Palmer ORBIT 11 Cardioid Coaxial 3-way studio monitor (MSRP 799€/899$)

[TimVG]

I'll just add that looking at Palmer as a standalone company is a mistake. Adam Hall also contains LD Systems whom are putting out affordable professional gear that performs very competitively (see production partner reviews).

 

[levimax]

They do not.

Cardioid response certainly helps, but room more peaks still remain and the Orbit has no built-in EQ to address those.

Ooops. I saw a picture of the "control panel" and assumed it included PEQ but it only has some room curve adjustments, my mistake. I still don't see LF extension as anything but a positive as it is trivially easy to knock down room modes with any number of DSP solutions manual or automatic. Even though reasonably priced they still aren't "cheap" and the target market (nearfield monitors) assumes some level of understanding of how speakers interact with a room.

 

[Audionaut]

I don't see the established players loosing sleep over an arguably strong newcomer.

That's absolutely right—they rarely do that, perhaps too rarely.
The German photo industry was completely confident of its dominant position on the global market – and completely slept through the attack by Canon and Co.

Detroit and its automobile factories were once much more than they are today.
The German automotive industry must be careful not to let itself be overtaken and live off past successes.

It is always the newcomers who light a fire under the established players.

 

[phoenixdogfan]

"And thats where the coaxial and cardioid elements of the speaker come to play, less room dependant."

I agree it’s something people repeat a lot, but it’s only partially true. In a typical 15‑square‑meter room, the Schroeder frequency is around 200 Hz. And below 200 Hz, almost no loudspeaker is actually cardioid. On top of that, it’s important to understand that treating the highs and mids is relatively easy : with 10 cm of dense rockwool, you still get an absorption coefficient of 0.5 or more between 200 and 20,000 Hz. At 40 Hz, using porous absorption, you would need about 45 cm of attic‑grade insulation to reach the same coefficient, which is simply impossible to implement in most rooms. You can of course do better with membrane bass traps, but the calculations and the practical implementation become far less trivial. So, yes, controlled directivity do help, but not necesseraly in the frequency range were it's the most difficult to handle. Multi subs can also help to make the room modes more even at the listening position, but won't adress the time domain issues either.

"Interesting point; it's really not. There is some of the fundamental 27.5Hz in there, but harmonics are dominant (>100% of fundamental)." We're on the same page.

I don't see how this speaker presents a different problem from, say, integrating a pair of LS 50 Metas in a small bedroom with a 12 inch powered sub. If you have REW, DSP like Dirac, and a Unik-1, it seems equally possible to integrate either system about as well as the other. While these kind of projects would have been extremely challenging to the non-sound engineers among us in 2010, with modern DSP, they seem achievable to anyone with a little patience and the ability to follow directions. Granted not a skill found in most people, nowadays, but still one rather prevalent among the denizens of this site.

 

[3125b]

You mean I'm lucky they didn't kill me ... yet ?

You should read the manual, it's a bit over the top.

It is not suitable for domestic use.
This product is not suitable for children and persons with limited physical, sensory,or mental capabilities or lack of experience and knowledge.

And then there are about 8 additional pages warning of various hazards.

The German automotive industry must be careful not to let itself be overtaken and live off past successes.

True, but I don't know if this is really a comparable situation.
Anyway, as consumers we can be happy for competition, it's only gonna benefit us.

 

[Ratterbass]

You should read the manual, it's a bit over the top.

And then there are about 8 additional pages warning of various hazards.

It’s not over the top, most other companies just are not up to code. EU safety regulations are crazy. Palmer are simply doing their job.

 

[Audionaut]

I don't see how this speaker presents a different problem from, say, integrating a pair of LS 50 Metas in a small bedroom with a 12 inch powered sub.

I agree with you in principle.
However, a pair of the Palmer has four actively driven 8-inch woofers, which roughly corresponds to the surface area of a 15-inch woofer.

 

[Bwaslo]

When presented with a reasonably priced high performance compact near field monitor with good LF extension, this LF extension is somehow considered a bug rather than a feature, even though the speakers come complete with the means to address room mode peaks. Tough crowd.

Couldn't agree more. ANY full-range speaker has the disadvantage the that the sub-range part is placed necessarily at the same place as the mains-range, and the likelihood that both are optimal at that place in a domestic room is nearly zero. I see the vlf radiation existing in the box as better contributing to multisub diversity with some added actial subs.

