Purifi 1et400a monoblocks with Revel M126be?

[Steve Dallas]

Your comparison of the P3 vs Be is interesting and has given me food for thought. I suppose it comes down to the tweeter and how you like your high's....I am a big fan of detail as opposed to "warmth".

I bought my amps and pre-amp to take full advantage of detail and precision in my listening.

This is very interesting info and I'm grateful you replied. That fact that you own a pair of F206's is also a bonus as I can now ask for your subjective opinion on their performance in your room. How big is you room? Do you have good placement? Do you have any measurements of you current listening position?

I really need to try that MMM function. Do you now EQ to the MMM method or the more direct, MLP scenario?

I really like your frequency response even though it is just "thrown down"! Looks really good!!!

I would not call the F206 warm or mellow or dull. If anything, they are on the brighter side of the spectrum. Not modern B&W bright, but brighter than average.

The difference between the Be and regular version is difficult to put into words. The Be speaker had a slightly more "premium" tonality, I suppose, but I really had to concentrate and listen for it in a near perfect room, with a very low noise floor, and with high end equipment (like yours). It also had a different response curve, and it was hard to know if I was hearing those premium components or the differences in the response. I think you would have to hear it for yourself to decide if it really is better or just more expensive. It wasn't truly premium enough for me to want to spend the money.

My media room is 13' 1" W x 12' 11" D by 10' 6" H. Nearly a cube. Terrible. I have enough treatment on the walls to kill the flutter echo, even out the reverb response, and bring the RT60 down to about 350ms. The room modes are brutal. I would kill to have the tools you have to work with in your Anthem.

My listening position is about 8 feet back, and the speakers are about 7.5 feet apart.

I have a ritual for setting up speakers. I set them up with a tape measure with no spikes attached. Then I set up the laptop and shoot dozens of stereo measurements, as I move them around: left, right, forward, backward, more toe, less toe, level, forward rake, rearward rake, etc. Whichever location yields the best measured results is where they will end up with spikes on. Then, I take per channel measurements and apply correction to each channel. This takes 1 entire day with no family in the house. I have not yet achieved such a day, so they have been sitting where I first stuck them, waiting for me to find time to work with them.

Yes, I have been using REW for 12+ years. A previous part time job was setting up the control rooms and mix rooms in project studios, so I have done this more than a few times.

I EQ against the MMM at the MLP. I gives a good approximation of where your melon actually is during listening. I usually end up with 60 to 80 averages per measurement.

I have 6 bands of EQ in a miniDSP and 7 bands of EQ in an AVR. I normally focus on frequencies below 500Hz. Above that is adjusted by repositioning the speakers, as long as they have decent directivity.

I don't know if any of that is helpful...

 

[Sparky]

Funny, mine sits on the right. I wonder if there is a correlation with LHD and RHD countries and where couple sit outside their cars.

My wife always seems to want to be sat or lay near a corner for some reason? Odd....

 

[Sparky]

I would not call the F206 warm or mellow or dull. If anything, they are on the brighter side of the spectrum. Not modern B&W bright, but brighter than average.

The difference between the Be and regular version is difficult to put into words. The Be speaker had a slightly more "premium" tonality, I suppose, but I really had to concentrate and listen for it in a near perfect room, with a very low noise floor, and with high end equipment (like yours). It also had a different response curve, and it was hard to know if I was hearing those premium components or the differences in the response. I think you would have to hear it for yourself to decide if it really is better or just more expensive. It wasn't truly premium enough for me to want to spend the money.

My media room is 13' 1" W x 12' 11" D by 10' 6" H. Nearly a cube. Terrible. I have enough treatment on the walls to kill the flutter echo, even out the reverb response, and bring the RT60 down to about 350ms. The room modes are brutal. I would kill to have the tools you have to work with in your Anthem.

My listening position is about 8 feet back, and the speakers are about 7.5 feet apart.

I have a ritual for setting up speakers. I set them up with a tape measure with no spikes attached. Then I set up the laptop and shoot dozens of stereo measurements, as I move them around: left, right, forward, backward, more toe, less toe, level, forward rake, rearward rake, etc. Whichever location yields the best measured results is where they will end up with spikes on. Then, I take per channel measurements and apply correction to each channel. This takes 1 entire day with no family in the house. I have not yet achieved such a day, so they have been sitting where I first stuck them, waiting for me to find time to work with them.

Yes, I have been using REW for 12+ years. A previous part time job was setting up the control rooms and mix rooms in project studios, so I have done this more than a few times.

I EQ against the MMM at the MLP. I gives a good approximation of where your melon actually is during listening. I usually end up with 60 to 80 averages per measurement.

