In that case, that's normal. However ''hot'' is a bit vague to allow us to make a comparison.
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Neumann KH120 II Monitor Review
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Measured mine at idle using a thermal imager and hottest point was about 60C/140F internally through the grills. It stays about the same during use since I listen at low to moderate volume only.
Breeze98
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What is the ambient temperature of the room?
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Mine are also quite warm in that area. This is a vast departure from the Genelec's which were ice cold around the entire frame, but I'm not sure if that's because the heat sinking was done internally and not much of that heat made it to a single area of the shell or if the heat sinking was direct to the aluminum shell and very well distributed.
I just powered mine back on and I'll hit it with one of those infrared temp guns once they're warmed up, and report back.
EDIT: After running for about 30 minutes, I measured across the hottest part of the exterior vent and I get 37.7C/100F at the hottest point, which is just below the Acoustical Controls section. Keep in mind, the "real" heatsink is just underneath that vent, so one would indeed expect warmth in that area. In fact, given the cheap infrared thermometer that I was using has a small surface area (dot) for detection, I may have been hitting the actual heat sink underneath the vent, directly. While I would have preferred that they move the heatsink above the controls, to the uppermost section of the cabinet given that heat rises, I'm hopeful that this won't cause a long term problem.
Ambient temp in the room was 22.8C/73F
I just powered mine back on and I'll hit it with one of those infrared temp guns once they're warmed up, and report back.
EDIT: After running for about 30 minutes, I measured across the hottest part of the exterior vent and I get 37.7C/100F at the hottest point, which is just below the Acoustical Controls section. Keep in mind, the "real" heatsink is just underneath that vent, so one would indeed expect warmth in that area. In fact, given the cheap infrared thermometer that I was using has a small surface area (dot) for detection, I may have been hitting the actual heat sink underneath the vent, directly. While I would have preferred that they move the heatsink above the controls, to the uppermost section of the cabinet given that heat rises, I'm hopeful that this won't cause a long term problem.
Ambient temp in the room was 22.8C/73F
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If your Generac is ice cold it isn’t on.
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LOL, indeed. This is what I get for using speech to text on my phone... Corrected, thank you!
Around 25°C/77°F.
It seems to me that the temperature is close to what @Fongus reported, at around 60°C/140°F (after a few seconds, you'd have to take your fingers off the area around the switches because it would be too hot to keep touching), but I don't have a thermal camera to measure that.
I would prefer that too
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I personally don't foresee a problem with the idle temps on mine. I don't run my space above the temp I posted, and while idling, I barely notice the warmth in that area of the cabinet. At full tilt, perhaps, but not idle. That said, their performance has been exemplary. So, I'm very pleased with the purchase!
I only had checked one kh150. Today I checked the other one. It was super hot at the spot you pointed at.
So I basically got one which is almost at room temperature, and the other one super hot, while using them in the same way. This is definitely weird.
UPDATE:
The speakers were purchased in November 2023. The first speaker failed in January 2026.
A replacement (brand new) speaker was received in April 2026, but it also failed 3 days ago after only about three months of use.
The replacement speaker suffered a catastrophic internal short circuit. Something inside the speaker suddenly exploded, producing a loud bang, visible spark, burning smell and the electrical circuit breakers tripping. The incident posed a serious risk to my computer and other equipment.
I use a REV SupraGuard surge-protected power strip, and my home's electrical installation has been installed in full compliance with all applicable electrical standards. This rules out inadequate electrical installation or the absence of surge protection as the cause of the failure.
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danila
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I bought a pair as I wanted, together with an MA-1 and a Scarlett 16i16. I think I'll return everything.
The sound wasn't impressive in my bedroom, where I used them as PC speakers. I guess in a poorly-treated room, it's the room which defines the sound, not the speakers? I didn't feel a huge difference to my LSR 305 MkII. Maybe I don't know what to listen for?
Still, I'd keep them if this was the only problem. After all, they hiss much-much less than my LSR 305, which is something I care about a lot.
But they are:
Separately from the speakers, I learned that I cannot use a pro USB audio-interface with multiple inputs for things like FaceTime or Google Meet on a Mac. I also bought a super-cardioid dynamic mic, and I thought I'll use it for videoconferencing, like cool podcasters on YouTube do. It turns out that FaceTime will sum up all the inputs (all 18 in the case of Scarlett 16i16) which will result, even if all other inputs are not connected to anything, in a very-very quiet sound of me as heard by the listeners in the call. Pro audio software (like DAW or the things podcasters use) lets you pick input channels, but FaceTime doesn't :/
What do you folks think about KEF LSX as PC speakers? I considered them several years ago and didn't buy due to similar complaints of users (i.e. similar "f**k you" attitude of the manufacturer). But at least they don't hiss like my LSR 305 (especially the left one).
The sound wasn't impressive in my bedroom, where I used them as PC speakers. I guess in a poorly-treated room, it's the room which defines the sound, not the speakers? I didn't feel a huge difference to my LSR 305 MkII. Maybe I don't know what to listen for?
Still, I'd keep them if this was the only problem. After all, they hiss much-much less than my LSR 305, which is something I care about a lot.
But they are:
- Super hot while on but not playing anything. Should two good class-D amps and a DSP waste so much energy while idling or is this just bad engineering? How can you even design it like this? I guess Class-D amps constantly switch their output MOSFETs to produce even zero output voltage, but that's why you spec in good MOSFETs and drive them properly, no? I'm not an EE though.
