Kef Uni-Q generations and speakers

[Crosstalk]

I don't know
But even with DSP in my R7s they can go very very loud, bookshelf tend to have their 100% of distortion much earlier in sub bass
This is a comparason r7 vs r3, anechoic chamber, im not sure
at 86dB kef told me the intetion with the towers was lower the 20hz-200hz distortion, but also because towers have 2 ports you can add one port lower, this is clearly represent here:
View attachment 186627
The distortion start to rise at very super loud volume, If you wanna play super loud the R11 are going to perform better at super loud volumes, but if you wanna super loud volume it's better add 2 subs.. if not, then the R11. But you can add 2 subs into the R11 anyway, lol.
Towers can play very loud..



Having that much distortion at lower frequency's it's ok, most speakers don't do 20hz.. it's pretty normal have a high distortion in that region
Even References or that magico you posted have that kind of distortion, your R11 have 4 woofers, and apparently that help a lot more that a bit better woofer
I guess the R11 can go very loud and play everything with ease
View attachment 186628
View attachment 186630

But the graph from stereoplay I posted earlier shows clearly that it distorts in lower bass even without eq. Audibility is another thing. But then we were unnecessarily bashing the canton Speakers back then as their also on graph it’s there but when I demoed them I couldn’t hear anything whatsoever. Yet I agreed to you because I wasn’t sure what I heard was distortion or sound. Anyway it was harmonic that nothing stood out. Call me anything, but I say again, that canton had more stunning sound in general than the r11 I listened !! If a random person walks into a store and demo both, there is a huge chance that they would overlook the r11 as r11 compared to all speakers in the category appears dull immediately. And sounds more vocal heavy.

One thing I don’t understand here is, why is the distortion graph of all speakera different from freq response ?

 

[abdo123]

I guess Kef like to put a bit of coloration in their speakers, it's very small coloration. I like it.

My goal was never get a perfectly flat speakers to enjoy my music

Thank for these graph, are very useful to see the differences


Anyway, the coloration is not too much, but actually the rooms can change a lot how they sounds

For example if you got some in-room gain issues between 200hz-500hz with the R3 the mids are going to sounds too much resseced/laid back and kind of blurry, having the same problem with the LS50M are going to be less harmful in comparason to R3

I guess if you put these in a very good room, these spakers are going to sound very similar but the ls50m a bit foward and the R series a bit laid back

If you look at the polar patterns / maps both speaker radiate the mids much wider than the highs. If you take these things into consideration the mids will likely not sound recessed.

 

[Mnyb]

If I get a set of R7 I will use them with sub anyway. Almost all reasonable speakers benefit from being high passed from the sub frequencies . One can experiment with rather low xover frequencies.

 

[Crosstalk]

If I get a set of R7 I will use them with sub anyway. Almost all reasonable speakers benefit from being high passed from the sub frequencies . One can experiment with rather low xover frequencies.

Can anyone post meausrments of some subs with low distortions here? Is it possible to get r7 and get low distortion in bass with two subs or one to the level of r11, paying the total price ?

 

[thewas]

One thing I don’t understand here is, why is the distortion graph of all speakera different from freq response ?

Because it is measured without windowing.

 

[Crosstalk]

Because it is measured without windowing.

Can you explain a bit ? I do not understand this

 

[Mnyb]

Data bass ? And Erin has measured a lot of them ?

Nb we have not good hearing in those very low frequencies so 10% THD at 20hz would be considered very very good.
It’s logical it follows the equal loudness curve ( fletchers Munson ) if we need >100 dB spl to even be able to hear the fundamental the 2nd tone at 40Hz will also need some serious spl to be audible . Consider that our hearing in the upper midrange is so much much better than in the deep bass ( just look at the curve ) our tolerance for THD is much higher in the bass, that’s why we even can use bass reflex, it’s a resonating tube , try that in midrange

You will hear when the mains crap out if some music has very low frequencies , especially bass reflex under the port tuning when the driver becomes undamped .
So just high passing the mains ( like some active monitors do ) without even using a sub is beneficial, no piont in trying to reproduce stuff the speaker can’t handle .

