Neumann KH 310A Review (Powered Monitor)

[Mnyb]

It was a thought that if the DUT was to be tested at high SPL then that might as well be for max SPL and so it was decided not to chance blowing up any speakers and any high SPL tests where simply not going to be done.

I think the listening tests indicates some of it anyway . Amir seems to like it loud and with bass

 

[Doodski]

I think the listening tests indicates some of it anyway . Amir seems to like it loud and with bass

From Amirm's commentary the Klippel system plays pretty loud when under test.

 

[IVX]

actually, today and even 20 years ago wasn't a big deal to add in such critical products like a studio monitor some $5 DSP with individually corrected Freq(single sweep during production and flash the FW with individual FIR).Response by minimum phase FIR. I did offer that idea Wharfedale management 3 years ago but didn't notice any interest yet. Perhaps Neumann did that individual correction.

 

[F1308]

Is there any reason to place the woofer in the inner side ?
Went shopping and found either left hand or right hand speaker based on that assumption...

https://m.thomann.de/gb/search.html?q=Neumann KH 310A

https://m.thomann.de/es/search.html?q=neum kh310

 

[daftcombo]

Great review!

Now could we have the KH120 next?
Less expensive and direct contender in the 8030c range.

 

[daftcombo]

This is a bit strange. The mid driver seems to never play "flat" and be there only to make the junction between the woofer and the tweeter.

 

[Costas EAR]

With a pair, how far back would you guess one could sit and it would still be loud enough?

There is no need for guessing.
Optimal listening distances are stated at the manual.
Also, there are plenty of measurement data at Neumann's site, stating the listening distance at 2,3m.

 

[Frank Dernie]

I find very difficult to integrate correctly a tweeter that starts acting from 2KHz, due to the linearity problems for most tweeters (usually they get linear above 2.5KHz), not mentioning that this lower frequency may destroy the tweeter if the crossover is not...well, perfectly designed.

I find the 3.5KHz frequency being a more "safe" one when pairing a mid with a tweeter. In the end it's all about what tweeter you can find and how good crossover you can design, although I don't think we should notice any sound differences due to the crossover frequency, of course, if the crossover is perfectly designed and paired with midrange and tweeter drivers.

My view too.
One of the best potential benefits of a 3-way is being able to shift the tweeter crossover higher because of a smaller mid driver.

 

[Frank Dernie]

All good questions. I think the Olive score is the hour hand in a clock. The minute hand is not there and we have to apply that judgement. With so much objective data, once the pandemic is behind us, I hope various groups of audiophiles get together and do some controlled testing to see what their subjective scores are.

Using a time analogy I am more inclined to consider the Olive preference score as the day rather than hour from my perspective.
It seems to miss a huge amoutnt of what is important to me in a fairly large room sitting between 11 and 21 feet from the speakers in the listening area, though the rearmost seats are normally only used watching a film.
Almost all of the good scoring speakers so far would be completely hopeless in here
Even these.

 

[Bruce Morgen]

I had a pair on demo. The only reasons I didn’t buy them was I auditioned them alongside some Kii 3s and the imaging and soundstage on the latter was significantly sharper/better. In most other respects they seemed pretty close.

The Kii Threes -- with their multiple Hypex Class D amps and sophisticated DSP -- should be superior, given their five-figure USD pricetag. These Neumanns are by no means a bargain bin purchase, but at least their cost doesn't relegate them to "maybe someday" pipe dream territory, especially given that there are first-rate small passive speakers -- e.g. the Selah Audio Purezzas Erin (aka "hardisj") Klippel-tested and loved -- that don't cost all that much less.

 

[thewas]

Yeah, I've always found these speakers to be very aesthetically pleasing ever since the O300D. For mastering speakers, they look friendly and approachable. You can picture vocals coming out of that midrange dome. That being said, I would be deathly afraid of accidentally touching it. Looks like that happened here:

Usually such silk domes have no problems with slight accidental touching, on above photo either the collisions were harder or they are deformed due to other reasons.

 

[thewas]

Active speakers with built in DSP should be expected to nail FR. so that leaves distortion and directivity to show excellence. Actives with any FR issues are normally a result of making a good choice when facing a trade-off with FR and distortion.

Mind you, all the Neumann monitors except the newest KH 80 are not DSP designs which makes their linearity even more impressive.

 

[thewas]

Thanks for all this work, AGAIN, Amir!

As soon as a saw this review posted, I was intrigued to see if the lateral placement of the woofer had any impact on off-axis behaviour. And I think it has. Looking at the above chart, I get the impression that the woofer and the mid-range driver are summing subtractively at around 700 Hz, and additively at around 900 to 1000 Hz. A one-toothed ‘comb’.

I can’t help thinking that if the units have been vertically aligned, as they are with a KH 410 loudspeaker, this would not have happened.

cheers

The orientation of the KH 310 was chosen like that with known little the compromise in the horizontal directivity as their target group uses them on a meter bridge and thus the height must be limited. On the other hand this makes the vertical directivity from mid to woofer a tad better than on vertical designs like the KH 410/420.

 

[thewas]

Only 0.19 better Preference Score than the JBL 308p Mkii when HF Trim Switch set to -2dB on the 308p! As seen here: https://www.audiosciencereview.com/...-mkii-studio-monitor-review.17338/post-570903

Well, this is one nice speaker from Neumann, expensive, but hey! (My JBL 308p is cheaper, and only 0.19 worse Preference Score, but yes distortion measurments!).