- Continuing reports of them failing. Maybe the high temperature is one of the reasons. If they are so hot on the outside, how hot should be the components inside that produce this heat! Again bad engineering.
- The software sucks. Not because I have to use a network switch and everything—I'm OK with this and I understand how it all works. But it's just badly written. For example, controlling the volume from the software has a few seconds lag. It's not the speakers that lag because when I control the volume from a Raspberry Pi using the pyssc library, it takes an order of 100 ms (I created a cool hardware volume controller for KH 120 II to which I planned adding EQ controls later too, like on a cool mixing console). What is the software doing all those seconds?
- The calibration itself turned out to be a very questionable thing. I didn't have experience with it before MA-1. Turns out, you calibrate your speakers, then you move them a bit (e.g. lift the standing desk a bit) or you move yourself, and it's already measurably off. As I understood, outside of studios perhaps, one recommendation is to calibrate only the low frequencies, to remove boomy sounds. However, MA-1 calibrates everything up to 20 kHz, and you can't control this.
- What MA-1 software shows as the "calibrated response" looks quite a bit nicer than what I measure with REW afterwards (even with smoothing in REW).
- The MA-A mic itself was packed so badly that I dropped it trying to unpack.
Separately from the speakers, I learned that I cannot use a pro USB audio-interface with multiple inputs for things like FaceTime or Google Meet on a Mac. I also bought a super-cardioid dynamic mic, and I thought I'll use it for videoconferencing, like cool podcasters on YouTube do. It turns out that FaceTime will sum up all the inputs (all 18 in the case of Scarlett 16i16) which will result, even if all other inputs are not connected to anything, in a very-very quiet sound of me as heard by the listeners in the call. Pro audio software (like DAW or the things podcasters use) lets you pick input channels, but FaceTime doesn't :/
What do you folks think about KEF LSX as PC speakers? I considered them several years ago and didn't buy due to similar complaints of users (i.e. similar "f**k you" attitude of the manufacturer). But at least they don't hiss like my LSR 305 (especially the left one).
somebodyelse
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We have this thread about repairing the original LSX that seems to have helped several people with similar failures outside warranty, and who didn't want to pay what KEF were charging for a replacement board. That doesn't tell us whether the failure rate is unusually high though.
Selection bias + negativity bias. You're welcome.
... I don't think so:
Look above @Karmacoma .
Neumann are using poor capacitors, and whole construction is poor (high temperature when they work ... so poor cooling, too small radiators for this amount of heat) in term of longevity.
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noiseconnector
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I see a lot of misunderstanding in that post.
It's usual for monitor speakers to get hot and to work like that. I use Neumanns for a few years now and before I had most of popular brands in this market - Dynaudio, Adam Audio, Genelec, Tannoy, Yamaha, Focal... and every single one of them got hot at some point if you just power them on. Not any one failed on me and with most cases I was a second or third owner. Maybe it's luck.
It's very popular for people to complain about something if it's wrong. I don't know how many Neumann monitors were sold, but I think that's quite A LOT, so question is - what is real failure rate. I worked for audio distribution of Focusrite and failure rate of Scarletts was REALLY low. But from time to time there's a guy that have that one unit that just died. That happens. And he's a YouTuber and gets a hundred thousand of views and of course people are gonna get a little bit angry. We like to. On the other side you have hundred thousands of users that are happy and won't post anything besides their recorded audio.
Volume should be faster to respond, but it's only for a calibration reason - it's set and forget type of volume.
I don't know what you expected about calibration, but it is done for specific position of speakers. If you change anything about it (left right higher lower), you change the acoustic response. If you got really messy room the calibration sweet spot can be very small and it is what it is. Mind you that calibration should be used as a helper, not a complete solver.
With calibration is quite the opposite as you wrote - in studios you could calibrate only the lows because that's the most difficult region to treat and to get right, so some massaging is always welcome. Mids and highs are very easy to absorb and/or diffuse and usually it's fine if calibration won't touch those bands. In living rooms and bedrooms you need to correct a lot more, because we don't usually have them symmetrical and response could get a little funky on one or the other side.
MA-1 calibration response gets the sum off all points you measured. Did you tried to measure the same points with REW and then made an average of them?
It's a known problem for MacOS users, but Apple have done nothing to solve it for years. Weirdly on Windows it's much easier because you can choose different amount of channels for audio driver. MacOS always use every channel, so sometimes I get DTS or even Atmos sound by default, because my interface got 16 output channels.
What am I supposed to see? A dude blowing a fuse?
I have to agree, even as a happy Neumann owner... I have not been impressed with what we've seen from the 80, 120 II, and 150. The 120A, 310, and 420 seem to be built to a higher standard.
That's not exactly what he said. He said ''trash level''.
Certainly below what I expect for the price. Trash tier, no, but I don't think he's off the mark saying it's nowhere near as good as it should be for how much these cost. The KH120 IIs are $1900 a pair, the KH150 almost double that. Their most obvious feature-for-feature competition is the Genelec 8330A (and 8340A, for the KH150) - and Genelec has a sterling reputation for reliability they are not soon to throw away.
The high heat levels @danila mentioned are concerning to me; we've seen elsewhere that Neumann is using lower-grade power supply electrolytic capacitors that have a reputation for premature failure, especially in higher ambient temperatures. We cannot say that it's the cause - no failure analysis has been done by any of us - but it's definitely something I'm keeping in mind.
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