• WANTED: Happy members who like to discuss audio and other topics related to our interest. Desire to learn and share knowledge of science required. There are many reviews of audio hardware and expert members to help answer your questions. Click here to have your audio equipment measured for free!

Genelec 8350 vs Neumann KH 310?

Mimeyar

Member
Joined
Jan 12, 2021
Messages
10
Likes
26
Hi all.

I've been looking at these two speakers for use between 1m and 2m. I want a maximum SPL capability of 105dB SPL between 100Hz and 500Hz which seems to be beyond the capabilities of woofers smaller than 8". In the future I will likely have a crossover to subwoofers but 8" woofers still seem to be worth having regardless for SPL capability. The 8351A is three times the price and has a more limited SPL according to Sound&Recording measurements but I don't know if I am interpreting that correctly.

Sound&Recording Measurements:
Genelec 8350A
Genelec 8351A
Neumann KH 310

Both of these speakers seem to have excellent SPL capability with low distortion. The midrange dome of the KH 310 seems to give some advantage above 400Hz but the KH 310 is slightly worse below 400Hz.
Genelec-8350A5.jpg
Neumann-KH310-Messungen3.jpg
Genelec-8351A-Studiomonitor-Messungen3.jpg


There seems to be significant differences in phase linearity with the 8350A being better. Is phase correction possible? I intend to use DSP correction but want to avoid getting locked in to a vendors ecosystem as other vendors like Rythmik seem to make better subwoofers for price. Would phase correction involve higher latency?
Genelec-8350A4.jpg
Neumann-KH310-Messungen2.jpg
Genelec-8351A-Studiomonitor-Messungen2.jpg



What confuses me is the IMD measurements. I have heard that 3 way systems tend to have lower IMD but I can't interpret the differences between the two graphs because of the different layout. Which one has better IMD performance here? Does the 8351A have lower IMD than the 8350A?
Genelec-8350A9.jpg
Neumann-KH310-Messungen7.jpg
Genelec-8351A-Studiomonitor-Messungen7.jpg


The 8350A and KH 310 are about the same price. How does the 8351A contrast to these two speakers considering that it is about three times the cost?

Thanks all.
 

q3cpma

Major Contributor
Joined
May 22, 2019
Messages
3,060
Likes
4,416
Location
France

Χ Ξ Σ

Senior Member
Forum Donor
Joined
Jul 16, 2020
Messages
457
Likes
1,969
Location
UTC-8
The 8351B is $7990/pair, and you can get GLM kit for FREE if you buy the speakers from Front End Audio.
The 8350A is $4798/pair, and you can get GLM kit for FREE if you buy the speakers from Front End Audio.
The 8050B is $3790/pair, not GLM compactable, so you would need a third party DSP.
The KH310 is $4400/pair, you would need a third party DSP.

The 8351B is the endgame and a technically superior speaker and it costs at least $3000 more than any other options. At this price though, one could question its diminishing returns in the benefit of coaxial directivity and wonder if spending less on the main speakers and more on subwoofers would yield a bigger improvement. I suppose The 8351B is the most room-friendly speakers if you don't have an optimal room. Let's say the two side walls are not even equidistant, The 8351B would be the best choice. However, moving your listening position and changing the room layout should cost less than $3000 if you think about it.

The 8350A is the 8050B plus built-in DSP. Without DSP they are the same speakers, but the 8350A costs $1000 more than the 8050B. Given you can get a third party DSP for a few hundred dollars, I simply don't think the 8350A is worth it (and I already deduct the $400 GLM kit from the extra cost). The 8050B would be a better value for the buck.

I am using the KH310 with two JBL310S subwoofers and Dirac. The reason I chose the KH310 is that it has the quietest hiss among all options. Not really a performance-related reason but that is very important to me in the nearfield.
 

Pearljam5000

Master Contributor
Joined
Oct 12, 2020
Messages
5,125
Likes
5,355
The 8351B is $7990/pair, and you can get GLM kit for FREE if you buy the speakers from Front End Audio.
The 8350A is $4798/pair, and you can get GLM kit for FREE if you buy the speakers from Front End Audio.
The 8050B is $3790/pair, not GLM compactable, so you would need a third party DSP.
The KH310 is $4400/pair, you would need a third party DSP.

The 8351B is the endgame and a technically superior speaker and it costs at least $3000 more than any other options. At this price though, one could question its diminishing returns in the benefit of coaxial directivity and wonder if spending less on the main speakers and more on subwoofers would yield a bigger improvement. I suppose The 8351B is the most room-friendly speakers if you don't have an optimal room. Let's say the two side walls are not even equidistant, The 8351B would be the best choice. However, moving your listening position and changing the room layout should cost less than $3000 if you think about it.

