. If you push a 20hz tone through it as loud as you can, you’ll probably be able to get it to self limit pretty easily, and yet I’m quite sure when you reach that limit the 20hz sound will not be at a level that will damage your hearing or even feel painful.

But just as you say, we need to consider the design intent of this speaker. Obviously, this was never intended to push 20hz at high SPL without a subwoofer.

I don’t think we are going to make much progress understanding why Amir has issues with the SPL capability unless we know what songs he listened to that caused the limiter to flash, and what listening distance was involved.

 

[Xyrium]

Generally speaking, yes — but again, this depends so much on frequency. If you push a 20hz tone through it as loud as you can, you’ll probably be able to get it to self limit pretty easily, and yet I’m quite sure when you reach that limit the 20hz sound will not be at a level that will damage your hearing or even feel painful.

But just as you say, we need to consider the design intent of this speaker. Obviously, this was never intended to push 20hz at high SPL without a subwoofer.

I don’t think we are going to make much progress understanding why Amir has issues with the SPL capability unless we know what songs he listened to that caused the limiter to flash, and what listening distance was involved.

Agreed. These were not intended to go that low.. Nothing (driver) under 12 inches in diameter should try to reproduce 20 Hz, IMHO.

Amir has "SPL problems" because he listens to Salon 2s powered by a 1kW amp...in a room that I would normally consider borderline small for that much sound power. All due respect and only based on his room pics of course. Poor Amir.. he needs SPL counseling. LOL.

 

[Senior NEET Engineer]

I listen to bass heavy music much of the time. I'd have to go bigger. If you can't do the volume at least down to 80, go home.

What volume are you listening at? I can go to around -5 dB from 100-3000hz before encountering single driver compression.

At -20 dB with bass heavy music (Terrors In My Head) I'm getting around 87 cont 103 peak dB SPL Z anywhere in my 3000 cu ft room.

That's a ton of headroom before adding sub...

 

[beefkabob]

I don't know. I never hooked up an SPL meter. JBL 708p and I tend to listen loudest around -5 to -20db. Around -5, I think the speakers start to compress. Quieter frequencies and parts of the music get louder, but the rest does not get equally louder.

 

[Senior NEET Engineer]

I don't know. I never hooked up an SPL meter. JBL 708p and I tend to listen loudest around -5 to -20db. Around -5, I think the speakers start to compress. Quieter frequencies and parts of the music get louder, but the rest does not get equally louder.

If the input sensitivity is matched, that's probably around 94-110 dB continuous. A pair of JTR dual 15" speakers will get the job done lol. They measure very good as well.

 

[beefkabob]

If the input sensitivity is matched, that's probably around 94-110 dB continuous. A pair of JTR dual 15" speakers will get the job done lol. They measure very good as well.

So I hooked up the mic to the phone and bought the $8 software then loaded the calibration file. -10 on the volume control seems to hit around 110db with some music. I can do that for about 2 songs before I get fatigued. A little quieter with others. -20db is about 90db. I can do that for a long time. ~2 meter distance. 100db is comfortable for a while.

 

[hmt]

Peak SPL
≥118 dB

Maximum peak acoustic output per pair in a listening room with music material at 1 m.



Short term max SPL
≥110 dB

Maximum short term sine wave acoustic output on axis in half space, averaged from 100 Hz to 3 kHz at 1 m.



Long term max SPL
≥101 dB

Maximum long term RMS acoustic output in the same conditions with IEC weighted noise (limited by driver protection circuit) at 1 m.

Same sustained as the 705p. I can see these not going loud enough. Hell, at this point, I feel the 708p are marginal. I understand why some would spring for the m2.

They do not achive this levels in the bass. The larger 8351 achieves 99 db max at 10% THD at 50-100Hz. At 50Hz it is 93db. The 8341 will top out even earlier. As said before it highly depends on what kind of music you use.

 

[q3cpma]

They do not achive this levels in the bass. The larger 8351 achieves 99 db max at 10% THD at 50-100Hz. At 50Hz it is 93db. The 8341 will top out even earlier. As said before it highly depends on what kind of music you use.

8351A.

 

[randy777]

I've had m

A few people here scratched their heads over Amir's claim the 8341 wasn't loud enough--and rightfully so. Personally, I damaged my hearing for 10 days due to an high-spl blast from sameself monitors.

There's one plausible explanation for the discrepancy: Amir's monitors were SPL--restricted. (In general, max SPL output can be set with the GLM software . A safety measure of course) .

Either the GLM profile stored in the monitor included that parameter, and it was active during the test, or if not active, a software glitch might have kept it alive.

@amirm I've only had my pair of 8341s for a week but inadvertently came across something in the GLM software that might possibly explain them not being loud enough during the review.

In short, I had a similar experience at first. As a test I set the speakers to -5 dB which was far louder than I could comfortably listen to at length at 1m, but it wasn't blow me away loud. Using fixed volume out of Roon I found myself listening with the GLM volume controller at around -35 to -25 dB typically at 1m. I used them for a few days uncalibrated like this. Then calibrated them which markedly improved the sound but didn't seem to alter the volume level in a noticeable way.

