Revel PerformaBe F226Be Floorstanding Speaker Review

[sweetchaos]

Revel PerformaBe F226Be Tower & C426Be Center Loudspeakers Review
-by Audioholics
https://www.audioholics.com/tower-speaker-reviews/revel-performa-f226be-c426be

 

[hardisj]

Yea. I saw that... I asked and unfortunately James didn't do verticals for these speakers. So no full SPIN data. Kinda sucks... I was hoping to see SPIN data on the center channel. Not so much the F226Be since I tested it already and trust my data. But, oh well. Just goes to show how much of a PITA vertical measurements are on a large speaker. But I still managed to do it.


That center channel looks plain ridiculous!

 

[yourmando]

Yea. I saw that... I asked and unfortunately James didn't do verticals for these speakers. So no full SPIN data. Kinda sucks... I was hoping to see SPIN data on the center channel. Not so much the F226Be since I tested it already and trust my data. But, oh well. Just goes to show how much of a PITA vertical measurements are on a large speaker. But I still managed to do it.


That center channel looks plain ridiculous!

Just read the Audioholics review and agree—bummer they didn’t do full SPINs. They really need to get on that bandwagon. It’s 2020 people, the bar has been raised

It shows how awesome your reviews are. They are a well known professional review site, and you’re doing super high quality reviews with full CTA 2034A data in your spare time while having a different full time job

 

[yourmando]

That center channel looks plain ridiculous!

That center channel does look ridic! I did consider for a bit getting it, and replacing my mains w/ the F226Be.

I ended up getting the Neumann 310. Totally apples and oranges as one is a studio monitor and the revel stuff looks good in a home. And the Revel directivity is much wider, where the Neumann is also well controlled but narrower. But works well in its horizontal orientation as a center channel and allows the mains to be identical, has an F3 in below 40hz, high max SPL, and is a “bargain” at much less cost, and includes amplification.

 

[Dj7675]

@hardisj a bit late to comment, but...
-Thank you for the review. Incredible amount of time and care was taken
-Really liked the spl/distortion graphic which showed great spl lack of compression and distortion
-Showing the frequency response in 2 different rooms with the predicted in room response on the same graph.
-Interesting how you did not care for Dirac full range correction with them in your theater compared to without. A good reminder that even with Dirac, full range correction still may not be preferred
-Enjoyed your “non-audiophile” playlist. Several tracks I was familiar with.


Just got a pair for our living room. Originally was going with M106/sub, but ended up going without a sub In our living room so went with floor standing speaker. Couple of brief comments that echo yours...
-Sounds great to me at all volumes
-Pushed it to around 95-100db and bass was really clean and quite good. No sub needed for me in this room. I am guessing good in room response in the 30-35hz range. Sound was not fatiguing or harsh at all to me. Me and my wife were listening quite loudly and she said that these were “easy on the ears” which I thought was interesting at such loud volumes.
-Size is very living room friendly as well as the Walnut finish

 

[ebslo]

I'm having trouble getting my head around the low frequency response of this thing. The on-axis measurement shows a very smooth, shallow roll-off beginning at about 80Hz that looks much more like the roll-off of an acoustic suspension speaker than the sharp knee of a bass reflex. Looking at the graph labeled "Revel 226Be On-Axis Response vs Components' Nearfield Response", the port has a pronounced peak at 40Hz which appears to make no contribution whatsoever to the on-axis response.

A similar disparity is seen for the F208 between fig. 4 of the stereophile measuements, which is complex sum of nearfield components below 300Hz, and the on-axis response as measured by ASR.

Any ideas what could be going on with the ports in these speakers or the measurements of them? FWIW, subjective evaluation noted good extension to mid-low 30's which would be expected from the nearfield component measurements, but not from the on-axis response.

 

[tuga]

I'm having trouble getting my head around the low frequency response of this thing. The on-axis measurement shows a very smooth, shallow roll-off beginning at about 80Hz that looks much more like the roll-off of an acoustic suspension speaker than the sharp knee of a bass reflex. Looking at the graph labeled "Revel 226Be On-Axis Response vs Components' Nearfield Response", the port has a pronounced peak at 40Hz which appears to make no contribution whatsoever to the on-axis response.

A similar disparity is seen for the F208 between fig. 4 of the stereophile measuements, which is complex sum of nearfield components below 300Hz, and the on-axis response as measured by ASR.

Any ideas what could be going on with the ports in these speakers or the measurements of them? FWIW, subjective evaluation noted good extension to mid-low 30's which would be expected from the nearfield component measurements, but not from the on-axis response.

