PS Audio FR30 speakers

[CtheArgie]

Retailers speak the language their customers expect to hear. If you’ve been around 42 years,I suspect they will not think you are into measurements.

it seems that any argument one uses here, DWI finds a counter. I am missing the point.

 

[Cars-N-Cans]

What is at 4:14? I missed whatever it was. Plus I have zero experience in mixing.

From Paul directly. As for hopes of objective performance metrics clearing Paul's subjectivity, please do forgive my irreverence, but all that comes to mind is "Terrain, Terrain, PULL UP! Terrain, Terrain, PULL UP!"

 

[DWI]

Imagine the psychological damage it may inflict me if a poorly measured speaker turns Slayer into Diana Krall.


A store manager like you is a treasure for sure! That is what an honest professional should do!

It seems from the website that the store is a terraced house in a residential street.

 

[amirm]

The vast majority of audio consumers have never heard of Klippel.

Two years ago no one had heard of it. When I introduced it here, many said it was impossible for it to work. Today, it is everyday language in the forum and its efficacy is proven. The knowledge is expanding at exponential rate. You are way underestimating the value of a site like ours with nearly 3 million visitors a month.

Stop looking at your feet when walking. Look ahead and the future is quite bright for audiophiles who want to know what sound reproduction is about with respect to Klippel NFS. I foresee a time when only a small fraction of audiophiles are in the dark as you mention.

 

[Enkay25]

The vast majority of audio consumers have never heard of Klippel.
Even less understand it.
Why try and understand something for a purchase made every 5 or 10 years?
No one sends tower / floorstanding speakers to ASR to test, primarily it’s bookshelf and monitors.
Retail consumers generally want to listen to speakers and there is no sign that is going to change.
In my experience retail dealers never discuss measurements, in 42 years it’s never happened. Ever.
Speakers are the main audio product that it is instantly obvious on listening whether you like the presentation or not, far more than electronics.
I have yet to read anyone suggest they would buy the FR30, so even with Amir’s recommendation, why bother?
That‘s the first few that come to mind.

Does that explain why,in the last 2-3 years, debates about measurements in audio is surging?

Does it also explain ASR current popularity/visits? (I vividly remember ASR with frugal memberships 5 years back.....but look at now)

Does it also explain the many YouTube reviewers surge towards mentioning measurements?

One gets an impression that young generations do tend to do quite an extensive online research for what they buy - be it subjective or objective reviews. And that there is an observational trend of seeking objective measurements?


When I say young generations I not only mean music lovers, but also bloggers, pod casters, sound mixers, audio engineers.


(But I do concede for very high end boutique, measurements may not be an important aspect for that cohort of rich buyers. However that may be because of a vested interest from sellers.)

 

[Cars-N-Cans]

(But I do concede for very high end boutique, measurements may not be an important aspect for that cohort of rich buyers. However that may be because of a vested interest from sellers.)

And that I think is a good point. The normal state of affairs is for companies to produce products to meet the needs of their customers. On the other hand, there does seem to be a lot of the opposite, in finding and retaining customers who can consume products that meet the needs of the company producing them. Edit: And in reality its more a mix of the two, with a definite continuum between the extremes.

 

[Cars-N-Cans]

Does that explain why,in the last 2-3 years, debates about measurements in audio is surging?

Does it also explain ASR current popularity/visits? (I vividly remember ASR with frugal memberships 5 years back.....but look at now)

Does it also explain the many YouTube reviewers surge towards mentioning measurements?

One gets an impression that young generations do tend to do quite an extensive online research for what they buy - be it subjective or objective reviews. And that there is an observational trend of seeking objective measurements?


When I say young generations I not only mean music lovers, but also bloggers, pod casters, sound mixers, audio engineers.


(But I do concede for very high end boutique, measurements may not be an important aspect for that cohort of rich buyers. However that may be because of a vested interest from sellers.)

And its worth noting that there is nothing wrong with having both systems that are geared towards objective sound reproduction and those geared towards subjective music reproduction, but it is improper to conflate the two. Companies want to be able to make speakers that provide a certain subjective presentation and still be able to ride the objective sound reproduction bus at the same time. But the problem with that is they seldom wish to pay the fare in the form of providing objective measurements that conform to industry best practices.

 

[DWI]

Two years ago no one had heard of it. When I introduced it here, many said it was impossible for it to work. Today, it is everyday language in the forum and its efficacy is proven. The knowledge is expanding at exponential rate. You are way underestimating the value of a site like ours with nearly 3 million visitors a month.

Stop looking at your feet when walking. Look ahead and the future is quite bright for audiophiles who want to know what sound reproduction is about with respect to Klippel NFS. I foresee a time when only a small fraction of audiophiles are in the dark as you mention.

I looked at the three forums I’ve registered with in the UK and the searched for the number of references to Klippel, which over 5 years are: Pinkfishmedia 85, HFwigwam 26 and Artofsound 5. About a third of the posts are from Purite Audio.

