HEDD Type 20 MK2 Monitor Review

[Spocko]

First of all, HD measurements are not completely useless...

If we focus only on harmonic distortion, then we can give a theoretical lowest listening threshold given by masking.
The masking limits are mean values and can be individual different.

So we are not asking how harmonic distortion affecting the sound (which has not really been clarified), but below which threshold we can exclude that they affect the sound.
Any speaker whose HD is (well) below the masking curve is virtually perfect (in terms of HD) and produces no audible HD.
...

Thank you so much for bringing up the importance of masking on the audibility of distortion - this point is completely lost when looking at measurements in a vacuum.

 

[fineMen]

Thank you so much for bringing up the importance of masking on the audibility of distortion - this point is completely lost when looking at measurements in a vacuum.

O/k, the raise affects all distortion components up to HD5. In all cases I know of this is indicative of mechnical issues like rattling or even chaotic movement. The resulting coloration is highly objectional. Especially the AMT I had once for evaluation (4 devices of same type) showed this. I dropped the idea to use such a driver because of this, when I eventually understood where this comes from. I think this type of speaker has inherent flaws that are most elegantly avoided by nowadays common dome tweeters, which may be perfectionized by waveguides. In the given price range people are selective, I assume.

 

[MDNSC]

If you experience Generek 8341,
You can immediately see how noisy the HEDD speakers are.

And the knob noise is...
Occurs when using the HEDD subwoofer.
If you haven't used a subwoofer, it's normal that you can't hear it.

I heard that the noise is heard at a distance of 30cm.
Please try type 20 MK2 and talk.
Even from a distance of 1m, your ears will hurt very much.

Although the noise was severe in 05MK2, 07MK2,
It was corrected through DSP modification without telling the consumer.
However, 20MK2, 30MK2 still have very loud noise.

The experience of using MK1
I hope you don't believe MK2 will be the same.

I owned the HEDD TYPE 20 MK2 and have been using it for one month now.
There is a little bit noise when not standing by, and surely they aren't the quietest monitor speakers I've heard, but my computer fans are louder than this.
For the changing DSP thing you've mentioned, I'm not sure but I just upgraded mine with their firmware updater. If you mean by different firmware versions, I think that's common for manufactrues to leave the newest firmware in their product coming out of factory.

By the way, they sound amazing in my case. Super flat in my little room as you can see in my avatar, just need a little bit EQing.
I decided to upgrade my speakers because one of my iLoud MTM's tweeter gone wrong, and I got a list of monitors to try out :
Amphion One18 with Amp700
Neumann KH310
EVE sc3070
Focal trio 6 be
HEDD TYPE20 MK2

Before trying them, I was almost sure that I would probably get the KH310s as they are praised everywhere and Neumann really did a great job in making every measuable specs clear on their website. For me, those HEDDs were the last place I would consider. After listened to all of them in a local shop in Shanghai, I was suprised that those HEDDs sounds really good. When they are in closed mode, there is some similar quality in the midlow range as the KH310s (subjective feelings, measured by my biasd ear), and the linearizer do make stereo image clearer.

KH310s comes close but I felt like the stereo imaging is not as good as those HEDDs (Also subjective feelings, measured by my biasd ear).
The Amphions are different, sound wise I'm not a fan of them but maybe they do translate the mix better when working on them? not sure.
The other speakers, IMO, just not as good as those (Also subjective feelings, measured by my biasd ear).

Anyway, I'm pretty happy with my TYPE 20 MK2s and hope to work with them for a long journey.

 

[MDNSC]

I owned the HEDD TYPE 20 MK2 and have been using it for one month now.
There is a little bit noise when not standing by, and surely they aren't the quietest monitor speakers I've heard, but my computer fans are louder than this.
For the changing DSP thing you've mentioned, I'm not sure but I just upgraded mine with their firmware updater. If you mean by different firmware versions, I think that's common for manufactrues to leave the newest firmware in their product coming out of factory.

By the way, they sound amazing in my case. Super flat in my little room as you can see my avatar, just need a little bit EQ in my case.
I decided to upgrade my speakers because one of my iLoud MTM's tweeter gone wrong, and I got a list of monitors to try out :
Amphion One18 with Amp700
Neumann KH310
EVE sc3070
Focal trio 6 be
HEDD TYPE20 MK2

Before trying them, I was almost sure that I would probably get the KH310s as they are praised everywhere and Neumann really did a great job in making every measuable specs clear on their website. For me, those HEDDs were the last place I would consider. After listened to all of them in a local shop in Shanghai, I was suprised that those HEDDs sounds really good. When they are in closed mode, there is some similar quality in the midlow range as KH310s (subjective feelings, measured by my biasd ear), and the linearizer do make stereo image clearer.

