Quality speakers for classical music with high output/volume

[ZolaIII]

Let's be serious any bookshelf's with 7~8" woffer's will only do the job with pair of capable subwoofer's.

 

[Biagiod]

as always, try before buy. Amazon does free returns up to ~$1500 speakers. I tested a whole string of speakers over the last two years that way. Buy a $750 Hypex amp and a DAC and start getting some experience if there are no stereo stores nearby. At least you can get an idea of what a "decent" speaker like the Debut References can do and still easily return them (provided you haven't driven them through the roof and damaged them). Other companies, like Crutchfield and Harman offer very reasonable return shipping rates as well (ex- $12 for a pair of 46 pound speakers I just sent back). With the death of hifi stores over the last couple decades this has been my new strategy.

well.. i would not consider this an ethical behavior.. I do not know which kind of business you are in, but evidently you are NOT in speaker manufacturing. Or any manufacturing. Just TRY to imagine if all customers will be like you. Will drive price of speakers (or electronics or anything else..) thru the roof and at least 50% of manufacturers will go bust dealing with thousands and thousands of returns.
You tested "A WHOLE STRING OF SPEAKERS"... Good Lord.

Talking about taking advantage of the system...

I wish you all the best

 

[sejarzo]

Neumann KH 150 Monitor Review

I think you can have a great result with any good subwoofer is you use the correct tool to match them up. There is not such a thing as good match for same brand drivers... the hk750 is a good deal if you haven't an external dsp already. For those who have one, there is others sub to think...

www.audiosciencereview.com

I know of that discussion, but apparently there was another that stated that two KH-750s are required to produce enough low end SPL to keep up with what the a pair of KH-150s can do.

 

[cavedriver]

well.. i would not consider this an ethical behavior.. I do not know which kind of business you are in, but evidently you are NOT in speaker manufacturing. Or any manufacturing. Just TRY to imagine if all customers will be like you. Will drive price of speakers (or electronics or anything else..) thru the roof and at least 50% of manufacturers will go bust dealing with thousands and thousands of returns.
You tested "A WHOLE STRING OF SPEAKERS"... Good Lord.

Talking about taking advantage of the system...

I wish you all the best

thanks, the feedback is welcome and I respect your opinion, but the bearer of the cost is Amazon, and last I checked they are not hurting for profit. It's their policy and it's part of doing business online. If you want to destroy the brick and mortar world you have to offer an alternative. Online I saw it first with clothing and shoes, where people could generally agree that "trying it on" was the only way to make a decision. Now it's expanding to almost any type of product. I think a discussion here on ASR regarding the ethics of the current state of affairs of online shopping for stereo products is a worthy topic, although it should go in one of the other forum areas. Having listened to and not been satisfied with a lot of speakers in person in the 90's and 00's when there were still stereo stores I know it would be a disservice to myself to simply buy some speaker I've never heard and conclude "good enough". For reference, I returned the DBR-62's despite liking them. The mid-highs were just a little too recessed despite their excellent bass character. And those were speakers one might expect to be "good enough" given their high praise here on ASR.

Note: I see you are in Italy. If I were in Europe I would just go to the stores and hear them. You've got to keep in mind that the retail space in Europe is significantly different from the US, at least for a little while longer. We all have Amazon, but Europe still has individual stereo stores. I went to two in Geneva and a couple in London. But in MD, where I live, I don't think there is a single store (I've looked) that stock Monitor, Elac, or Wharfedale. There are KEF dealers but they don't keep much besides the LS50's in stock. Best Buy is a joke for demoing speakers- noisy wiring, crap switching boards, moronic salesmen, already damaged demo speakers. There are a few high end dealers but I had to drive 6 hours to NY to listen to some Van Schweikerts.

 

[charleski]

Amazon does free returns up to ~$1500 speakers

They will also ban your account if you return too many items and they calculate you're costing them money or gaming the system.
Just one example of the many available if you search:
https://www.reddit.com/r/amazonprime/comments/vvfmpf

 

[cavedriver]

They will also ban your account if you return too many items and they calculate you're costing them money or gaming the system.
Just one example of the many available if you search:
https://www.reddit.com/r/amazonprime/comments/vvfmpf

we're going way off topic here. I do a ton of business through Amazon and they've never complained perhaps because we do so much with them. They are probably running cost/benefit metrics on all their customers all the time so if you "become a problem" I'm sure they'll react somehow, but I suspect that bar is pretty high. That story sounds like the person had other problems with Amazon that might have precipitated the reaction - we don't know their history from that one story.

Edit- btw, that person sounds like they got into an argument over "was it delivered or not". That's an argument you're going to lose if the shipper shows it was delivered and the poster was a fool for making that their hill to die on. I pity people that live in insecure neighborhoods and have to live with package thieves. If I lived in an apartment building I'd replace my door with one with one of those giant "postal dropoff" doors like they have for packages at post offices.

 

[excelsius]

This also concerns me...

Even in the car, where I used to blast classical, my $1000+ system with two amps (Zed Audio) and 4 speakers (Rainbow) + an 8-inch sealed sub was not enough to sustain high levels of classical music listening (was fine for other music). The amp would sometimes overheat and shut off temporarily. I might have burnt a twitter there too. But of course, a car is far from an ideal environment.


