Harbeth now with active version

[Ron Texas]

you forgot the 'benefit' of 6+ additional boxes and the extra mile of cable salad

An interesting and welcome move by Harbeth. And I do like their speakers. But it's really hard to see the benefit compared to top of the line actives from geithain/neumann/genelec/etc ... which are also quite a bit cheaper.

I suspect the electronics are a large percentage of the high price. It's an awful lot of stuff to cram into a studio, and a lot of waste heat from tubes.

 

[MattHooper]

Beauty is in the eye of the beholder. I hope you realize you just annoyed any forum member which owns or aspires to own 420's.View attachment 367967

Cripes those are ugly!

Those go into the category for me of “I don’t care how good they sound. Those aren’t going in my room.”

(Sorry, but if someone can’t deal with the fact taste is subjective they’re going to have a hard time in life)

 

[Ron Texas]

Cripes those are ugly!

Those go into the category for me of “I don’t care how good they sound. Those aren’t going in my room.”

(Sorry, but if someone can’t deal with the fact taste is subjective they’re going to have a hard time in life)

That's OK, I don't want them either.

 

[lashto]

Cripes those are ugly!

Those go into the category for me of “I don’t care how good they sound. Those aren’t going in my room.”

(Sorry, but if someone can’t deal with the fact taste is subjective they’re going to have a hard time in life)

they look much better in person

Joking aside, they actually did for me. The build quality is good, to my eyes they reached the "ok" level. And if you use the grilles it's just another quadratic box

 

[DSJR]

Ooooh, the 420s have grilles

This from Alan and hope I get it right...

Last year, they showed what was in effect an active M40 model (named the D40) to show dealers and distributors the advantage of going full dsp-active. Nobody doubted the sonic improvements but the following became a real issue it seems and it's something we here are seemingly and largely immune from...

Dealers internationally seem to be having an ever-ageing clientele and if they're to survive, they NEED an upgrade ladder as started for us in the UK with Linn and Naim, adding on power supplies, fancier cabling, turntable upgrades and so on as it brings clients back to the store on a regular basis and not just for repairs! Sell them a one-box active setup such as our favourites and you won't see that customer again for many years it at all as the one-box solution answers it all (similar things happened with B&O in the 90's as their gear became more reliable and the slim active speakers simply did the job year in year out). There simply aren't enough customers walking through the doors*

So, the NLE 3 three way model has had to make dealer-concessions, allowing a stack of external boxes to be chosen at a variety of price points - as Linn and Naim still do. I'm sure they'll 'sound' great, but *those* Genelecs with incredibly advanced dsp (and with external amp/crossover boxes) are showing what sixty grand can buy you...


*I had my wrists firmly slapped for being negative about it, but Harbeth have taken on Richer Sounds' stores in their UK dealer portfolio. One reason I suspect is that if I take Brighton as an example, the Richer store there is always bustling if not downright busy, where the more 'audiophile based' and arguably snootier store up the road (best not name it) hardly has any footfall whatsoever in comparison although they do seem to be surving as part of a chain. It's been like this for thirty years or so and hasn't really changed I understand.

 

[thewas]

they look much better in person

Joking aside, they actually did for me. The build quality is good, to my eyes they reached the "ok" level. And if you use the grilles it's just another quadratic box

Since they are quadratic some people had custom made wood frames for their Klein + Hummel / Neumann monitors, here for example 3x K+H O500C(!):

Source of photo: https://www.hifi-forum.de/viewthread-8-7523-3.html#113

 

[Vinsen]

I find it impossible to judge the complete aesthetics from pictures. Not for furniture, cars, clothing and audio, etc. You need to walk around it, far away, close up and under various light sources. Heck, even how things catch dust and age over time... This has everything to do with taste and being aware that you can't fully describe why you like something or not just from a picture where you miss critical observations.
For example on the KH420: I know how the direct and indirect light falls through the grill, how the grill and metallic paint are finished, how it behaves under various light sources, its smooth edges everywhere, etc. Based on that I can say I appreciate that they are far from the most beautiful speakers in a vacuum, but are expertly finished, don't follow any temporary trend or draw unwanted attention in my room. Just like the posted Harbeths without the 6 seperate boxes

 

[lashto]

Since they are quadratic some people had custom made wood frames for their Klein + Hummel / Neumann monitors, here for example 3x K+H O500C(!):

Source of photo: https://www.hifi-forum.de/viewthread-8-7523-3.html#113

Nice setup. I was actually thinking that wood panels shouldn't be so hard to add. And some nicer wood&textile grilles are also doable. And voila, you have "beautiful" Harbeth boxes

 

[lashto]

Cripes those are ugly!
Those go into the category for me of “I don’t care how good they sound. Those aren’t going in my room.”
(Sorry, but if someone can’t deal with the fact taste is subjective they’re going to have a hard time in life)

This would be a no-way-ugly for me. Even if installed behind curtains, I would still feel its stare

 

[dfuller]

Cripes those are ugly!

Those go into the category for me of “I don’t care how good they sound. Those aren’t going in my room.”

(Sorry, but if someone can’t deal with the fact taste is subjective they’re going to have a hard time in life)

They're not really as bad as you'd think. The matte gray means they sort of fade into the room and don't attract attention.

 

[DSJR]

NLE1 in Germany looks to be around Eur3459 the pair. Selecting eq switches apparently for typical old-school 'monitors' such as NS10s (yes, really!) and other more hideous playback devices such as an iPhone (Android too common?) or cheapo TV (loosely quoting from the HUG). Size is miniature, as in a little larger than a P3 or LS3/5A.

