Help choosing column speakers

[Des Esseintes]

I'm worried that the Focals might just simply be too big and have the wrong tonality for my room. Watching that video here and the guy discussing room acoustics/speakers pairing just picked Focal and B&W as the first example that came to mind of speakers to avoid in a bright room. His description of the room pretty much fits mine too...

 

[Mart68]

If you don't want to fix the room you might be better off with a narrower dispersion speaker like a KEF. There's a couple of models that have a bass shelf for close to wall placement, although I forget which ones now.

Truth is no speaker will ever sound really good in a highly reflective space.

 

[raindance]

If you don't want to fix the room you might be better off with a narrower dispersion speaker like a KEF. There's a couple of models that have a bass shelf for close to wall placement, although I forget which ones now.

Truth is no speaker will ever sound really good in a highly reflective space.

R3 Meta has a close wall "shelf" in it's response and they have a few other models designed to be close the the wall without being boomy. I don't know about brightness with those. The smaller JBL Studio 530 or 630 have good directivity control and their ports can be open or closed. I have 530's in a very reflective room quite close to the wall.

 

[Des Esseintes]

If you don't want to fix the room you might be better off with a narrower dispersion speaker like a KEF. There's a couple of models that have a bass shelf for close to wall placement, although I forget which ones now.

Truth is no speaker will ever sound really good in a highly reflective space.

It's not that I don't want to, it's rather that I am not sure I can. I'm not sure adding another carpet so far from the speakers is going to make that much difference and even curtains on the windows won't really help because then that would mean being in the dark every time I want to listen to music. I think the problem might be with the ceiling which is concrete, and the walls which are made of bricks, with no insulation. Probably I should have insulated the house from the inside first before renovating it, but that's a major hassle now.

Close to wall placement is not really a problem in my case. I can place the speakers pretty far from the walls and still have enough space in between them.

I know reflective spaces are not ideal, but it seems that Focals make matters even worse than other speakers.

 

[Mart68]

It's not that I don't want to, it's rather that I am not sure I can. I'm not sure adding another carpet so far from the speakers is going to make that much difference and even curtains on the windows won't really help because then that would mean being in the dark every time I want to listen to music. I think the problem might be with the ceiling which is concrete, and the walls which are made of bricks, with no insulation. Probably I should have insulated the house from the inside first before renovating it, but that's a major hassle now.

You can.

My room is not dissimilar in size and construction, although it is longer than yours which puts the main mode way down in the 20s.

Nevertheless, the floor is concrete, walls are brick, a big chunk of the ceiling is an RSJ that supports the upper floor. I still managed to damp it enough to get some Focal towers sounding natural and balanced, I think I spent about £60 on dedicated panels, the rest is just furnishings (and a big roll of loft insulation in one corner).

Curtains don't need to be fully closed to be effective, but they are only one tiny part of the jigsaw. Likewise with the rugs. Lots of little things that in isolation will make no difference but together will have a large effect.

I listed the things you can do with 'normal furnishings' in a previous post, you can add to those with some absorption panels on the walls and on any doors. It will all add up and the difference won't be subtle.

It's interesting that you linked to 'British Audiophile' since it's pretty obvious from his videos that his room is highly reflective. You can see it and hear the echo in his voice. Some of what he says is correct in the same way a broken clock is right twice a day, but I wouldn't use him as a reliable source of advice. He believes in many of the typical audiophile fantasies like power cables improving the sound.

 

[Des Esseintes]

Yeah, that's the thing with hi-fi, it's all about deciding who you trust, and when you have no scientific background in acoustics, it's basically completely random. Testing the stuff yourself is difficult as brick and mortar hi-fi stores have become rare and even when you do find one, choice will be limited and listening conditions vastly different from your own room.

 

[Mart68]

Yeah, that's the thing with hi-fi, it's all about deciding who you trust, and when you have no scientific background in acoustics, it's basically completely random. Testing the stuff yourself is difficult as brick and mortar hi-fi stores have become rare and even when you do find one, choice will be limited and listening conditions vastly different from your own room.

Well I am no expert despite having 40 years of hands on experience and many thousands of hours spent studying the research and desperately trying to understand it.

However I know enough to recognise who is an expert and who isn't. There's numerous contributors here on this forum who are experts. Listen to them, disregard the Youtubers.