Yes, it is far from ideal, but given that this is ASR....

The cabin volume of a 2022 Accord is 106 cubic feet. Your room volume is estimated at 13x21x8 or 2184 cubic feet...or about 21x the volume of a typical auto passenger cabin.

Physics cannot be cheated.

If you were not satisfied with an 8 inch sub in a car, why would a couple of 6.5" woofers be capable of doing what you want in a large room?

Windows down, wind noise, engine noise, sub was in the trunk, etc. Also, bass was not an issue (I had the sub on a low setting).

 

[Deleted member 48726]

This also concerns me...

Even in the car, where I used to blast classical, my $1000+ system with two amps (Zed Audio) and 4 speakers (Rainbow) + an 8-inch sealed sub was not enough to sustain high levels of classical music listening (was fine for other music). The amp would sometimes overheat and shut off temporarily. I might have burnt a twitter there too. But of course, a car is far from an ideal environment.


Yes, it is far from ideal, but given that this is ASR....

The cabin volume of a 2022 Accord is 106 cubic feet. Your room volume is estimated at 13x21x8 or 2184 cubic feet...or about 21x the volume of a typical auto passenger cabin.

Physics cannot be cheated.

If you were not satisfied with an 8 inch sub in a car, why would a couple of 6.5" woofers be capable of doing what you want in a large room?

Quality speakers for classical music with high output/volume

Can you give some reasoning about why Revel? Revels are optimized around the Toole research that is very well regarded in these parts. My anecdotal experience is that the uniform and relatively wide dispersion of Revels is really helpful in a difficult room and/or out of sweetspot. Others...

audiosciencereview.com

 

[sejarzo]

Windows down, wind noise, engine noise, sub was in the trunk, etc. Also, bass was not an issue (I had the sub on a low setting).

I have to be utterly frank. This is what has a lot of us concluding that you really don't know enough yet to know what you want.

 

[cavedriver]

Found also some Australian with great price and good looking build quality including triodal transformer and both type of inputs and you get to chose OP-AMP to your likings for almost nothing while others price that a lot.

Edit: balanced only becomes a problem with sub's because you either need sub's with balanced inputs which isn't usual or MiniDSP SHD instead of Flex and both ways it inflates price too much for a budget.

I see what you mean now, yes, the balanced inputs have been a bit of a pain. I had been using an SMSL M300 DAC with balanced outs but recently acquired a miniDSP flex with balanced outs to play around with and possible drive a sub, and yes, now have to deal with getting to an unbalanced connection on the sub. Maybe I'll just build my own sub, haha.

 

[Deleted member 48726]

Windows down, wind noise, engine noise, sub was in the trunk, etc. Also, bass was not an issue (I had the sub on a low setting).

Excuse me, but are you having all of your hearing yet?

Sounds to me like you just need to buy the largest speakers 2nd hand you can find to go with a powerful pro amplifier.
Does not sound like you are after anything refined so a big pair of Cerwin Vegas and a Crown amp and you are good to go.

Job done.

 

[cavedriver]

I have to be utterly frank. This is what has a lot of us concluding that you really don't know enough yet to know what you want.

that's not fair. Have you never cranked Beethoven's 15th string quartet at maximum volume while blasting down the highway? I mean, I'm not sure you've really lived...


but to be fair let's not go too far. I used to drive an army-surplus Chevy truck that had bare metal for an interior basically. I probably have some hearing loss from trying to appreciate many different forms of music in that vehicle. give the OP time to explore the answers they've received so far, maybe they'll come back with more info. For now, we are limited in what else we can tell them, that's all.

 

[sejarzo]

that's not fair. Have you never cranked Beethoven's 15th string quartet at maximum volume while blasting down the highway? I mean, I'm not sure you've really lived...

What I meant and thought would be clear was that of course, the background noise in that situation would be too high for any system to overcome--and wholly irrelevant to determining what he will need in his room.

 

[excelsius]

The car audio example is relevant because I worked with professionals to pick and install the system, given my specifications. As for wind and engine noise, well of course, it's a car. When putting together a car audio system, the expectation is that it has to be taken into account that the car is going to be driven. Other music mostly sounded fine, just not classical. This is a case of the audio professionals not understanding the need, that's why the example applies because that’s what I’m trying to avoid at home.

Also, windows down = means the sound wave energy is dissipated outside, which addressed the question about cheating physics.

 

[Triliza]

Just a random example from Amir's review of a speaker recommended in this thread:

Speaker Listening Tests
Ah, what joy! Just put the ELAC DBR-62 on the stand and with no fiddling/adjusting, etc. it sounded superb! Absolutely superb. Balanced sound with tons of detail. Bass output was impressive. Despite use of a single speaker in my testing, it could fill my massive space with plenty of powerful low energy. Mind you, there was 1000 watts on tap to drive it but still, the speaker showed little sign of stress. At extremely high levels (ear bleeding) I could hear some resonances but back off a bit and you were invited to incredible performance.