KH310s comes close but I feels like the stereo imaging is not as good as those HEDDs (Also subjective feelings, measured by my biasd ear).
The Amphions are different, sound wise I'm not a fan of them but maybe they do translate the mix better when working on them? not sure.
The other speakers, IMO, just not as good as those (Also subjective feelings, measured by my biasd ear).

Anyway, I'm pretty happy with my TYPE 20 MK2s and hope to work with them for a long journey.

To be clear, I'm not working in super loud environments, my room is not big enough and I don't think going beyond 86dB is healthy when monitoring nearfield. I use them in closed mode most of the time. I did try to test their limits, and the low frequency distortion can be a problem when they are at super loud volume, you can see the woofer rumbling, but that's way beyond my listening loudness.

Something interesting during my testing is that, when the VOL knob is at max position (+12dB, Analog in), I feel like the limiter engaged later/louder than when the knob is in default position (based on when the red led shows up), I'm not sure. Still waiting for HEDD's email reply for explaining how their volume control works.

 

[norman bates]

Perhaps being a 3-way helps it sound better than other 2-ways..............

maybe the intermod distortion is low, even though harmonic distortion plots aren't the best ...................

We can't argue with the flatish response, maybe with the 400hz peak out the port, and the mid is a bit unhappy 500-1khz compared to neuman kh150

Neumann KH 150 Monitor Review

This is a review, listening tests and measurements of the Neumann KH150 DSP 2-way studio monitor (active speaker). It is on loan from the company and costs US $1,750 (each). The design language is not changed of course. The main woofer is 6.5 inches now powered by 120 watt dedicated...

www.audiosciencereview.com

But we are looking at Neuman's 6.5" doing 750hz at 96db versus HEED's 4".

 

[dananski]

Well yes, I see that what I wrote sounded a bit overly Black and White and was not the most complete comment.

My normal, average, non-background listening SPL is 80db to 90. In terms of 90db (or higher) that is definitely something I do regularly enough to want that ability but is not how I always listen and I can certainly enjoy more modest SPL.
Keep in mind that in my case that is @12feet away from the speakers so it does require significantly more raw output than vs 1-1.5meter in the nearfield(which these HEDD speakers seem aimed toward)
Obviously total room size will be factor as well particularly in the bass..

In terms of listening at 90+db I really enjoy the life sized sound that you are talking about with a real piano and sax and loud humans. Therefore at times the system must be cranked up pretty far. I am careful not to overdo it, no 120db. I do want that sense of realism though and yes many things can be quite a shock when played back well above 90db - that is fun.
I wear my ear protection around any loud equipment that I run, and I am not in a band or heavy industry and don't work or spend that much time in loud environments outside of my audio systems. I basically save it for audio. Fingers crossed these ears will lose whatever they lose doing something fun so I am very lucky as realize many people have to be around very loud things daily.

I would not expect this smallish set (7" woofer)of HEDD speakers to handle true bass duties at high SPL in a farfield system, nor really any speaker with smaller woofers. I use high pass filtering to subs with most any speaker, especially smaller ones. This definitely helps in many cases but it will not always fix an SPL limitation.

Godlike is a bit dramatic on my part, I am trying to stress the sheer level of enjoyment that I get when I am in the right mood and a system can do near to life like sound with realism, dynamics and attack and 'no subjective sense of overload' on the part of the system and no sense of things being strained or becoming harsher than the recording is or starting to change. That they sound as good @ 95db as they do @80 with no sense that turning them up is a downgrade in sound quality of any kind - in fact it is an upgrade, they sound even better.(due in my case to the more life like 'size/amount')

By the way I do interpret the data here and the subjective comments in a way that leads me to give these speakers a thumb's up. They seem very well engineered for their intended use case. I don't think for my typical farfield use, they are quite right but I would love to try them and play with the various settings and the port. It would be an easy way to test a few things out in a blind test that would be reasonably easy to rig up.

Just wanted to say thanks for such a detailed reply. It's been a busy week for me so I didn't read it till now.