I have 6 bands of EQ in a miniDSP and 7 bands of EQ in an AVR. I normally focus on frequencies below 500Hz. Above that is adjusted by repositioning the speakers, as long as they have decent directivity.

I don't know if any of that is helpful...

Your comparison of the 206 vs 226be is very interesting and seems to mirror what most people are saying.
It's a case of, money-no-object = 226be or Budget friendly = 206. It's odd because the F206 seems to measure completely different to the rest of the line up including the cheaper and more expensive models.
It's frequency response is very un-linear as opposed to the rest which puzzles me as Revel say that their entire range are to measure to the same standard but with the difference being the higher up the range you go, the more exotic the components become.

God yeah, your room is almost a cube so I bet you do have issues with nulls/peaks etc but at least you have the option/ability to install some absorption/reflection panels. I like your positioning method as it's something I would do given the space but, like you've said, it all takes time and finding the time to measure it all is difficult!

It's funny, I have to gear to correct (mostly) my issues but not the space and you have the opposite! If I lived near you I would be loaning you my gear!

I've only really just got into REW and I love using it! I find it fascinating but I have only scratched the surface of it's abilities! I keep doing measurements then, after I've put everything away, I'll realise that I forgot to do something which makes my measurements invalid and I have to try to find time to do it all over again whilst trying to remember what I missed the last time!

Before I bought the Anthem, I always wondered if a MiniDSP model would suit my needs more but I was swayed by ARC.
ARC isn't THAT good you know....I have to admit that the cost of the Anthem STR Pre doesn't really grant me the EQ I need for my room as the response below 500hz is god awful! The size of the Null/Peaks are so great that the abilities of ARC are sorely tested and I don't feel it does a good job. Maybe I'm being too critical (somebody is going to shout at me here) but - pound for pound - I bet a miniDSP option would've done just as good a job.

Although I'm not longer using the 2x4HD, it is incredibly powerful for it's price and it beats the Anthem in bass EQ. My opinion of course.

Your input it 100% helpful mate!! Thank you.

 

[Steve Dallas]

Your comparison of the 206 vs 226be is very interesting and seems to mirror what most people are saying.
It's a case of, money-no-object = 226be or Budget friendly = 206. It's odd because the F206 seems to measure completely different to the rest of the line up including the cheaper and more expensive models.
It's frequency response is very un-linear as opposed to the rest which puzzles me as Revel say that their entire range are to measure to the same standard but with the difference being the higher up the range you go, the more exotic the components become.

God yeah, your room is almost a cube so I bet you do have issues with nulls/peaks etc but at least you have the option/ability to install some absorption/reflection panels. I like your positioning method as it's something I would do given the space but, like you've said, it all takes time and finding the time to measure it all is difficult!

It's funny, I have to gear to correct (mostly) my issues but not the space and you have the opposite! If I lived near you I would be loaning you my gear!

I've only really just got into REW and I love using it! I find it fascinating but I have only scratched the surface of it's abilities! I keep doing measurements then, after I've put everything away, I'll realise that I forgot to do something which makes my measurements invalid and I have to try to find time to do it all over again whilst trying to remember what I missed the last time!

Before I bought the Anthem, I always wondered if a MiniDSP model would suit my needs more but I was swayed by ARC.
ARC isn't THAT good you know....I have to admit that the cost of the Anthem STR Pre doesn't really grant me the EQ I need for my room as the response below 500hz is god awful! The size of the Null/Peaks are so great that the abilities of ARC are sorely tested and I don't feel it does a good job. Maybe I'm being too critical (somebody is going to shout at me here) but - pound for pound - I bet a miniDSP option would've done just as good a job.

Although I'm not longer using the 2x4HD, it is incredibly powerful for it's price and it beats the Anthem in bass EQ. My opinion of course.

Your input it 100% helpful mate!! Thank you.

I would be interested to see where you are seeing unlinear measurements on the F206. Soundstage has a good set of measurements on them, and they look great to me. (Soundstage instructs you to ignore everything below 100Hz, due to limitations of the NRC's anechoic chamber.) This looks like +/- 1.5 dB all the way down the line.

Revel's own data closely matches what Soundstage found (red and blue lines):

That appears to be at least as good, if a little different from the F208 that amirm measured, which has slightly more energy in the upper bass, lower mids:

Then, there is Revel's data for the Be version, which has a tiny (probably unintentional) hint at the BBC curve and are a tad brighter:

For the F206 speakers to be considered unlinear, we would REALLY have to be splitting tiny hairs, would we not? All of these speakers measure excellently.

BTW, it was the F208 and the F228Be I auditioned. I have not heard the F226Be.