IME with music and reasonable spl you will not even hear the deepest bass anyway ( equal loudness curve again) I think very low f3 in small speakers is just specmanship it looks good in the data. To make this audible you have to play really loud , many pop and rock albums does not have much below 50Hz anyway

I use a rhythmic fhp15 ? Their subs have servo control and low THD

 

[Crosstalk]

Data bass ? And Erin has measured a lot of them ?

Nb we have not good hearing in those very low frequencies so 10% THD at 20hz would be considered very very good.
It’s logical it follows the equal loudness curve ( fletchers Munson ) if we need >100 dB spl to even be able to hear the fundamental the 2nd tone at 40Hz will also need some serious spl to be audible . Consider that our hearing in the upper midrange is so much much better than in the deep bass ( just look at the curve ) our tolerance for THD is much higher in the bass, that’s why we even can use bass reflex, it’s a resonating tube , try that in midrange

You will hear when the mains crap out if some music has very low frequencies , especially bass reflex under the port tuning when the driver becomes undamped .
So just high passing the mains ( like some active monitors do ) without even using a sub is beneficial, no piont in trying to reproduce stuff the speaker can’t handle .

IME with music and reasonable spl you will not even hear the deepest bass anyway ( equal loudness curve again) I think very low f3 in small speakers is just specmanship it looks good in the data. To make this audible you have to play really loud , many pop and rock albums does not have much below 50Hz anyway

I use a rhythmic fhp15 ? Their subs have servo control and low THD

Are there measurements of this sub?

 

[Crosstalk]

Data bass ? And Erin has measured a lot of them ?

Nb we have not good hearing in those very low frequencies so 10% THD at 20hz would be considered very very good.
It’s logical it follows the equal loudness curve ( fletchers Munson ) if we need >100 dB spl to even be able to hear the fundamental the 2nd tone at 40Hz will also need some serious spl to be audible . Consider that our hearing in the upper midrange is so much much better than in the deep bass ( just look at the curve ) our tolerance for THD is much higher in the bass, that’s why we even can use bass reflex, it’s a resonating tube , try that in midrange

You will hear when the mains crap out if some music has very low frequencies , especially bass reflex under the port tuning when the driver becomes undamped .
So just high passing the mains ( like some active monitors do ) without even using a sub is beneficial, no piont in trying to reproduce stuff the speaker can’t handle .

IME with music and reasonable spl you will not even hear the deepest bass anyway ( equal loudness curve again) I think very low f3 in small speakers is just specmanship it looks good in the data. To make this audible you have to play really loud , many pop and rock albums does not have much below 50Hz anyway

What do you mean by undamped ? How does one find from graphs how a driver is umpdamped or damped ?

 

[Mnyb]

Rythmik FV15HP Subwoofer Review

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CEA-2010 is a test Protocol for sub woofers, so look for this for all subs . I think Erin follows this protocol to .

 

[Crosstalk]

Rythmik FV15HP Subwoofer Review

Powerful, rich, deep and solid with true 20Hz extension is how I would describe the bass output of the Rythmik FV15HP sub. It's a well engineered product that will serve any upscale home theater.

www.audioholics.com

CEA-2010 is a test Protocol for sub woofers, so look for this for all subs . I think Erin follows this protocol to .

What’s the distotion percentage of this under 40hz?

 

[Mnyb]

What’s the distotion percentage of this under 40hz?

I actually haven’t figured that exactly, it s very level depending as usual at low spl I guess it’s single digit % .

Sub test protocol is. A bit different due to our bad hearing . The cea-2010 protocol has some tolerable THD levels built in ( don’t ask me what it is look it up ) then one test how loud it goes before the treashold is reached and plot a curve.

