Monitor Audio Silver 50 7g Bookshelf Speaker Review by Erin

[MarkS]

I think it sucks that almost no speaker companies these days seem capable of designing grilles that don't f*** up the sound. The list of such companies is very long and includes all the ASR faves.

 

[YSC]

I think it sucks that almost no speaker companies these days seem capable of designing grilles that don't f*** up the sound. The list of such companies is very long and includes all the ASR faves.

I would guess that when a grille is located with some distance and is a flat surface it would interfere with with driver more and cause more problems, the ones without very noticeable drawbacks I would say are like the 80x0 genelecs, neumann etc which have a grille shaped roughly the same as the driver, I would guess that being equal distant to the driver surface would minimize the issue, with a flat grille, and especially you want some protection so it's of some rigidity the distance,from driver to the grille having undesired reflection and comb filtering is unavoidable

 

[Doodski]

I think it sucks that almost no speaker companies these days seem capable of designing grilles that don't f*** up the sound. The list of such companies is very long and includes all the ASR faves.

Energy used to make grills that where part of the front waveguide glass bead plastic front panels that where glued to the cabinets. We couldn't keep them in stock because they sold so well and decimated most other speakers in their respective price ranges. if you look at the curvature and dimensions of the front glass bead plastic panel you can see how a grill would conform to the waveguide and woofers.

 

[MarkS]

It's not that hard to design non-diffracting grilles, and there are some options out there (though not many). On principle, I refuse to buy speakers that do not have non-diffracting grilles.

 

[HarmonicTHD]

Personally I never liked MA brightness in many of their speakers and always decided for other brands in (subjective) listening tests. Which I think is too bad, because they obviously have nice built quality and as shown above are able to produce a decently linear speaker. Why not just fix that brightness (high frequency hump) and all would be great, especially for that price. Do they still think they need that to impress in showrooms?

 

[Bcarroll]

Yes, this would be good if it had a metal case, the wood casing lives so the bolt always loosens.

Not in my experience. I have 3 different ma speakers currently, and the newer ones (RX6 and Silver 100 6g) use the bolt-through fixing method. I check the bolts a few times a year, and they rarely need tightening. Maybe loosening would occur at higher listening levels.

 

[Bcarroll]

Thank You for the honest forthright review. And especilly for realizing the design purpose of the driver securing bolt, not mistaking it for a “wall mounting screw” as another famous reviewer did in his review, thus de-legitimizing every measurement and comment in the review. Which I found infuriatingly unprofessional. That review should not have been published under those conditions.

 

[mglobe]

Not in my experience. I have 3 different ma speakers currently, and the newer ones (RX6 and Silver 100 6g) use the bolt-through fixing method. I check the bolts a few times a year, and they rarely need tightening. Maybe loosening would occur at higher listening levels.

A dab of loctite would fix that.

 

[Ruffy]

I’d be interested to know people’s thoughts on these vs dbr-62 in my case (dbr’s which I already have). I am running them in a built in TV cabinet, fed from a NAD D3045 through HDMI ARC.

I am really struggling with hearing dialogue; I understand that mixing has a lot to do with it but wondering if the difficult load of the dbr at 100Hz is making it worse, and if a change of speaker may improve it with the current amp (no EQ ability). D3045 amp can’t change due to size constraints and being able to be placed vertically.

They sell the Silver 50 speakers as being able to be placed close to walls, and in the absence of front ported options these look okay. Would have the cupboard wall immediately beside them and a wall 10cm behind.

Cheers,
Andrew

 

[Ruffy]

I’d be interested to know people’s thoughts on these vs dbr-62 in my case (dbr’s which I already have). I am running them in a built in TV cabinet, fed from a NAD D3045 through HDMI ARC.

I am really struggling with hearing dialogue; I understand that mixing has a lot to do with it but wondering if the difficult load of the dbr at 100Hz is making it worse, and if a change of speaker may improve it with the current amp (no EQ ability). D3045 amp can’t change due to size constraints and being able to be placed vertically.

They sell the Silver 50 speakers as being able to be placed close to walls, and in the absence of front ported options these look okay. Would have the cupboard wall immediately beside them and a wall 10cm behind.

Cheers,
Andrew

 

[warpdrive]

I’d be interested to know people’s thoughts on these vs dbr-62 in my case (dbr’s which I already have). I am running them in a built in TV cabinet, fed from a NAD D3045 through HDMI ARC.

I am really struggling with hearing dialogue; I understand that mixing has a lot to do with it but wondering if the difficult load of the dbr at 100Hz is making it worse, and if a change of speaker may improve it with the current amp (no EQ ability). D3045 amp can’t change due to size constraints and being able to be placed vertically.

They sell the Silver 50 speakers as being able to be placed close to walls, and in the absence of front ported options these look okay. Would have the cupboard wall immediately beside them and a wall 10cm behind.

Cheers,
Andrew

I doubt changing the DBR for these would make a meaningful difference. The NAD should be able to handle the load.

I wonder if the way you have your speakers placed (in a cabinet) has anything to do with the sound quality. Are you sitting on-axis (toed in). Are your ears level with tweeter?