The 8350A is the 8050B plus built-in DSP. Without DSP they are the same speakers, but the 8350A costs $1000 more than the 8050B. Given you can get a third party DSP for a few hundred dollars, I simply don't think the 8350A is worth it (and I already deduct the $400 GLM kit from the extra cost). The 8050B would be a better value for the buck.

I am using the KH310 with two JBL310S subwoofers and Dirac. The reason I chose the KH310 is that it has the quietest hiss among all options. Not really a performance-related reason but that is very important to me in the nearfield.
Not exactly the same
Screenshot_20210112-214957.jpg
Screenshot_20210112-214930.jpg
 

Χ Ξ Σ

Senior Member
Forum Donor
Joined
Jul 16, 2020
Messages
457
Likes
1,969
Location
UTC-8
Not that the difference in electronics has a lot to do with sound performance, but sure, not exactly the same.

On the same note, the only difference between the 8351B and the 8351A is the upgraded electronics. If the OP don't mind buying a older model that has the same acoustic design, the 8351A is a lot cheaper than the 8351B.
 

Sancus

Major Contributor
Forum Donor
Joined
Nov 30, 2018
Messages
2,923
Likes
7,616
Location
Canada
On the same note, the only difference between the 8351B and the 8351A is the upgraded electronics. If the OP don't mind buying a older model that has the same acoustic design, the 8351A is a lot cheaper than the 8351B.

Couldn't be more wrong, the 8351B has completely redesigned all drivers including different crossover, more optimized woofers, larger midrange/tweeter, and significantly more power(250W woofer/150W midrange vs 150W/120W in the 8351A).

You really, really shouldn't buy 8351As right now unless you are getting them at a huge discount.
 

q3cpma

Major Contributor
Joined
May 22, 2019
Messages
3,060
Likes
4,416
Location
France
Couldn't be more wrong, the 8351B has completely redesigned all drivers including different crossover, more optimized woofers, larger midrange/tweeter, and significantly more power(250W woofer vs 150W in the 8351A).

You really, really shouldn't buy 8351As right now unless you are getting them at a huge discount.
On the other hand, it might be better than the B if a subwoofer is used, as it controls LF directivity way lower due to the lower woofer to midrange crossover frequency.
 

Sancus

Major Contributor
Forum Donor
Joined
Nov 30, 2018
Messages
2,923
Likes
7,616
Location
Canada
On the other hand, it might be better than the B if a subwoofer is used, as it controls LF directivity way lower due to the lower woofer to midrange crossover frequency.

What do you mean? The woofer-mid crossover in the A is 470hz, it's 320hz in the B.

Directivity control looks much better to me on the 8351B horizontally, I can see the 8351A might have slightly lower directivity control vertically, it's hard to be sure, but the 8351B is so much smoother and has much improved frequency response so I really can't imagine picking the 8351A for this minor difference.

Especially since we know a major reason the 8351A woofer was redesigned is due to SPL limits even in regions where a subwoofer won't play(ie 100-200hz, 200-500hz).

Graphs
QdmrVNf.png
 

ernestcarl

Major Contributor
Joined
Sep 4, 2019
Messages
3,106
Likes
2,313
Location
Canada
Would phase correction involve higher latency?

If you mean just linearizing the phase mainly at the high-mid xo it could be as little as 2ms — KH80. 10-20ms was stated for the new HEDD monitors and 200-500ms for their subs. I believe others have mentioned even higher 600-700ms with the use of external processing.
 

daftcombo

Major Contributor
Forum Donor
Joined
Feb 5, 2019
Messages
3,687
Likes
4,068
What confuses me is the IMD measurements. I have heard that 3 way systems tend to have lower IMD but I can't interpret the differences between the two graphs because of the different layout. Which one has better IMD performance here? Does the 8351A have lower IMD than the 8350A?
I'd be interested too in an interpretation of those IMD graphs and a comparison.

-20dB at 85 dB seems a lot of disto to me!
 

Sancus

Major Contributor
Forum Donor
Joined
Nov 30, 2018
Messages
2,923
Likes
7,616
Location
Canada
I'd be interested too in an interpretation of those IMD graphs and a comparison.

-20dB at 85 dB seems a lot of disto to me!

Well it's not 85dB, it's 85dBA at 4m Free Field, or 97dBA @ 1m. And A-weighting complicates it further, depending on what signal they use, if it's bass-weighted then that could be 5-10dB on top of that. That graph style is old and I'm far too lazy to dig up an explanation, but I am guessing the signal is very close to the maximum SPL limit of the KH310. I also sort of suspect this graph was really showing TD, not just IMD.