 

[Sparky]

I would be interested to see where you are seeing unlinear measurements on the F206. Soundstage has a good set of measurements on them, and they look great to me. (Soundstage instructs you to ignore everything below 100Hz, due to limitations of the NRC's anechoic chamber.) This looks like +/- 1.5 dB all the way down the line.

Revel's own data closely matches what Soundstage found (red and blue lines):

That appears to be at least as good, if a little different from the F208 that amirm measured, which has slightly more energy in the upper bass, lower mids:

Then, there is Revel's data for the Be version, which has a tiny (probably unintentional) hint at the BBC curve and are a tad brighter:

For the F206 speakers to be considered unlinear, we would REALLY have to be splitting tiny hairs, would we not? All of these speakers measure excellently.

BTW, it was the F208 and the F228Be I auditioned. I have not heard the F226Be.

Ah, I'm glad you've pulled me up on this as it's clearly my lack of experience reading and understanding a frequency response graph.
I completely misunderstood the "green" and "black" trace for the F206 as the rest of the line-up measures almost flat (to my eyes) so to see the F206 seemingly measuring differently to the rest has puzzled me somewhat.

I'm more than happy for you to correct me on this as I want to learn how to read these graphs/charts effectively!

 

[Steve Dallas]

The Revel graphs show the on-axis, 15 degree off-axis, 30 degree off-axis, and 45 degree-off axis measurements at the tweeter height on the horizontal plane. The black and green lines are on-axis and 15 off-axis horizontally. That implies you have the speakers toed-in to point directly at your head or almost so, and your ears are at tweeter height, which they will not be with this speaker. Revel knows few people use such extreme toe in, so they design the most linear sound to be 30 to 45 degrees off horizontal axis, which implies slight toe-in. Mine are toed-in about 5/8", which is right in that window at my speaker spread and listening distance. The tweeters are a few inches above my ear height, when sitting on a standard sofa.

The listening window in the Soundstage measurement (the first chart I posted) is the average of 15 degrees off-axis in every direction, which is a good representation of how the speakers might be used. That is more or less 15 degrees of toe-in and sitting with ears 15 degrees below the tweeter, which is similar to 30 degrees off horizontal axis, assuming a very good waveguide and/or otherwise limited diffraction. (Yes, I know the math doesn't quite work.) That should roughly correlate to the red line in the Revel chart, which it pretty much does.

Amir's Kilppel in-room response is a little more complex, taking reflections into account, but most closely correlates with the listening window measurement of most measurement sets.

All-in-all the F206 offers an excellent real-world, in-room presentation. There are no problems with FR smoothness. Revel would not release such a speaker in the Performa line.

 

[Sparky]

The Revel graphs show the on-axis, 15 degree off-axis, 30 degree off-axis, and 45 degree-off axis measurements at the tweeter height on the horizontal plane. The black and green lines are on-axis and 15 off-axis horizontally. That implies you have the speakers toed-in to point directly at your head or almost so, and your ears are at tweeter height, which they will not be with this speaker. Revel knows few people use such extreme toe in, so they design the most linear sound to be 30 to 45 degrees off horizontal axis, which implies slight toe-in. Mine are toed-in about 5/8", which is right in that window at my speaker spread and listening distance. The tweeters are a few inches above my ear height, when sitting on a standard sofa.

The listening window in the Soundstage measurement (the first chart I posted) is the average of 15 degrees off-axis in every direction, which is a good representation of how the speakers might be used. That is more or less 15 degrees of toe-in and sitting with ears 15 degrees below the tweeter, which is similar to 30 degrees off horizontal axis, assuming a very good waveguide and/or otherwise limited diffraction. (Yes, I know the math doesn't quite work.) That should roughly correlate to the red line in the Revel chart, which it pretty much does.

Amir's Kilppel in-room response is a little more complex, taking reflections into account, but most closely correlates with the listening window measurement of most measurement sets.

All-in-all the F206 offers an excellent real-world, in-room presentation. There are no problems with FR smoothness. Revel would not release such a speaker in the Performa line.

Hi Steve.

Thanks for correcting me and giving this vital info!
I'm in a bit of a quandary at the moment about speaker selection so the info given is crucial.

I'm set on a path of a 3 way design now as I feel that offers a much more precise presentation of the whole frequency range (especially when backed up with subs).

My current 2 ways sound flat in most areas and I'm regularly left dissatisfied with them.

Being helped by you guys on here (and some behind the scenes) is proving to be a very refreshing experience.

Thanks Steve.

 

[Steve Dallas]

You are more than welcome.

