Need some help in deciding between speakers

[tomtan]

I'm buying two bookshelf speakers that will be used together with a sub from SVS.

I've been to showrooms to listen to speakers but haven't been able to bring my own music (so I didn't know any of the music I tested with intimately) and the tests were done without subs

I've listened to:
- Focal Aria 906
- Polk L200
- B&W 705 s2
- B&W 707 s2
- Dali Epicon 2

So far the best sounding to me were the non B&W but then without subs it would make sense since I don't think the B&W have much bass extension? So not testing with a sub definitely handicaps them.
Focal Aria is actually much more expensive here than in Europe/US so they actually are more expensive than the Polk L200. I did see that both of those measure well here on this site.

The dali Epicon is normally super expensive but I can get it for 3,600 usd a pair. I do think it could be a good deal in that it seems the resell value would probably stay relatively high and I could probably resell it in 2-3 years for around 3000 usd when I move out of here. I haven't really found any good measurements of them though it's purely subjective... It did sound very good, but I'm worried that it's like a nice bottle of wine and just knowing the sound came out of those speakers colored my perceptions.

Those speakers will be both used to listen to music and as the front left and right of a home theater. Music is more important to me in that I'll be much more critical if music doesn't sound good whereas when watching a movie, I'll be less annoyed if it's not perfect.. I also do not have space for a center (if I have a center, then it blocks my way back to my bedroom since I'm using a projector screen that drops out from the ceiling so it's not a fixed setup like many people have... I don't want to have to place the center and put it back everytime I watch a movie)

So I'll use a phantom center when watching movie, some people do seem to like it but I have no idea if there are specific considerations when picking speakers...

 

[Wes]

all in the same showroom?

even if true, you really need to hear them in your room, AND with your music

if a dealer cannot allow me to test at home, I find a new dealer - and did so a few years ago

- have you checked the SpinoRama thread to see if any are on it?

 

[tomtan]

In 2 different showrooms. I'm in Hong Kong, apparently dealers here refuse to let you test at home. Even apple in Hong Kong doesn't allow any returns.

I have found the measurements of the Focal and the Polk... The Polk seem to measure slightly better. I haven't found any measurement of the dali anywhere

 

[amirm]

We have only tested the Focal and it was good. https://www.audiosciencereview.com/forum/index.php?threads/focal-aria-906-speaker-review.14085/

 

[tomtan]

Yes, saw that. Thanks Amir... For the Focal, I'd be paying 1600 usd for the pair so not sure it's a great deal (significantly more expensive than what you have access to in the US)..

Seems like the KEF R3 which you also tested would be cheaper here than the focal actually

I did see this https://www.audiosciencereview.com/...si-anechoic-spinorama-and-measurements.13191/ and it seems that polk l200 measures slightly better than the focal? But it's not measured by you and it's a bit hard to compare measurements made by different people...

 

[Darvis]

Yes, saw that. Thanks Amir... For the Focal, I'd be paying 1600 usd for the pair so not sure it's a great deal (significantly more expensive than what you have access to in the US)..
.

That's absurdly expensive. In my "less objective" days I bought a Cayin tube amp to a guy in Hong-Kong, very heavy. The shipping cost wasn't cheap but not huge either. Customs is a bit of a gamble, sometimes nothing, sometimes a lot, in my case it was a 100-150€. So, why wouldn't you buy the Focal from France or Germany when discounted around 400-450? If you don't like it you'll probably be able to resell and even make a small profit.

Or local brands? Aurum Cantus?

 

[tomtan]

400-450 for a pair? I did see 800 usd on amazon (shipping is cheaper from US than EU) but yes that's an option, with cheaping it would cost me 980 usd for the pair.
Only thing I'm a bit worried about damages during shipping.

Hadn't heard of Aurum Cantus. I'll try them out

 

[Darvis]

Hadn't heard of Aurum Cantus. I'll try them out

They look very serious but maybe it's just appearance, Idk, well worth investigating I think.

 

[Willem]

You may also consider the Elac DBR 62, tested here. Your local price may be a different matter, of course. I certainly like their contemporary looks.