The new graph style is also pretty incomprehensible without explanation. They published one in the S360A review, thankfully, and it gets you most of the way there:

With this type of test, levels of a special multitone test signal are increased until a Total Distortion(THD+IMD) threshold is exceeded. "The crest factor (ratio of peak value to effective value) of the test signal is also very close to a music signal that is not too compressed at 12 dB. The multitone is composed of 60 sinusoidal signals with a random phase and a frequency spacing of 1/6 octave. "

They seem to change the TD threshold from test to test, which I don't understand. Sometimes it's -20dB(10%), sometimes -34dB(2%), and sometimes -30dB(~3%).
  • The green line is the spectrum of the test signal(it's not flat, designed to represent music better).
  • The red line is the resulting output from the speaker.
  • The blue lines are "distortion components." Based on the fact that the top blue line seems to always correspond with the TD threshold, I'm guessing that it's TD, and then:
  • The "blue hash" is maybe? IMD? Not sure about this. It might be some mix of the components but I'm not sure how you're supposed to interpret that.
I haven't seen the "distortion components" fully explained. The hash could be THD and the difference could be IMD, as well.

So the 8350A hits the TD threshold(-20dB) at Leq of 101 and Lpk of 114dB, Leq are average levels and Lpk are real peak as measured.

Genelec-8350A9.jpg


@hardisj You've done some IMD testing. Any guesses on what the "blue hash" in these graphs is trying to represent?
 
Last edited:

daftcombo

Major Contributor
Forum Donor
Joined
Feb 5, 2019
Messages
3,687
Likes
4,068
I don't know about IMD, but as for harmonic distortion, sticking to 3%, and considering that for electronic music, the loudest sounds are sometimes as low as 50Hz (sometimes even 40Hz or 30Hz actually):

Neumann can't play those at more than 91 dB or so (the graph scale is tricky, it goes down to 50 Hz only)
Genelec 8351A: 82 dB (quite poor)
Genelec 8350A: 96 dB

On S&R, for the 8361A it's 102 dB.
Even 8331A beats 8351A with 87 dB.
 

dfuller

Major Contributor
Joined
Apr 26, 2020
Messages
3,339
Likes
5,056
I don't know about IMD, but as for harmonic distortion, sticking to 3%, and considering that for electronic music, the loudest sounds are sometimes as low as 50Hz (sometimes even 40Hz or 30Hz actually):

Neumann can't play those at more than 91 dB or so (the graph scale is tricky, it goes down to 50 Hz only)
Genelec 8351A: 82 dB (quite poor)
Genelec 8350A: 96 dB

On S&R, for the 8361A it's 102 dB.
Even 8331A beats 8351A with 87 dB.
Yes, it's well known that the KH310's one real weak point is low bass content at high levels. This makes sense as it's a small box and is sealed. Worth crossing with subs if you're listening to or working on content with lots of sub-bass.
 

daftcombo

Major Contributor
Forum Donor
Joined
Feb 5, 2019
Messages
3,687
Likes
4,068
Hi all.

I've been looking at these two speakers for use between 1m and 2m. I want a maximum SPL capability of 105dB SPL between 100Hz and 500Hz which seems to be beyond the capabilities of woofers smaller than 8". In the future I will likely have a crossover to subwoofers but 8" woofers still seem to be worth having regardless for SPL capability. The 8351A is three times the price and has a more limited SPL according to Sound&Recording measurements but I don't know if I am interpreting that correctly.

Sound&Recording Measurements:
Genelec 8350A
Genelec 8351A
Neumann KH 310

Both of these speakers seem to have excellent SPL capability with low distortion. The midrange dome of the KH 310 seems to give some advantage above 400Hz but the KH 310 is slightly worse below 400Hz.
Genelec-8350A5.jpg
Neumann-KH310-Messungen3.jpg
Genelec-8351A-Studiomonitor-Messungen3.jpg


There seems to be significant differences in phase linearity with the 8350A being better. Is phase correction possible? I intend to use DSP correction but want to avoid getting locked in to a vendors ecosystem as other vendors like Rythmik seem to make better subwoofers for price. Would phase correction involve higher latency?
Genelec-8350A4.jpg
Neumann-KH310-Messungen2.jpg
Genelec-8351A-Studiomonitor-Messungen2.jpg



What confuses me is the IMD measurements. I have heard that 3 way systems tend to have lower IMD but I can't interpret the differences between the two graphs because of the different layout. Which one has better IMD performance here? Does the 8351A have lower IMD than the 8350A?
Genelec-8350A9.jpg
Neumann-KH310-Messungen7.jpg
Genelec-8351A-Studiomonitor-Messungen7.jpg


The 8350A and KH 310 are about the same price. How does the 8351A contrast to these two speakers considering that it is about three times the cost?

Thanks all.
So, did you purchase one?
 
Top Bottom