As far as trying / testing stuff my solution has mostly been to buy it and see. I'm better at buying it then selling it so it does tend to accumulate! Now I'm retired I can no longer afford to do that. But I've achieved the level of sound quality I set out to attain way back in 1986. A bit better, in fact.

 

[Wolf11Man]

I have read some reviews of your FOCALnow and with a grain of salt, those are HT speakers, not audiophile products. The HT guys love "Bang/Sizzle" and don't care for the fine print that much. So returning them should be a good idea. Not even a bi-wire terminal should have been a warning. Maybe more a Chinese Focal than a French one.
For your needs in such a critical room, my advice would be to look at larger, active studio monitors. Most of them have the option to adjust to the room, something the HIFI industry is ignoring in most products. This may be a very hard cut for you, but usualy you will get double or three times the value of a HIFI product from such pro speakers. Don't expect to get a pro speaker at 50% discount like the Focal HIFI pair.

Maybe have a look at Thomann, best prices and great service: https://www.thomann.fr/ecrans_d_eco...LCJjdXJyZW5jeSI6MiwibGFuZ3VhZ2UiOjR9&reload=1

PS have a look at the "Dynaudio LYD-48" may be what you are searching for.

 

[Des Esseintes]

I have read some reviews of your FOCALnow and with a grain of salt, those are HT speakers, not audiophile products. The HT guys love "Bang/Sizzle" and don't care for the fine print that much. So returning them should be a good idea. Not even a bi-wire terminal should have been a warning. Maybe more a Chinese Focal than a French one.
For your needs in such a critical room, my advice would be to look at larger, active studio monitors. Most of them have the option to adjust to the room, something the HIFI industry is ignoring in most products. This may be a very hard cut for you, but usualy you will get double or three times the value of a HIFI product from such pro speakers. Don't expect to get a pro speaker at 50% discount like the Focal HIFI pair.

Maybe have a look at Thomann, best prices and great service: https://www.thomann.fr/ecrans_d_eco...LCJjdXJyZW5jeSI6MiwibGFuZ3VhZ2UiOjR9&reload=1

PS have a look at the "Dynaudio LYD-48" may be what you are searching for.

I thought bi-wiring was another of those hi-fi myths. Where did you find those reviews? I couldn't find a single one.

 

[raindance]

Lots of bad advice in this thread... The room is the problem and you have chosen wide dispersion speakers, which are the worst choice for highly reflective rooms. Spending more money on speakers won't fix much. Equalize the system to remove bass modes imposed by the room and introduce a sloping down curve to tame the treble. Don't point the tweeter straight at you. Try plugging the bass ports if equalization is not an option. Use tone controls. Try different placement options. Try sitting closer to get in the near field to have less obvious room influence. You have options!

 

[Wolf11Man]

An active studio speaker will bring it's correction filters, because different rooms have different problems. Those manufacturers (like FOCAL in it's pro line, by the way) know that and give the professionals the tools to correct this.
You could as well use some tone controls, analog or digital, better parametric filters, or an automated system using a measuring microphone. We mentioned Dirac, Audyssey, but there are many more.
I looked around for the Focal series of your speakers and found some opinions, but didn't bookmark them. They are simply not considered audiophile speakers.

Bi-wiring is no myth if low and high section of a speaker are electically separated and you use two amps for each. It may just not always give better results. Just two wires with a single amp is very questionable, if you ask me, just nonsense. So don't mix bi-wiring and bi-amping, but in any case you need a double set of terminals. These are called bi-wiring terminals in most cases.

 

[Des Esseintes]

As a rule of thumb, is the following a good assumption?

wide dispersion speakers + dampened room > narrow dispersion speakers + dampened room > narrow dispersion speakers + reflective room > wide dispersion speakers + reflective room

In other words, what I am trying to assess is the risk I am taking in keeping the speakers as opposed to exchanging them for narrow dispersion speakers.

 

[raindance]

What risk? You can equalize what you already have to work better. Changing them risks your money. If you change to controlled directivity speakers, while it may help the treble, it won't help the bass where you'll still probably need EQ. Try measurement and EQ before swapping one set of problems for another.

 

[Mort]

As a rule of thumb, is the following a good assumption?

wide dispersion speakers + dampened room > narrow dispersion speakers + dampened room > narrow dispersion speakers + reflective room > wide dispersion speakers + reflective room

In other words, what I am trying to assess is the risk I am taking in keeping the speakers as opposed to exchanging them for narrow dispersion speakers.