 

[CapMan]

NLE1 in Germany looks to be around Eur3459 the pair. Selecting eq switches apparently for typical old-school 'monitors' such as NS10s (yes, really!) and other more hideous playback devices such as an iPhone (Android too common?) or cheapo TV (loosely quoting from the HUG). Size is miniature, as in a little larger than a P3 or LS3/5A.

So the logical competition (5” woofer) is the Kh120 Mk II at £1400 for 2. For that you get digital and analogue in, near perfect frequency response , access to Neumann room correction and their sub integration .

I just don’t see why you’d chose the Harbeth - I’m biased, but still struggle to see why you’d spend more than double …

 

[DSJR]

The apparent disconnect between traditional newbie audiophile buyers with a Harbeth brand interest and the old hands like ourselves who frequent here seems immense, the knowledgebase and experience here simply not there in Harbeth-world - no wonder Alan and his team are having to lead suspicious audiophiles (to active and anything 'digital') in such carefully measured tiny steps. A response pliot has been posted showing a lf drop-off below 110hz or so but on-axis basically flat above (not sure on the smoothing, but no jagged response 'edges' as we see on Klippel plots). The theory of asking a tine lf driver to work too hard is definitely a sound one - I'm deeply suspicious of the baby KH models seemingly going down 'flat' to 50Hz and maybe below as distortion is huge if they're worked too hard it seems - 'we' all recommend subs anyway for these - but a typical well off audiophile with no tech knowledge would find it difficult and sad for me to say, the dealers around and about these days don't seem to have much real knowledge either I believe apart from the commission they can earn on large-price-ticket sales of larhe-box bling.

We're hugely spoiled here, by Amir and Erin amongst a very few other publications internationally and I do applaud Harbeth for trying to come into the 21st century, but I fear their typical brand-followers (as much retro-visual types I suspect) are in reality decades behind in terms of tech and system-building...

 

[CapMan]

We're hugely spoiled here, by Amir and Erin amongst a very few other publications internationally and I do applaud Harbeth for trying to come into the 21st century, but I fear their typical brand-followers (as much retro-visual types I suspect) are in reality decades behind in terms of tech and system-building...

I agree - it's a very positive move to get into actives. I have much admiration for the team at Harbeth and as an owner the customer service and ethos of the company is exemplary.

I just fear the 'brand' will need to do an awful lot of heavy lifting to justify the enormous price gap to other very accomplished speakers in this class. The KH120 is equally flat but goes down to 41Hz not 80Hz and has the ability to take both digital and analogue feeds and integrate a Neumann sub These are big functionality differences.

Neumann also publish a forensic level of specification about the KH120 of the type we see on ASR. Many of the folks on HUG seem generally fine / wowed with just an on axis FR (the posted graph was at 65dB and 0.6m)

 

[Purité Audio]

At the show indeed.

 

[CapMan]

At the show indeed.View attachment 369444

How did they sound Keith ?

 

[Purité Audio]

Cap I couldn’t go hence visiting vicariously through Leo’s photographs , on another forum I read a contributor rated them the best thing he heard ( in the whole of the huge Munich show) , which says something just not quite sure what.
Keith

 

[DSJR]

@Purité Audio , this brand's speakers have always had, even from the beginning, a very pleasant uncoloured midrange which favours acoustic instruments and well recorded speech/singing incredibly well (I'm hoping @ahofer can confirm as he has various systems and a more 'classical' music taste than I these days). In the past, they've always sounded too 'safe' in many ways and the main clientele used to be more mature gents who'd run the gamut of HiFi speakers ripping their increasingly delicate and limited hearing to shreds. My own SHL5's have a tonal balance in the crossover region and very high impedance that I reckon a valve or vale-like amp (such as the enthusiast-much-missed Croft Series 7) would eq them more 'flat' in balance.

No comments at all on the HUG as yet apoart from commets on the visuals by 'those that may know,' but the 'discovery' and use of 'waveguides' in this new active baby is a huge step forwards and I suspect the lateral dispersion will be quietly much improved too. The 'switch' I believe may be to do with selection of various pre-set eq settings I believe, the gold knob a gain setting. Nobody seems botheres by the external power sourse though.

Further comments discuss the balanced input and mean-sensitivity for what seems like a '4V' input. Comments were made about using the basic amp-less Naim streamer as a typiucal domestic source as I gather it has seemingly proper balanced outs on it, but comments have been made as regards it's high price and suggesting the Wiim streamer, which only has RCAs and may not have enough output - Hopefully this can be accommodated but no idea how it'll drive the balanced XLR inputs though.

 

[CapMan]

Cap I couldn’t go hence visiting vicariously through Leo’s photographs , on another forum I read a contributor rated them the best thing he heard ( in the whole of the huge Munich show) , which says something just not quite sure what.
Keith

Hmm - 5" woofer, very large room, 50W amp, 80Hz -3dB point .... I guess if you were playing vocal music they could sound very alluring as my P3s do...

Alan is very, very good at curating music for these shows - I think that is part of it.

 

[classicaloracle]

My concern with the NLE-1 is that they apparently accept XLR connections only - no digital inputs. It appears this has been done to placate dealers who will then be able to sell expensive pre-amp/streamers rather than a WiiM device or similar. Of course the WiiM does have unbalanced RCA connectors but I would expect most users to go with the digital connections. XLR is totally understandable on the NLE-3 but not on the consumer-level NLE-1, particularly at a time when Harbeth is now selling its products through Richer Sounds. I wonder what others think of that. Incidentally, my post on HUG to this effect was deleted by the moderator - it's obviously a sensitive point!