Fun fact if you have sub you always can localise, it’s does not fulfil this . We can’t localise frequency under 100Hz but we can localise bad subwoofers , the many overtones rattles port turbulence etc and to shallow filters give it away.

In practical use this one is dead silent it’s just there’s .

They also operate in such a limited band that all talk about musicality and fast bass and such is complete nonsense

 

[Crosstalk]

I actually haven’t figured that exactly, it s very level depending as usual at low spl I guess it’s single digit % .

Sub test protocol is. A bit different due to our bad hearing . The cea-2010 protocol has some tolerable THD levels built in ( don’t ask me what it is look it up ) then one test how loud it goes before the treashold is reached and plot a curve.

Fun fact if you have sub you always can localise, it’s does not fulfil this . We can’t localise frequency under 100Hz but we can localise bad subwoofers , the many overtones rattles port turbulence etc and to shallow filters give it away.

In practical use this one is dead silent it’s just there’s .

They also operate in such a limited band that all talk about musicality and fast bass and such is complete nonsense

That’s true there are lot of people who thinks timing is a thing!

 

[Colonel7]

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[thewas]

Can you explain a bit ? I do not understand this

The frequency response curves are generated at almost all magazines and hobbyists (exceptions are the rare Klippel NFS, huge anechoic chambers and huge spaces outside for freefield or ground plane measurements) with a windowed measurement for the region above bass which is "stitched" together with some nearfield bass measurements because the usual time window is too small to get enough resolution in the bass, see more about it here. For a full distortion measurement you cannot do this so the frequency response shown has some deviations from the real one.

 

[BrokenEnglishGuy]

If you look at the polar patterns / maps both speaker radiate the mids much wider than the highs. If you take these things into consideration the mids will likely not sound recessed.

I thinked my R7s sounded a bit laid back/recessed/smooth because when I listen my r7 every day it seems to sound in that way too, but when installed a huge foam in the front wall, mids changed a lot... become much more clean, that soft impact in drums just dissapiar, the impact in the drums are more aggresive with no soft character, I also asked myself why the R7s have a kind of soft impact, I thinked was the speakers but the big foam removed that character, the sound become magical to me using the foam+in room Eq+placement.


The sound from my R7s is what I describe as a very nice balance sound, plus recording never sound harsh or very bright which is what I was looking for too.


I don't know at this point if I still think the R are recessed or not, but I always enjoy the fact that my r7s never sound harsh or bright, sound more right than bright or dark.

To me, of course. Im young.

 

[BrokenEnglishGuy]

But the graph from stereoplay I posted earlier shows clearly that it distorts in lower bass even without eq. Audibility is another thing. But then we were unnecessarily bashing the canton Speakers back then as their also on graph it’s there but when I demoed them I couldn’t hear anything whatsoever. Yet I agreed to you because I wasn’t sure what I heard was distortion or sound. Anyway it was harmonic that nothing stood out. Call me anything, but I say again, that canton had more stunning sound in general than the r11 I listened !! If a random person walks into a store and demo both, there is a huge chance that they would overlook the r11 as r11 compared to all speakers in the category appears dull immediately. And sounds more vocal heavy.

One thing I don’t understand here is, why is the distortion graph of all speakera different from freq response ?

Because the 100% in low end is pretty normal ( did you see your images from the Magico speaker? 32,000 and also 100% of distortion in bass ) at high volumes, canton have the distortion problem in the most sensitive area. 1khz-3khz.
For example the other way for not getting the ugly 100% and lower bass, it's just elimite the bass.
If you see this graph, there is no bass at 40hz or below.

The r7 only have nearly 100% at very loud volume ( 100dB ), it's almost 100% but is not, but also the speaker is doing 28hz~@93dB~. which is pretty low.

The canton Barerly hits 86dB in the lower bass. The r7 are almost doubling the SPL in sub bass vs canton.
There is so much more sub bass with Kefs at 100dB, so if pretty obvious the kefs are going to look ugly in that graph.

And, one thing to notice, it's the R11 ability for remain clean at 100 dB.