To be honest, no. You might want to check out the audioholics YouTube series on directivity.

Wide and narrow, executed competently, are personal preferences.

 

[Des Esseintes]

A few more questions. When I contacted the hifi store that sold me the speakers, they said the Focals are actually not that easy to drive because while their nominal impedance is 6-8 ohms, they can drop as low as 2 ohms. So they said testing them on my Nuforce DDA 100 (50W per channel) did not do them justice, especially in the lower register. They said that the Nuforce's power supply was probably too small. True or false?

They also said that the speakers need a burn-in period to reach their full potential. I have read that the idea of burn-in periods for amps is pretty much an urban legend. How about speakers?

 

[raindance]

A few more questions. When I contacted the hifi store that sold me the speakers, they said the Focals are actually not that easy to drive because while their nominal impedance is 6-8 ohms, they can drop as low as 2 ohms. So they said testing them on my Nuforce DDA 100 (50W per channel) did not do them justice, especially in the lower register. They said that the Nuforce's power supply was probably too small. True or false?

They also said that the speakers need a burn-in period to reach their full potential. I have read that the idea of burn-in periods for amps is pretty much an urban legend. How about speakers?

It depends how loud you listen as to whether or not the amp has enough power. A more powerful amp might help but I'd suggest borrowing one to try before you buy. More important than power is equalization.

If I was in your situation I'd get an AV receiver with decent room correction, such as a Denon 1800 and up, buy the really cheap app and optimize your sound the easy way.

Burn in is bullshit. It's a lie the dealers use to avoid returns.

 

[Wolf11Man]

Speaker burn in: Play your " AC/DC Live" CD at uncomfortable high SPL and you are done with burn in after 30 minutes. Anything else is talk to avoid returns of unpleasureable sounding audio gear sold with great promises.
I do "burn in" with any speaker driver I measure the TSP, before and after. In some cases the resonance frequency dropped a little, but mostly with large, hard suspended PA drivers. The "usual" HIFI woofer doesn't change in any audible way. Never seen more than 5 Hz after a night of very high excursion.

Burn in of any other part is esotheric nonsense. Your cooper wire should not burn (in). The coil in the crossover is just a few turns of cooper wire...
If capacitors or resistors would need burn in, they could not be used in any precise machine, as their values would change and disturb the calculated function.

PS your amp is no power house, but has been tested well even with hard to drive speakers. Nothing wrong with it.

 

[Rzezniq]

A few more questions. When I contacted the hifi store that sold me the speakers, they said the Focals are actually not that easy to drive because while their nominal impedance is 6-8 ohms, they can drop as low as 2 ohms. So they said testing them on my Nuforce DDA 100 (50W per channel) did not do them justice, especially in the lower register. They said that the Nuforce's power supply was probably too small. True or false?

They also said that the speakers need a burn-in period to reach their full potential. I have read that the idea of burn-in periods for amps is pretty much an urban legend. How about speakers?

With 50w you can drive it really loud (I have a 43w tube amp and that's plenty). Audiocholics measurements classified the Focals as easy to drive so unless you want 107db+ you should be good. Since these speakers caused you so much drama I suggest you return them as you are clearly not happy and unwilling to EQ. But please understand that any other speakers will come with their own set of problems.

 

[Des Esseintes]

With 50w you can drive it really loud (I have a 43w tube amp and that's plenty). Audiocholics measurements classified the Focals as easy to drive so unless you want 107db+ you should be good. Since these speakers caused you so much drama I suggest you return them as you are clearly not happy and unwilling to EQ. But please understand that any other speakers will come with their own set of problems.

Not sure what makes you think I am unwilling to EQ (I have in fact spent quite a lot of time fiddling around with the EQ on my computer) but advice well taken.

 

[Rzezniq]

Not sure what makes you think I am unwilling to EQ (I have in fact spent quite a lot of time fiddling around with the EQ on my computer) but advice well taken.

Apologies. I might have misunderstood. This topic has a lot what I could call "BS". It's not your amp, lack of bi-amping or the opinion that Focal is not hifi. Objective data (again Audiocholics measured Vestia N3) shows a good and even response and no issues related to speaker's impedance.

It is either how you perceive sound or a room that is difficult acoustics wise. EQ should remove most if not all of your issues.