Their are actually a few minor errors in my explanation above, but not significant enough to change the overall meaning. For example, the Listening Window is actually the average of on-axis and 15 degrees off-axis up, down, left, and right. I left out the on-axis measurement.

Three ways can be great (like the F206), but some are poorly executed and end up sounding worse than a well-executed 2 way or 2.5 way in the very region they aim to improve. Your target price range should filter out most of the bad ones, but as we have seen in Amir's measurements, that is not the case as often as it should be.

 

[Sparky]

You are more than welcome.

Their are actually a few minor errors in my explanation above, but not significant enough to change the overall meaning. For example, the Listening Window is actually the average of on-axis and 15 degrees off-axis up, down, left, and right. I left out the on-axis measurement.

Three ways can be great (like the F206), but some are poorly executed and end up sounding worse than a well-executed 2 way or 2.5 way in the very region they aim to improve. Your target price range should filter out most of the bad ones, but as we have seen in Amir's measurements, that is not the case as often as it should be.

Well for me you pretty much nailed it mate.
I'm like an apprentice when it comes to audio....
I'm a 42 year old electrician yet this hobby of mine makes me want to ditch the day job and concentrate on audio all day long!

Pipe dreams are great eh.....

 

[Sparky]

I have a very good friend who is an audio nut, more so than me and he really knows his stuff!

When I told him about the possibility of buying an F206 or Song3 he immediately told me I'm making a mistake and I should buy bookshelf speakers as my room, as proven with the terrible measurements below 500hz, shows that any speaker that plays down to 40hz and under is going to excite the nasty room modes I have and I'll end up back in the exact same position I'm in now.
Boomy bass and buyers remorse.

I do see his point. It is a worry to me that I'll buy these amazing new speakers, hook them up and find that those room modes are still there.
That would be a disaster......

 

[Jdunk54nl]

Again...has been mentioned MANY times in this thread....the only way those speakers will excite that room mode is IF you let them play down to that frequency and do not set a crossover for them.

Look at your ARC results, the speakers are no longer exciting that room mode in any meaningful way or you wouldn't have those results. That is actual data, not just a guess.

If you set a crossover for bookshelf, floorstanders, or whatever else you buy, they will not play the frequencies that excite a room mode. If you have them playing 100hz to 20,000hz, that is it, no matter the "style" of the speaker. A 24db LR slope would have them down about ~24db by 50hz.

As has also been said, floor standing speakers usually have more capability (dynamics) throughout the frequency range compared to bookshelfs, even if you don't push them to their lowest limits.

 

[richard12511]

Looking at the F206 vs the other speakers in the series(M105, M106, F208) the F206 does seem to have a more jagged on axis and LW response, but the ER and SP are superb.

Any idea what's causing this? Usually I find that it's the bigger speakers that struggle more with response, but in this case it's the smaller speaker. Also in the series, the M106 seems to have the worst ER and SP curves. F208 seems to be the best in almost every way, though it's also the most expensive. M105 seems to measure the second best(imo), but it's going to be very output limited in comparison to the M106 and especially the F206/F208.

 

[Sparky]

Again...has been mentioned MANY times in this thread....the only way those speakers will excite that room mode is IF you let them play down to that frequency and do not set a crossover for them.

Look at your ARC results, the speakers are no longer exciting that room mode in any meaningful way or you wouldn't have those results. That is actual data, not just a guess.

If you set a crossover for bookshelf, floorstanders, or whatever else you buy, they will not play the frequencies that excite a room mode. If you have them playing 100hz to 20,000hz, that is it, no matter the "style" of the speaker. A 24db LR slope would have them down about ~24db by 50hz.

As has also been said, floor standing speakers usually have more capability (dynamics) throughout the frequency range compared to bookshelfs, even if you don't push them to their lowest limits.

Fair enough mate. I'll take that one on the chin.

You know when you can't see the wood for the tree's.... That's me right now.

I think having so many options at my disposal, it's causing me to second guess every decision I attempt to make.

Of course, you're right. It doesn't matter if I'm crossing to subs....

 

[Sparky]

Looking at the F206 vs the other speakers in the series(M105, M106, F208) the F206 does seem to have a more jagged on axis and LW response, but the ER and SP are superb.

View attachment 87692

Any idea what's causing this? Usually I find that it's the bigger speakers that struggle more with response, but in this case it's the smaller speaker. Also in the series, the M106 seems to have the worst ER and SP curves. F208 seems to be the best in almost every way, though it's also the most expensive. M105 seems to measure the second best(imo), but it's going to be very output limited in comparison to the M106 and especially the F206/F208.

Thats what I noticed initially and found it strange that the F206 seems to be at odds with what the others in the range are doing. I was then corrected by @Steve Dallas