 

[Soniclife]

It did sound very good, but I'm worried that it's like a nice bottle of wine and just knowing the sound came out of those speakers colored my perceptions.

This is a very real thing, and it's good to be aware of, but only control testing can work around it.

Are there any shops doing returns you can use?
Have you considered active? The pro audio shops seem much more open to returns in general.

 

[Soniclife]

Seems like the KEF R3 which you also tested would be cheaper here than the focal actually

Worldwide prices for speakers vary a lot, do the made in China ones get better prices locally for you?

 

[tomtan]

Worldwide prices for speakers vary a lot, do the made in China ones get better prices locally for you?

It used to but right now when ordering from China, it's harder to get it shipped to Hong Kong...

This is a very real thing, and it's good to be aware of, but only control testing can work around it.

Are there any shops doing returns you can use?
Have you considered active? The pro audio shops seem much more open to returns in general.

Yes, I have a friend who is pushing me to try active speakers and has been telling me to take a look at the Genelec 8x00 or the Dynaudio (particularly the Air)

 

[tomtan]

One of the questions I have with active pro speakers, is that they are all supposedly nearfield but I'll be sitting around 15 feet from the speakers, wondering if that impacts anything?

 

[AnalogSteph]

5 meters! People are using 8" mains at half that distance. Honestly, I think you're looking at the wrong kind of speaker altogether. These kinds of distances tend to require Real Men's Loudspeakers®, not itty bitty 6.5" bookshelves. (Think more like 2x 8", like the 3-way Revels that Amir has - Performa C52, actually a center.)

Unless your listening room is very heavily (read: atypically) acoustically damped, you're likely to end up with substantially more diffuse sound than direct sound, requiring superbly even dispersion characteristics to avoid substantial coloration. With all that reverb, detail rendition is not exactly ideal either. I mean, look at the recent Behringer B2030P review - good dispersion but really quite broad, giving high freedom of movement in actual nearfield use.

What you'd want is still even but overall narrower dispersion to involve less of the room - that's a speaker much closer to PA terrain. (In fact, PA speakers doing a good job in home listening do exist among the more modern ones. You'd probably want something with a 12" woofer, as these efficient ones do not go very deep for the size.) Some attention to wall reflections via absorbers and diffusor(s) on the ceiling is not likely to hurt either.

As a rough rule of thumb, if the speaker is the size of a postage stamp from where you're sitting, it's probably not ideal.

 

[ttimer]

Here are some simple measurements for the Dali Epicon 2 from a German website. Looks fairly flat with the typical Dali treble hump because they are supposed to be listenend to off-axis. Directivity looks decent too, as far as one can tell from such coarse measurements.

 

[tomtan]

5 meters! People are using 8" mains at half that distance. Honestly, I think you're looking at the wrong kind of speaker altogether. These kinds of distances tend to require Real Men's Loudspeakers®, not itty bitty 6.5" bookshelves. (Think more like 2x 8", like the 3-way Revels that Amir has - Performa C52, actually a center.)

Unless your listening room is very heavily (read: atypically) acoustically damped, you're likely to end up with substantially more diffuse sound than direct sound, requiring superbly even dispersion characteristics to avoid substantial coloration. With all that reverb, detail rendition is not exactly ideal either. I mean, look at the recent Behringer B2030P review - good dispersion but really quite broad, giving high freedom of movement in actual nearfield use.

What you'd want is still even but overall narrower dispersion to involve less of the room - that's a speaker much closer to PA terrain. (In fact, PA speakers doing a good job in home listening do exist among the more modern ones. You'd probably want something with a 12" woofer, as these efficient ones do not go very deep for the size.) Some attention to wall reflections via absorbers and diffusor(s) on the ceiling is not likely to hurt either.

As a rough rule of thumb, if the speaker is the size of a postage stamp from where you're sitting, it's probably not ideal.

Ok, so I guess I should bring the speakers closer to me in the middle of the room to have roughly 10 feet (3 meters) distance to them (that's the same as the width of the room). Would that work better?

Here are some simple measurements for the Dali Epicon 2 from a German website. Looks fairly flat with the typical Dali treble hump because they are supposed to be listenend to off-axis. Directivity looks decent too, as far as one can tell from such coarse measurements.