It seems to me that this particular speakers can handle itself relatively well even in very high volume. I'd think other more expensive speakers will probably be even better at this. If you manage to blow them up, then yes, you need other type of speakers, or you are listening to levels that aren't exactly very healthy.

 

[Talisman]

The car audio example is relevant because I worked with professionals to pick and install the system, given my specifications. As for wind and engine noise, well of course, it's a car. When putting together a car audio system, the expectation is that it has to be taken into account that the car is going to be driven. Other music mostly sounded fine, just not classical. This is a case of the audio professionals not understanding the need, that's why the example applies because that’s what I’m trying to avoid at home.

Also, windows down = means the sound wave energy is dissipated outside, which addressed the question about cheating physics.

But it is clear that this is the case, you are reinforcing the comment of those who claim that you lack experience. The dynamic range of the classical means that in order to hear the quieter parts of the classical above the background noise of the car, you have to keep the volume so high as to make it unbearable for any system to manage the parts at higher volume, and it could not be different from so.

 

[sejarzo]

But it is clear that this is the case, you are reinforcing the comment of those who claim that you lack experience. The dynamic range of the classical means that in order to hear the quieter parts of the classical above the background noise of the car, you have to keep the volume so high as to make it unbearable for any system to manage the parts at higher volume, and it could not be different from so.

Precisely. OP has just explained in all the detail necessary as to why with said car system "other music sounded mostly fine" on less dynamic material but failed to meet his standards for classical.

 

[ZolaIII]

Just a random example from Amir's review of a speaker recommended in this thread:



It seems to me that this particular speakers can handle itself relatively well even in very high volume. I'd think other more expensive speakers will probably be even better at this. If you manage to blow them up, then yes, you need other type of speakers, or you are listening to levels that aren't exactly very healthy.

They can handle them 6~7 dB more keeping THD under 3 % when crossed with sub's at 100 Hz than alone and so do other much more expensive suggested one's but with those he doesn't have money left for sub's or DSP. As they have 20° wider dispersion than suggested monitor's and will fill the space better that potentially adds a decibel or two more. With sub's and removed cabinet resonance (because they don't do sub 100 Hz range anymore) which is their biggest flaw they will score better than projected and better than any monitor ever made while if sealed sub's are used it will be a system with by far better time domain. And still as they aren't best scoring speakers ever made they will improve more with DSP processor than already DSP-ed with embedded DSP one's.
Edit: I don't really believe that whose random example by you.

 

[kemmler3D]

the bearer of the cost is Amazon, and last I checked they are not hurting for profit.

As someone who used to sell speakers on Amazon for a living, unfortunately you are mostly mistaken here. The bottom line is that Amazon holds all the cards and never bears that cost if they can avoid it.

Pay attention to the "sold by" when you buy something on Amazon. Usually it will be "Sold by: ABC Audio Company" and "Shipped by: Amazon". This is true even when you are looking at a "prime" listing.

When it's "Sold by ABC Audio Company", it means a third party (an audio retailer, or even the manufacturer itself) is listing their items for sale on Amazon.

In these situations, when you buy something on Amazon and return it, after going to an Amazon warehouse somewhere, often it ultimately goes back to ABC Audio Company, who is then responsible for shipping, unpacking it, inspecting, testing, replacing manuals, bags, damaged foam, etc. And then shipping it back to Amazon, (again at significant cost) and usually having to sell it for a lower price as 'refurbished'. For many speaker manufacturers, they have lost money on the speaker by now.

Ultimately all the costs of returns are borne by the manufacturer, and then the consumer. Even if they didn't sell the speaker to you, or receive the return, the cost of returns is built into the contract between the manufacturer and the retailer, be it Amazon or anyone else. This allowance can range from 1-10% or more, and it will go higher as soon as the retailer realizes they're getting more returns than expected.

Making it a habit to return speakers just means 1) you're directly hurting the retailer, possibly the manufacturer, and in a VERY tiny way, maybe Amazon and 2) pushing up the cost of speakers in general over time.

Ultimately Amazon is the one hurt the least by returns.

My opinion: Returning stuff isn't wrong if you have a good reason to return it. However, I would say it's unethical to order things if not in good faith. What I mean by this is: Order speakers one at a time, and only when you think there is a real chance that you will keep it. Don't order 3 at a time intending to return 2, if you have any alternative.

The cost to the manufacturer goes up sharply depending on size / weight. So the bigger the speaker, the more important it is not to order with the intent to return. Likewise with cost. Once something has been returned and marked as "refurb", some percentage of that price is lost forever. The harm is much smaller with cheap IEMs than floorstanders, but I would encourage everyone to consider that all but the largest audio businesses can't easily absorb the impact of demos-via-returns.

 

[Triliza]

Edit: I don't really believe that whose random example by you.

Kind of random, I searched a bit Erin's reviews as he tests speakers for distortion and dynamic range, but I'm not sure I can interpret them correctly, so I checked DBR62 review since I watch that thread. I own DBR62, but avoid recommending them simply because I like them, especially in this case with op requirements, since I don't drive them at very high spl. In any case, can we please not make the discussion personal, everyone is entitled to his opinion.