Flicking through some of the posts, people evaluate speakers by listening to them. I looked at some comments following you negative review of Harbeth. Very popular, I’ve owned three pairs. You get things like this (my emphasis):

ASR is a sort of blog, which hosts a forum where (mostly) alt-objectivists congregate.
It is commendable that Amir is offering his time and money to perform measurements.
It is not commendable that the has created a false impression that measurements will tell one everything about the performance of a DAC (namely that silly SINAD thingy).
Thinking that measurements could fully characterise the performance of a loudspeaker is too absurd to be laughable.
The philanthropist/egotist balance is difficult to achieve.
I can understand the temptation but Amir must not pass judgement on speaker performance but stick to reporting the facts. If independence is a goal.
And it looks to me as though he's not (yet) sufficiently in control of the theory nor of the methodology (i.e. not measuring the Harbeth's FR on the correct axis, etc.).

I would happily look at measurements for good value electronics, but not speakers.

 

[amirm]

Thinking that measurements could fully characterise the performance of a loudspeaker is too absurd to be laughable.

Whoever wrote that has severe reading comprehension seeing how he has missed the fact that I listen to every speaker for every review. No, measurements don't "fully characterize" the speaker. But sure go heck of a lot farther than junk that goes for evidence from posters like that.

And oh, this is how we compare in reach on the Internet relative to sites you listed:

All three of them combined doesn't amount to much relative to how we are doing to spread the news about importance of audio science and engineering. They are all much older sites than ASR yet we passed them while they are stuck in mud. Ergo, audiophiles absolutely care about how we go about evaluating audio hardware.

I would happily look at measurements for good value electronics, but not speakers.

Funny there as where you absolutely want to pay attention to measurements is speakers! You can get bad audio electronics and still not know it because most audiophiles are not critical to impairments there. With speakers, colorations in frequency response are absolutely audible. So to ignore that is the best evidence of one's head to be so far in the sand as only the feet sticking up!

 

[modulardesign]

They have a speaker with the same (or similar) ribbon midrange and tweeter as the FR30. I don't know any details beyond that. It looks like its just used for level monitoring at that point. The final mixing seems to be done on the FR30s themselves. This is in contradiction to them appearing to use ATCs, but its hard to say more beyond that. One thing that is distinctive, though, is that if you listen to the samples in the Octave catalog, the mixing suddenly changes in tonality and character. It becomes rather dull and uninteresting, which is in contradiction to Paul's sentiments on things being intimate and revealing. I don't have any conclusion for that, other than being confused. One could argue skullduggery given that the video footage of the FR30s in action has the common theme of having Octave music as the source material, but in the video we have a clear audio reference with them doing the warm-up session in that the microphone seems to have a reasonable degree of fidelity. However, there is a distinct change when we hear it on the monitors. Granted, given all we know about speaker directivity and radiation patterns along with the use of planar ribbon drivers, drawing conclusions from that is beyond problematic, and these seem to just be used for monitoring of the levels. But I cant help but notice that they have the same sort of tonal character as the finished mixes. On top of this, Paul naturally is furiously scrubbing the comments in that video. My cousin is a mixing and mastering engineer who has worked at several prominent record labels, it would be interesting to get his take if I manage to see him at some point. But to me its just a head scratcher. Nothing seems to pass the smell test, but this was the theme with their electronics as well.

Having listened to the said Octave record samples I would say octave records sound has been constantly evolving. One thing to note about the samples is that some of them have been downgraded to save on bandwidth this may have introduced tertiary harmonics.
About the value. Beauty is in the eyes of the beholder. You can have two plates of food with almost similar taste with one plate at $25 and another plate at $150. Which plate you fancy is a personal choice, the $150 plate may be served on a higher quality plate at a higher dining location with a chef that has a higher pay check. When one has money and spends it on higher priced commodities this is also a form of charity in those circles.

 

[Vacceo]

Does that explain why,in the last 2-3 years, debates about measurements in audio is surging?

Does it also explain ASR current popularity/visits? (I vividly remember ASR with frugal memberships 5 years back.....but look at now)

Does it also explain the many YouTube reviewers surge towards mentioning measurements?

One gets an impression that young generations do tend to do quite an extensive online research for what they buy - be it subjective or objective reviews. And that there is an observational trend of seeking objective measurements?


When I say young generations I not only mean music lovers, but also bloggers, pod casters, sound mixers, audio engineers.


(But I do concede for very high end boutique, measurements may not be an important aspect for that cohort of rich buyers. However that may be because of a vested interest from sellers.)

I think that has to do with how money is spent depending on availability.

If you're filthy rich, you just spend your money in filthy expensive stuff because you can. If that happens to be well-engineered, well, great.

If you're on a low budget, you go for whatever gives the functionality at the lowest price.

In between, hell breaks loose. If you have to save to afford your gear, you'll try to squeeze the last drop of performance and satisfaction, hence the thorough research.