Thanks. Not sure I understand about the treble hump, so it's designed to be off access horizontally? Meaning I shouldn't angle them towards me but just angle them parallel to the wall and perpendicular to the listener? What are the consequences of that?

 

[AnalogSteph]

Ok, so I guess I should bring the speakers closer to me in the middle of the room to have roughly 10 feet (3 meters) distance to them (that's the same as the width of the room). Would that work better?

I would expect so (though there is a certain "no-go area" of less than ideal back wall distance between about 0.5 m and maybe 1.5-2 m leading to some hard-to-control frequency response wiggles related to comb filtering from delayed back reflections when the distance hits half the wavelength λ/2 ~= 340 m/s / 2f; the magnitude of the problem will depend on the ratio of listening distance to back wall distance). If you can do 2 m, that wouldn't hurt. 2.5 m seems to be a good distance for something 8". Specifics may vary depending on individual dispersion and level handling (here's what a state of the art 6.5" midwoofer can do, more data on the same).

I would think really hard about spending anything close to 3600 USD used on a pair of plain old passive 6.5" 2-ways in this day and age though. That's more like fancy furniture that happens to emit sound as well. You could almost get some brand new Genelec 8050s for that kind of money (active 8" 2-ways from a pro audio manufacturer not exactly known for low prices). Used K+H O300s have sold for much less, not sure what some new Neumann KH310As would cost you. Either would be an excellent choice, and I personally find them to be sufficiently decorative as-is (mind you, I'm not an Italian style guru, gear that looks like business is perfectly fine by me).

A good look at room acoustics may certainly be worth it as well (e.g. absorbers at wall reflection points, behind speakers, a diffusor on the ceiling and a thick carpet, or more absorption on the ceiling if you have a hard floor). Not sure what you have available locally, but I've seen absorbers in all kinds of shapes and colors. I just happened to research them recently as I got a few for my nearfield setup at long last. (Definitely worth it, too. Now what do I do with that pesky sound field disturbance between the speakers, also known as a monitor...?)

 

[tomtan]

In the end after reading Amir's test, I decided to pick up a cheap second hand pair of Revel M105. I figure that I can resell it without losing too much if I want to upgrade later and I don't really want to go traipsing around in showrooms during this time when we have a new covid outbreak. Ends up being 840 usd for the pair in total...

I'll definitely look at room distortion and placement once I receive them...

 

[Wes]

Post your results or impressions

I'd have advised buying the smallest, most portable speakers that can be used in England...

 

[tomtan]

Post your results or impressions

I'd have advised buying the smallest, most portable speakers that can be used in England...

Ok, I received the Revel M105, I'm honestly really not impressed. To use vague audiophile language to describe my experience, it sounds muddied with the bass too strong compared to the rest and when listening to any music with multiple instruments, it's hard to distinguish between instruments.

I also received the SVS Prime elevation which I'm planning to use for my atmos system (still don't have the sub or surround speakers) and they sound much better to my ears. And the SVS prime elevations are not great by any means when compared to good headphones but at least sound much clearer... Even the old sonos beam I had sounds better to my ears.

Me and my girlfriend have done some blind testing and there's no question, we both came to the same conclusion.

I know it measures well but at this point I really am surprised by the result. I'm wondering what I might be doing wrong, I've even tried listening to it exactly at the point where both speakers are the same distance of each other as I am from them and they still sound the same. Since I don't have speaker stands yet and they are sitting about 50 cm from the floor I've tried sitting down so that my ears would be at the same level on the theory that the issue might be because I was too high compared to them but it doesn't seem to improve much...

I'm using some relatively cheap 16 awg cable from In-akustic star edition (cable to each speaker is 6 meter), it was the cheapest one I could easily get close by (due to the new outbreak of covid in Hong Kong, I avoid traipsing around and about) but I don't think the cable should matter that much? It's very confusing because those speakers sounded very good in the test from Amir but I really don't hear it...

Could it be due to shipping? There was no sign of external damage on the packages though and they seemed rather well packed with the original packaging material...

So, now I'm really not sure what I'm doing wrong...