Even 30,000k speakers have problem at loud spl 100dB, it's pretty normal..

 

[Crosstalk]

Because the 100% in low end is pretty normal ( did you see your images from the Magico speaker? 32,000 and also 100% of distortion in bass ) at high volumes, canton have the distortion problem in the most sensitive area. 1khz-3khz.
For example the other way for not getting the ugly 100% and lower bass, it's just elimite the bass.
If you see this graph, there is no bass at 40hz or below.
View attachment 186942
The r7 only have nearly 100% at very loud volume ( 100dB ), it's almost 100% but is not, but also the speaker is doing 28hz~@93dB~. which is pretty low.

The canton Barerly hits 86dB in the lower bass. The r7 are almost doubling the SPL in sub bass vs canton.
There is so much more sub bass with Kefs at 100dB, so if pretty obvious the kefs are going to look ugly in that graph.
View attachment 186943


And, one thing to notice, it's the R11 ability for remain clean at 100 dB.

Even 30,000k speakers have problem at loud spl 100dB, it's pretty normal..

to conclude kef r7 at 100 db has almost 100 percent distotion on sub bass and canton has 3% distortion of high treble. Both are audible. At lower levels both the sub bass problem on kef and high treble problem on canton is avoidable

One is not superior to the other imo, both are flawed in its own regard

“Even 30,000k speakers have problem at loud spl 100dB, it's pretty normal..”

Hmmm, but this is what you wrote in the canton reference 7k thread to prove the cantons were bad.

“
Also every 1 meter reduce the loudness is reduce by 6dB, let's say at 2 - 3 meters you easily push them a lot, also the music it's dynamic ( DR ).
Let's not forget the music it's dynamic, so if you are listening at 90dB at 1 meters, when you are listening music these peak are of 6 - 12 dB, so 90dB with 102dB of peaks.”

So why does this not apply to the bass region? Is DR limited to highs alone?

Again most sensitive is debatable, 100 percent distotion in bass is as audible as 3 percent in highs.

 

[BrokenEnglishGuy]

to conclude kef r7 at 100 db has almost 100 percent distotion on sub bass and canton has 3% distortion of high treble. Both are audible. At lower levels both the sub bass problem on kef and high treble problem on canton is avoidable

One is not superior to the other imo, both are flawed in its own regard

“Even 30,000k speakers have problem at loud spl 100dB, it's pretty normal..”

Hmmm, but this is what you wrote in the canton reference 7k thread to prove the cantons were bad.

“
Also every 1 meter reduce the loudness is reduce by 6dB, let's say at 2 - 3 meters you easily push them a lot, also the music it's dynamic ( DR ).
Let's not forget the music it's dynamic, so if you are listening at 90dB at 1 meters, when you are listening music these peak are of 6 - 12 dB, so 90dB with 102dB of peaks.”

So why does this not apply to the bass region? Is DR limited to highs alone?

Again most sensitive is debatable, 100 percent distotion in bass is as audible as 3 percent in highs.

Nope, the kef are audible at his max spl, 105dB.
Also when you add subs, better

 

[Crosstalk]

Nope, the kef are audible at his max spl, 105dB.
Also when you add subs, better

The red line is 100db, so it’s at 100db. Same with canton.

If you plan canton and kef at 100db you hear distortion in bass from kef and in treble from canton.

Kef has more extension but at 100db it doesn’t matter as you will be annoyed by that distortion than what is audible.

When you add subs, you need to use a high pass on kef which means you need a DSP to avoid the distiortion at 100db.

Anyway it won’t matter to a person like me as I would never listen that loud. But like you said 12db of DR of music may happen at lower loudness than 100db.

So effectively you can safely listen both at 88db without hitting any distotion from dynamics. With canton you cannot fix the treble problem with a DSP but with kef you can use a high pass from say 40hz

By the way what DSP s are out there which doesn’t mess up the resolution of sound When filters are applied ?