I think I agree with everything you say here, though I personally don't tend to enjoy sound over 90dB, at least in my ears - I love a loud concert with proportionate hearing protection and feeling fully immersed. And at home I definitely need to try crossover to a sub - even my floorstanders would benefit by my REW measurements. I'm hoping someone out there measures HEDD's subs too.

 

[MDNSC]

Perhaps being a 3-way helps it sound better than other 2-ways..............

maybe the intermod distortion is low, even though harmonic distortion plots aren't the best ...................

We can't argue with the flatish response, maybe with the 400hz peak out the port, and the mid is a bit unhappy 500-1khz compared to neuman kh150

Neumann KH 150 Monitor Review

This is a review, listening tests and measurements of the Neumann KH150 DSP 2-way studio monitor (active speaker). It is on loan from the company and costs US $1,750 (each). The design language is not changed of course. The main woofer is 6.5 inches now powered by 120 watt dedicated...

www.audiosciencereview.com

But we are looking at Neuman's 6.5" doing 750hz at 96db versus HEED's 4".

That's an interesting point of view, the KH150 also got lower distortion in 100-500Hz range than the KH310, maybe the 2 way is sometimes better.
But both of them are better than HEDD Type 20 mk2 in 96dB distortion measurement.

 

[MDNSC]

@amirm HEDD replied, very interesting that those volume controls also affact when the limiter engaged, which means there might be distortions from the limiter (from what I understood).

 

[MDNSC]

View attachment 261537
I just sent an email to HEDD Support, guess amirm will test it out first or HEDD will respond quicker

The Email I sent to HEDD.

View attachment 262806
@amirm HEDD replied, very interesting that those volume controls also affact when the limiter engaged, which means there might be distortions from the limiter (from what I understood).

The answer they got.

@amirm Seems like there might be a chance for the TYPE 20 MK2 to have a 6dB more headroom with the distortion figure measured by now.

 

[MDNSC]

Another good news though.

 

[Jerico]

Xmax is peak to peak

Xmax is peak to peak.

Could you find data on the 1.5in/38mm voice coil version that is in my Hedd type 07 and send it to me please.

 

[Zvu]

Unfortunately no. I haven't had the chance to see that woofer being offered or measured.

 

[andresnol]

just noticed, that HEDD released a new firmware for these speakers.
wonder if this review had anything to do with this?

"The new Firmware in a nutshell:
- improves the backing up of the speaker memory & settings for increased longevity
- implements better overheating protection
- improves the limiter function for clipping, distortion and protection of the drivers"

 

[MDNSC]

just noticed, that HEDD released a new firmware for these speakers.
wonder if this review had anything to do with this?

"The new Firmware in a nutshell:
- improves the backing up of the speaker memory & settings for increased longevity
- implements better overheating protection
- improves the limiter function for clipping, distortion and protection of the drivers"

The limiter one may change the THD performance during high SPL output.

 

[Alex333]

I cannot understand many of the points of criticism regarding the Type 20 MK2. I have been using the speakers in my recording studio for two years now and never had noise problems or any defects in all that time. I also know 3 other studio owners who have all switched to Hedd Audio speakers. One of them has a studio complex with 8 Studios in it. Every room has a pair of NS10 for comparison and Hedd Audio Type 20 or Type 30 Speakers depending on the room size. Also never heard that there was a defect or problems with the speakers. I purchased my pair directly from Hedd Audio. It would also be interesting to know which firmware was used in the original tests. I always update as soon as there is a new one and I have definitely noticed many improvements. For me personally, the MK20 are in the top 5 of 3 way speakers up to 10,000 €.

 

[F1308]

I cannot understand many of the points of criticism regarding the Type 20 MK2. I have been using the speakers in my recording studio for two years now and never had noise problems or any defects in all that time. I also know 3 other studio owners who have all switched to Hedd Audio speakers. One of them has a studio complex with 8 Studios in it. Every room has a pair of NS10 for comparison and Hedd Audio Type 20 or Type 30 Speakers depending on the room size. Also never heard that there was a defect or problems with the speakers. I purchased my pair directly from Hedd Audio. It would also be interesting to know which firmware was used in the original tests. I always update as soon as there is a new one and I have definitely noticed many improvements. For me personally, the MK20 are in the top 5 of 3 way speakers up to 10,000 €.

Would you please list those 5 top monitors...?

I am still looking for a replacement for my 2009 old pair...

Thank you.