Sometimes measurements can tell you quickly if there is anything way off with your setup. It might be better to invest in measurement mic and check things out rather than blindly changing out speakers

 

[Ruffy]

I doubt changing the DBR for these would make a meaningful difference. The NAD should be able to handle the load.

I wonder if the way you have your speakers placed (in a cabinet) has anything to do with the sound quality. Are you sitting on-axis (toed in). Are your ears level with tweeter?

Sometimes measurements can tell you quickly if there is anything way off with your setup. It might be better to invest in measurement mic and check things out rather than blindly changing out speakers

Thanks for the reply @warpdrive! I am hamstrung by the position, I've got a flat shelf in a built-in cabinet that is just wide enough for a TV, vertical amp and speakers. Speakers are at ear level but not even room to toe in speakers. My wife also wants it to be minimalistic, hence the D3045 with HDMI ARC from the TV.

I have borrowed a pair of Usher s520's and MA Silver 100's to trial in the same area. Both of them are much more intelligible with dialogue than the DBR-62 were; I find I am not changing volumes as much (up to hear voices, then down again with all the other sounds/music/explosions etc). Maybe the DBR interacting with my fixed room makes vocals worse? I've heard people subjectively refer to them as "boring" and "flat" and I would agree with that in this specific space (big caveat being this space - I understand they measure extremely well on the klippel). I don't have a mic to correlate frequency response to what I was hearing, although even if I did I don't really have the option of changing much anyway.

My other thought as above was power or lack thereof, plenty of talk on the web that the DBR's need 100+ watts to get going. Maybe they need more juice than the D3045 can give? I did like the DBR's in my big room, finding they were very neutral and without offense (again subjective). They did nothing wrong, did not give listening fatigue (important) but were lacking bass which was to be expected in the size of the room, although this was with much more power than the D3045. Interestingly in the same system I much prefer the Silver 100's.

Either way, I'll be putting the DBR's up for sale. I think a pair of these Silver 50's could be the ticket for my use case, and look better than the DBR's to boot (important to the wife).

Cheers, Andrew

 

[Lawrence of Suburbia]

Monitor Audio are making exciting speakers! Addictive listening (i.e. you want to play album after album with the 50's!)

Happy panther!

 

[jsrtheta]

Monitor Audio are making exciting speakers! Addictive listening (i.e. you want to play album after album with the 50's!)

Happy panther!

They're the only maker I use, except for my Dali sub.

 

[fadetoblackbs]

Personally I never liked MA brightness in many of their speakers and always decided for other brands in (subjective) listening tests. Which I think is too bad, because they obviously have nice built quality and as shown above are able to produce a decently linear speaker. Why not just fix that brightness (high frequency hump) and all would be great, especially for that price. Do they still think they need that to impress in showrooms?

Would it be possible to "correct" that brightness if necessary using some available room correction software like Dirac etc.?

 

[Ktacos]

Would it be possible to "correct" that brightness if necessary using some available room correction software like Dirac etc.?

Depends on the speakers dispersion but in the case of this review MA speaker, look at the estimated in room response. Everything above 3khz is elevated so a simple shelving filter at 3khz of a few DB should help a lot.

 

[jsrtheta]

Would it be possible to "correct" that brightness if necessary using some available room correction software like Dirac etc.?

I don't find MA speakers to be too bright, and have been using them for years.

 

[Jim Creek]

I’ve owned MA Silver 100s gen 6 for 6 years. They have an 8” woofer which improves the bass response compared to the MA Silver 50s. The presentation of the 100s lean to the bright side but not excessively. The build quality is quite good. I really like them.

The MA S100 gen 6 sold for $1000. The new MA S100 gen 7 sells for $1650 on Crutchfield. They are essentially the same speaker but $1650 is a bit over priced IMHO.

 

[MattHooper]

Personally, I’ve always loved the old big pair of Monitor Audio (early 80s) speakers my father-in-law owned.

However, I found their more modern speakers, from the silver range on upwards to the platinum, to be a little too bright and antiseptic sounding.

However, I get along quite well with the Bronze range, at least the generation that I listened to and bought from. I have several sets of Bronze stand mounted speaker speakers for various purpose purposes, but mostly I’m using some for rear and side surround channels.

They don’t sound bright and don’t measure bright. I’d say they pretty much sound like they measure here:

SoundStageNetwork.com | SoundStage.com - NRC Measurements: Monitor Audio Bronze 6 Loudspeakers

www.soundstagenetwork.com

 

[cavedriver]

Personally, I’ve always loved the old big pair of Monitor Audio (early 80s) speakers my father-in-law owned.

However, I found their more modern speakers, from the silver range on upwards to the platinum, to be a little too bright and antiseptic sounding.

However, I get along quite well with the Bronze range, at least the generation that I listened to and bought from. I have several sets of Bronze stand mounted speaker speakers for various purpose purposes, but mostly I’m using some for rear and side surround channels.

They don’t sound bright and don’t measure bright. I’d say they pretty much sound like they measure here:

SoundStageNetwork.com | SoundStage.com - NRC Measurements: Monitor Audio Bronze 6 Loudspeakers

www.soundstagenetwork.com

View attachment 482045

The port chuffing on the Bronze bookshelves I demod was really bad, so it's probably a good thing you're using them with 80 Hz cutoffs