A few days later I tried using the SPL standard volume feature. Afterwards I could barely hear anything until the volume was turned up near 0 dB (and then only faintly) which didn't seem correct. I reverted back to my previous config from the cloud, and a saved config on my desktop, but still could barely get any sound to come out, even when I turned off the SPL standard volume feature.

After several reboots, reloading my previous configuration, and recalibrating them again, suddenly I could get sound out again. Except now they are significantly louder at the same GLM volume level (with everything else in my system being constant). Now I find myself listening at -65 to -55 dB on the GLM volume controller typically with Roon and I can't imagine setting the volume to -5 dB now or it probably would blow me away.

I sent an e-mail to Genelec to try to get to the bottom of it but if the loudness I am getting now is correct, I can only imagine how loud these will get if I set the volume controller to 0 dB now. So I am wondering if perhaps this might explain the perceived lack of loudness during the review?

 

[echopraxia]

I've had m


@amirm I've only had my pair of 8341s for a week but inadvertently came across something in the GLM software that might possibly explain them not being loud enough during the review.

In short, I had a similar experience at first. As a test I set the speakers to -5 dB which was far louder than I could comfortably listen to at length at 1m, but it wasn't blow me away loud. Using fixed volume out of Roon I found myself listening with the GLM volume controller at around -35 to -25 dB typically at 1m. I used them for a few days uncalibrated like this. Then calibrated them which markedly improved the sound but didn't seem to alter the volume level in a noticeable way.

A few days later I tried using the SPL standard volume feature. Afterwards I could barely hear anything until the volume was turned up near 0 dB (and then only faintly) which didn't seem correct. I reverted back to my previous config from the cloud, and a saved config on my desktop, but still could barely get any sound to come out, even when I turned off the SPL standard volume feature.

After several reboots, reloading my previous configuration, and recalibrating them again, suddenly I could get sound out again. Except now they are significantly louder at the same GLM volume level (with everything else in my system being constant). Now I find myself listening at -65 to -55 dB on the GLM volume controller typically with Roon and I can't imagine setting the volume to -5 dB now or it probably would blow me away.

I sent an e-mail to Genelec to try to get to the bottom of it but if the loudness I am getting now is correct, I can only imagine how loud these will get if I set the volume controller to 0 dB now. So I am wondering if perhaps this might explain the perceived lack of loudness during the review?

In the review he says the LED flashed red, which indicates the clipping limiter was engaging. This should not be related to what 0db is calibrated to.

If you have this speaker and want test it, you could use a miniDSP UMIK-1 mic and REW to do some sweeps while slowly increasing volume between sweeps until the limiter flashes, but also while monitoring the distortion plots. When I did this, I could go extremely loud on my 8351B’s. I think it achieved 105-110db at 50hz before the limiter engaged.

 

[randy777]

In the review he says the LED flashed red, which indicates the clipping limiter was engaging. This should not be related to what 0db is calibrated to.

If you have this speaker and want test it, you could use a miniDSP UMIK-1 mic and REW to do some sweeps while slowly increasing volume between sweeps until the limiter flashes, but also while monitoring the distortion plots. When I did this, I could go extremely loud on my 8351B’s. I think it achieved 105-110db at 50hz before the limiter engaged.

Thanks for the suggestion, I have a UMIK-1 mic on the way and will try this after it arrives. I only went up to at most -5 dB on the volume controller last time and don't recall seeing the clipping limiter engaging yet. It's not clear to me yet how, but my speakers seem to be playing much louder now at the same calibrated volume level, which in theory would allow them to play much louder now (unless I've just encountered a software bug).

 

[echopraxia]

Thanks for the suggestion, I have a UMIK-1 mic on the way and will try this after it arrives. I only went up to at most -5 dB on the volume controller last time and don't recall seeing the clipping limiter engaging yet. It's not clear to me yet how, but my speakers seem to be playing much louder now at the same calibrated volume level, which in theory would allow them to play much louder now (unless I've just encountered a software bug).

I wouldn’t rule out a software bug. The Genelec software I’ve seen isn’t exactly the most cleanly designed and bug free in the UI, but I give it a pass since it’s worked fine for me functionally.

My Genelec 8351B’s get very impressively loud for their size, so I too am surprised Amir found them too quiet along with the rest of the 43 pages of comments here about that

So yeah if you could gather data, it would do more than a million words. No amount of speculation on our part will answer that question ... only measurements will

 

[randy777]

I wouldn’t rule out a software bug. The Genelec software I’ve seen isn’t exactly the most cleanly designed and bug free in the UI, but I give it a pass since it’s worked fine for me functionally.

My Genelec 8351B’s get very impressively loud for their size, so I too am surprised Amir found them too quiet along with the rest of the 43 pages of comments here about that

So yeah if you could gather data, it would do more than a million words. No amount of speculation on our part will answer that question ... only measurements will

I agree, I'm very pleased with the GLM software functionality also. I'm new to audio equipment so it could just be user error on my part but curious to find out if my speakers are actually playing louder now. I will report back after I get the UMIK-1 mic and test them out.

 

[soundwave76]

I have a pair of 8340 and still scratch my head when somebody says they are not loud enough...

 

[matt3421]

@amirm do you have a beamdwidth graph for this speaker?