 

[Citizen]

I have just recently acquired a set of type 30 mk1's, the sound is mighty and has an impressive sense of scale, I was looking for a set of mid field monitors to replace my main monitors which was a set of Adam A7x and a set of AVI ADM 9.1t(I preferred the AVI even though they had a lack of bass everything above 60hz was few orders of magnitude above the A7x), I did look at some Adam A77h but was quite under whelmed by the performance but it was in a store but yet it did now reach the volume levels of even the A7x, I really don't know why most speaker manufactures are reducing their max spl numbers but most seem to do it, Dynaudio for instance used to hit 126db on their old bm6a and now the newer LYD series barely gets above 110db, so the reason I went with the HEDD was mostly because of the quoted 126db per pair which is 12db more than the A7x and if I remember rightly the db scale is exponential and thus the type 30 should be far louder that the A7x but to my ears it is not, yes it has far more bass extension but as soon as i turn them up loud the mid and tweeter just can't handle it, I have the gain knob on the back set at 0, it can go six more but because this is the mk1 and not the mk2 then I don't think the same thing applies to turning them all the way up to +6db, I am running them from a half decent sound card(digidesign mbox 2), they are in the same position as the Adams were so can't really understand why they don't seem to be significantly louder, I mean this speakers have four ICE power amps rated at 300 watts each.

I don't know, are my expectations a bit much here, is anyone else having these types of issues?

 

[tktran303]

The specs don’t really tell what the measurement conditions are.

I mean, 125dB for a pair at 1m, which means 119 dB for a single speaker.

But is that for 4pi? (free space/anechoic, the way Amir would measure it on the NFS)
or is that 2pi (the way it would be if it was in-wall/soffit mounted, which can provide as much as 6dB of boost below ~500Hz).
And for how long is this maximum level?
Are we talking maximum SPL levels for 8 hours, 1 hour, 1 minute, or 1 second?
And what about distortion? Suppose I crank up my up my speakers as much as I can, but you stop cranking them when you hear distortion- who is going to play louder?

All these things make a difference.
We must remember that SPL is like power ratings. It really depends on how it’s measured.

And unfortunately HEDD don’t provide a qualifier of how they specify 125dB for a pair at a metre.

Interestingly, look what Sound & Recording.De measured:

((translated to English)
“Maximum level based on 1 m distance at a maximum of 3% distortion (red curve) and at a maximum of 10% distortion (blue curve) for the low-frequency range up to 200 Hz”

Even for pair of speakers (+6dB) you are getting a real world SPL of …

Reference:
Sound & Recording 02.2017

 

[Citizen]

The specs don’t really tell what the measurement conditions are.

I mean, 125dB for a pair at 1m, which means 119 dB for a single speaker.

But is that for 4pi? (free space/anechoic, the way Amir would measure it on the NFS)
or is that 2pi (the way it would be if it was in-wall/soffit mounted, which can provide as much as 6dB of boost below ~500Hz).
And for how long is this maximum level?
Are we talking maximum SPL levels for 8 hours, 1 hour, 1 minute, or 1 second?
And what about distortion? Suppose I crank up my up my speakers as much as I can, but you stop cranking them when you hear distortion- who is going to play louder?

All these things make a difference.
We must remember that SPL is like power ratings. It really depends on how it’s measured.

And unfortunately HEDD don’t provide a qualifier of how they specify 125dB for a pair at a metre.

Interestingly, look what Sound & Recording.De measured:

View attachment 315662

Figure 7: translated
“Maximum level based on 1 m distance at a maximum of 3% distortion (red curve) and at a maximum of 10% distortion (blue curve) for the low-frequency range up to 200 Hz”

Even for a pair of speakers (+6dB) It would appear that your experience aligns closely with this measurement- 110dB or less.

Reference:
Sound & Recording 02.2017

I would say that sounds about right, the Adams say 114db and I would say the type 30's are just a bit below that, thing is the bass is performing well at that point but the tweeter and mid just can't keep up.

This is an incredibly disappointing realization for me because not even adding a sub is going to make any difference to the tweeter/mid, I guess I will just have to live with it for now and see if the speakers other qualities can compensate for this short coming but this maybe a deal breaker for me.

 

[LTig]

Also one should be aware that physical limits exist. Therefore I'd be very caucious with such a huge claimed difference. IME it's almost impossible that one speaker of a vertiable brand can play 12 dB louder than a similar sized/priced speaker of another veritable brand.