Which really shows the limitations of the Harman model when it comes to highest standard comparisons as like written by other posters already in this topic only accounts for FR.
Sorry if I bust your illusion but I own myself the JBL LSRs and I have had the KH 310 for testing for some weeks and the sound quality is really on a different league, which is of course not a bad result for the JBL as they cost only a fraction.

 

[thewas]

I find very difficult to integrate correctly a tweeter that starts acting from 2KHz, due to the linearity problems for most tweeters (usually they get linear above 2.5KHz), not mentioning that this lower frequency may destroy the tweeter if the crossover is not...well, perfectly designed.

I find the 3.5KHz frequency being a more "safe" one when pairing a mid with a tweeter. In the end it's all about what tweeter you can find and how good crossover you can design, although I don't think we should notice any sound differences due to the crossover frequency, of course, if the crossover is perfectly designed and paired with midrange and tweeter drivers.

For modern well engineered tweeters and high crossover slopes as used on good active designs 2 kHz MT cross are no problem and are rather needed if you use a 3" mid dome to be able to use it before it starts beaming too much, the directivity problems of higher crossover frequencies can be observed at similar ATC designs.

 

[thewas]

Nice measurements as expected! The bass dip is a bit weird looking but watching the scale that should not be listenable deviation! I am uneducated but may I ask if that is a dsp product or pure analog?

Its a fully analogue active implementation.

I am sure that all these basically flat speakers are a treat to listen to, what I am getting as an impression for these accurate speakers from my new 8030C is that beside you can’t detect any frequency deviation it’s so clean and never makes you feel tired listening! That didn’t come when I use the HE500 headphones or the old kef x300a where there will always be some kind of song sounds harsh and tiring, I bet it’s the wild frequency response or distortion related?

It can both although if listened at moderate volumes on your H500 and X300a I guess it rather were FR problems.

 

[thewas]

Is there any reason to place the woofer in the inner side ?
Went shopping and found either left hand or right hand speaker based on that assumption...

https://m.thomann.de/gb/search.html?q=Neumann KH 310A

https://m.thomann.de/es/search.html?q=neum kh310

For symmetry for optimal imaging as otherwise if both MT were for example placed on the left side the image would be slightly shifted to that direction.

 

[q3cpma]

Impressive directivity they get out of such a layout. Only needing some midbass cardioid capabilities and it'd be perfect =).
As expected of a sealed design, distorsion isn't pretty, though. Would be very very interesting to see a bigger version with a good port (inb4 that's just the KH420).

 

[thewas]

This is a bit strange. The mid driver seems to never play "flat" and be there only to make the junction between the woofer and the tweeter.

This is usual at mid dome implementations where you have to cross them relatively high to the woofer and thus for a relatively limited bandwidth.
Am sure to many the question arises, why bother than with a 3 way design, but the difference is huge especially if we consider the audibility limits of loudspeaker distortion which are the lowest from 600 Hz to 3 kHz:

Source: https://www.hifi-selbstbau.de/grund...nmenu-70/239-klirrfaktor-wie-viel-ist-zu-viel

 

[JustIntonation]

I find very difficult to integrate correctly a tweeter that starts acting from 2KHz, due to the linearity problems for most tweeters (usually they get linear above 2.5KHz), not mentioning that this lower frequency may destroy the tweeter if the crossover is not...well, perfectly designed.

I find the 3.5KHz frequency being a more "safe" one when pairing a mid with a tweeter. In the end it's all about what tweeter you can find and how good crossover you can design, although I don't think we should notice any sound differences due to the crossover frequency, of course, if the crossover is perfectly designed and paired with midrange and tweeter drivers.

Yes there are differences because of crossover frequency. The differences are due to off-axis behavior and center-to-center distance of the mid and tweeter.
By crossing at 3.3kHz instead of 2kHz you will get a much more narrow vertical window / smaller angle where the tweeter and mid are in-phase. In other words, the vertical angle where the tweeter and mid go out of phase at the crossover freq becomes much smaller with a higher crossover freq if the distance between the mid and tweeter remain the same.
Secondly, usually the mid driver will have some off-axis drop-off / increased directionality with frequency. The lower the crossover the less directional the mid driver will be and the better it will match the directivity of the tweeter. (this also means a better phase match off-axis again increasing the coherent vertical angle)
Thirdly, there is a psychoacoustic difference in crossover freq. Any errors around the crossover are more objectionable around 3-4kHz than they are around 1-2kHz. It makes sense for several reasons, part of how our ears/brain localize sounds which uses a different system >2kHz than for the mids, and partly because our ears are much more sensitive to the 2-5kHz region with for instance 3.3kHz being the most sensitive region of our hearing. It's easy to test some of this difference too, simply put a notch at 3.3kHz vs a notch at 2kHz or lower and listen to the difference. I find the 3.3kHz notch far more objectionable.

So yes, if you want an easy analogue crossover then you need to select the right tweeter for this, also one that can handle a low crossover. There are plenty available.
With DSP crossovers the fr of the tweeter is less of an issue and one can simply look mostly for low distortion down low (while having a smooth off-axis up high. My favorite tweeter for instance is the BlieSMa T34A-4 it does everything right and you can cross it safely at 1.3kHz).