Not that the under 50Hz output useless, just not optimal on its own.

For that matter, I question whether it is rational that anyone with 2kilobuck or above range speakers (and active at that) would lack dsp eq/room correcting capability.

 

[Karmacoma]

potentially acoustic investments far exceeding the price of the speakers themselves.

For 400€ you can get a good mic + dsp + software bundle (now if you wanna invest in basstraps that's another story for sure, but do you really want that anyway) and not more panels than for any other speaker, presumably less considering they're cardioid.

 

[Pearljam5000]

So what's a better option for a small room.
KH120 II or Orbit 11

 

[sidechain]

So what's a better option for a small room.
KH120 II or Orbit 11

 

[BDE]

Technically and price wise, these sound like very interesting speakers. Thanks, Palmer!

Luckily, it seems there wasn’t any budget left for a talented product designer; even some of the Photoshop renders in this thread already look better (e.g. #294). With the aluminum cast, they actually had some design options… The control panel on top? Let’s just say it doesn’t exactly scream “elegance”. Fortunatly the overall look feel a bit too busy – so, no need for me to buy them for my living room setup.

Still, I hope the Orbit 11 becomes a real hit in the studio market, and maybe forces Genelec to rethink their pricing.. Or based on its success, Palmer might be encouraged to offer further speakers with a more appealing design.

 

[Audionaut]

Luckily, it seems there wasn’t any budget left for a talented product designer; even some of the Photoshop renders in this thread already look better

That is also a completely subjective opinion.
I don't begrudge you that and don't feel the need to discuss it, but I myself think the speakers are very well designed according to the principle: form follows function.

 

[Salt]

For me the design is top notch: no visible screws, menue on the top means no crawling to the back, rounded edges ... even the orange (tangerin?) thing fits (Roxanne, you don't need ...)

 

[Karmacoma]

Looks better than this imo

 

[Salt]

It has no orange ring ..

 

[Oboreal]

For 400€ you can get a good mic + dsp + software bundle (now if you wanna invest in basstraps that's another story for sure, but do you really want that anyway) and not more panels than any other speakers, presumably less considering they're cardioid.

If your pair of speakers costs more than, say, 200 euros and was designed by a competent engineer, the room is always the weak link. If you have a cancellation at certain frequencies, no automatic calibration software will be able to fix it, because even with more than 10 dB of boost, it will still be there. If the dip is very narrow, you might not notice it while listening, but my experience measuring rooms shows that they are often wide enough to be clearly audible.

Moreover, if you have a one‑second decay in the low end, even the best DSP in the world won’t be able to do anything about the fact that you’ll have no definition in the bass.

Not convinced ? Try to sonorise a drum kit and a bass playing rock in a gymnasium and come back at me…

Now, why is it worse with speakers that go lower? I’ve explained this before, but reducing RT60 below 100 Hz becomes exponentially more complex as you approach 20 Hz. So what’s already difficult at 40 Hz becomes completely unmanageable below that, even with very advanced acoustic designs. So yes, if you buy this speakers to mix music and have a better translation than with less bass capable speakers, it may actually not be trivial at all. Of course, if you just want to enjoy a lot of bass extension, even if it's a little bit muddy and undefined, wich seem to be your case, what i explain doesn't apply to you !

 

[BVK]

If your pair of speakers costs more than, say, 200 euros and was designed by a competent engineer, the room is always the weak link. If you have a cancellation at certain frequencies, no automatic calibration software will be able to fix it, because even with more than 10 dB of boost, it will still be there. If the dip is very narrow, you might not notice it while listening, but my experience measuring rooms shows that they are often wide enough to be clearly audible.

Moreover, if you have a one‑second decay in the low end, even the best DSP in the world won’t be able to do anything about the fact that you’ll have no definition in the bass.

Not convinced ? Try to sonorise a drum kit and a bass playing rock in a gymnasium and come back at me…

Yup. Someone said "it is trivially easy to knock down room modes with any number of DSP solutions manual or automatic" and boy, do I wish it was so. My job would be infinitely easier.

Multi subs are almost always the easier - and often only - solution in difficult rooms, but that's not a criticism towards the Orbits. It is, however, something that should be considered when shopping for full range systems.

 

[Salt]

Some quick and dirty tweek (for me): just move the seat back and force untill you feel comfortable

 

[MarkS]

a drum kit and a bass playing rock in a gymnasium

That is going to sound horrible no matter what, both live and recorded