 

[YSC]

The vast majority of audio consumers have never heard of Klippel.
Even less understand it.
Why try and understand something for a purchase made every 5 or 10 years?
No one sends tower / floorstanding speakers to ASR to test, primarily it’s bookshelf and monitors.
Retail consumers generally want to listen to speakers and there is no sign that is going to change.
In my experience retail dealers never discuss measurements, in 42 years it’s never happened. Ever.
Speakers are the main audio product that it is instantly obvious on listening whether you like the presentation or not, far more than electronics.
I have yet to read anyone suggest they would buy the FR30, so even with Amir’s recommendation, why bother?
That‘s the first few that come to mind.

I don’t understand why you keep sticking to Klippel being not known by most consumers.

I think most ppl trashing the FR30 here in the first place is due to measurement from another source which is the only available source thus far. And Klippel only mentioned as a potential way to make the speaker designing better, and not a must for a well engineered speaker.

Hell it’s like arguing ppl don’t know ASML and so advanced EUV produced chips are irrelevant!

Ppl don’t need to know what’s the tool the vendor is to making a well performing product, but ppl would generally want a product which performs well!

It’s like saying a lot of cars in car magazines back then don’t mention about 0-100 time, but if the data is available I bet a lot of buying choice will be influenced by that data. Same as Nurburgring lap time. Without it as a standard we know a type R is a fast car, as well as a Porsche and a Ferrari, but which one is the best in lapping? You would just read subjective reviews and have a guess. If the data is shown then buyers can get a better basis on their subjective trial in showroom or testing before buying. There’s no conflict in any of these.

And remember here are the gathering place for objectivists in major, being subjectively preferring a product won’t turn us think a bad measuring product is good

 

[modulardesign]

I think Paul mentioned that one can go audition the FR30 and see whether it fits one tastes

 

[Geert]

From Paul directly.

3:00 Active speakers are no good because they use class D amplifiers. Doesn't seem to know Neumann and ATC use class AB amp's. And then at the end he claims his own one-off speakers sound fine, using Hypex class D amp's

 

[Spkrdctr]

Imagine the psychological damage it may inflict me if a poorly measured speaker turns Slayer into Diana Krall.

You have found the magic in audio! Diana Krall will be easier on my ears and all I need to do is buy crappy speakers. What a deal!

 

[Vacceo]

You have found the magic in audio! Diana Krall will be easier on my ears and all I need to do is buy crappy speakers. What a deal!

Magic, yes, but not the dark one I need to keep my sanity.

 

[Spkrdctr]

3:00 Active speakers are no good because they use class D amplifiers. Doesn't seem to know Neumann and ATC use class AB amp's. And then at the end he claims his own one-off speakers sound fine, using Hypex class D amp's

I noticed that. He went all over the place. Slamming class D as not good enough for speakers and then using the class D himself. Also, that in the future he would (could) develop some active speakers using class A/B. I was thinking, which is it Paul? So in the end there was no take away other than if he made active speakers they would be much better than anything available now. He would use expensive hard to buy, low production SMD devices of impeccable quality. Stuff that no one else can get. The voodoo magic was brought out at the end. Take the cover off ANY piece of electronic equipment in the normal audio world and it all has pieces made buy the big manufacturers. Put a cover on it and it becomes "magic". You are then told he would use the finest best electronic parts available, not the junk everyone else uses! I'm paraphrasing of course..

 

[Geert]

So in the end there was no take away other than if he made active speakers they would be much better than anything available now.

Indeed, he was also going to use "good drivers". So Paul is going to teach the whole world how to make drivers, speakers, amplifiers and superb sounding records He's going to make Bruno Putzeys look like an amateur.

I also feel sorry for his customers who bought one of his recent 'Stellar' series power amp's, which are ... class D ...

 

[Spkrdctr]

I also feel sorry for his customers who bought one of his recent 'Stellar' series power amp's, which are ... class D ...

That is exactly what I was thinking. Trashing class D as subpar and you sell a class D product!

 

[DWI]

I don’t understand why you keep sticking to Klippel being not known by most consumers.

I think most ppl trashing the FR30 here in the first place is due to measurement from another source which is the only available source thus far. And Klippel only mentioned as a potential way to make the speaker designing better, and not a must for a well engineered speaker.

Hell it’s like arguing ppl don’t know ASML and so advanced EUV produced chips are irrelevant!

Ppl don’t need to know what’s the tool the vendor is to making a well performing product, but ppl would generally want a product which performs well!

It’s like saying a lot of cars in car magazines back then don’t mention about 0-100 time, but if the data is available I bet a lot of buying choice will be influenced by that data. Same as Nurburgring lap time. Without it as a standard we know a type R is a fast car, as well as a Porsche and a Ferrari, but which one is the best in lapping? You would just read subjective reviews and have a guess. If the data is shown then buyers can get a better basis on their subjective trial in showroom or testing before buying. There’s no conflict in any of these.

And remember here are the gathering place for objectivists in major, being subjectively preferring a product won’t turn us think a bad measuring product is good

I don’t know what ASML and EUV are. I’d never heard of Klippel before looking here and I’d never noticed it on the UK forums I’m signed up to, because it hardly ever gets mentioned. Plus most audio consumers never even read a forum and I’ve never seen Klippel mentioned in a magazine (although I’m only subscribed to HiFi News, how I saw the review of this FR30 speaker).