The 100Hz bump is an artefact which results from the nearfield technique used to measure the woofer, you can see it in all measurements.
Atkinson explains this in a piece called Measuring Loudspeakers.

 

[ebslo]

The 100Hz bump is an artefact which results from the nearfield technique used to measure the woofer, you can see it in all measurements.
Atkinson explains this in a piece called Measuring Loudspeakers.

WRT fig. 4 of the stereophile measurement of the F208, I was refering to the 30Hz shelf that corresponds to the 30Hz peak of the port response in fig. 3. This shelf that extends LF extension, along with the subsequent steep roll-off, is absent from the ASR on-axis measurement.

*Edit: It should be noted that the Harmon Audio Test System frequency response also shows this port contribution at 30Hz.

 

[sfdoddsy]

I suspect that like most Revel speakers they have an under-damped alignment, ie port smaller than usual.
I prefer this to the alternative.

 

[ebslo]

I suspect that like most Revel speakers they have an under-damped alignment, ie port smaller than usual.
I prefer this to the alternative.

Do you mean that the port output is out of phase with the woofers? I guess that would be the only way for the on-axis response to be lower than the port output in the region from 25 to 48Hz.

 

[MrPeabody]

Do you mean that the port output is out of phase with the woofers? I guess that would be the only way for the on-axis response to be lower than the port output in the region from 25 to 48Hz.

I don't know exactly what he meant, but at the port resonance frequency, the port output will always be very, very close in phase with the driver. Moving lower in frequency, below the port resonance, the port and the driver will be increasingly out of phase, such that the driver excursion goes wild even though the net sound pressure in the far field drops in accordance with the phase-driven cancellation. The impedance graphs indicate that the port resonance is between 25 Hz and 30 Hz. Thus, if you were talking about the on-axis response being weaker than the port output below maybe 20 Hz, this would not be mysterious. It would however be mysterious if this were the case in the region you mention, between 25 Hz and 48 Hz. I had previously read your other post:

... The on-axis measurement shows a very smooth, shallow roll-off beginning at about 80Hz that looks much more like the roll-off of an acoustic suspension speaker than the sharp knee of a bass reflex. Looking at the graph labeled "Revel 226Be On-Axis Response vs Components' Nearfield Response", the port has a pronounced peak at 40Hz which appears to make no contribution whatsoever to the on-axis response...

The specific graph you mention here is a bit treacherous, because Erin cannot open up the speaker and disconnect all the drivers but one. And with the port output it is even more difficult, because if you disconnect the driver, you lose the port output along with the driver. So in this graph, the individual outputs as they appear in the graph are only approximations to the true individual outputs. Amir produces the same kind of graph and the same limitation applies to his graph as well. Potentially they could plug the port to obtain a purer graph for the woofers, but this wouldn't correspond correctly the woofer's behavior when the port isn't plugged. And when you consider that at these low frequencies sound is omnidirectional, there isn't any practical way to get a clean measurement of either the port output or the woofer output, where each would be unaffected by the other. The peak output of the port should be at its resonance, which we know from the impedance measurement is located between 25 Hz and 30 Hz. Yet, as you state, the graph indicates that the peak is just a hair below 40 Hz. I don't think there can be much doubt that this is caused by the mic picking up the sound from the woofer, the primary effect of which would be to shift the apparent response of the port to frequency slightly higher than it actually is.

You also said that the port's output appears to make no contribution to the on-axis response. When I looked at the graph it was not obvious to me why you had made this inference, but no matter the exact reason, the explanation is most likely the same, i.e., the individual curves you see in that graph are rough approximations where each of them is affected to some extent by the others, especially at low frequency. If you are able in your head to work out what corrections would need to be made to the individual graphs such that they would sum in agreement with the overall speaker output, then this mental image will probably be a more correct image of the individual outputs.

One thing that I very much like and am surprised by, which you pointed out, is that the net output of the speaker closely mimics the smooth, slow rolloff of a sealed speaker. What this suggests to me is that the Revel engineers were shrewd enough to figure out how to use the port to improve the efficiency and sensitivity of the speaker in the deep audible bass without suffering the usual drawbacks, or at least without one major drawback. This looks to be an amazing speaker, and I would very much like to hear it at some point. Anyone who doesn't believe that measurements reveal the sound quality of a speaker, and who would doubt that this speaker sounds as good as the measurements indicate, would surely experience an awakening of sorts upon listening to this speaker. I still can't believe that Erin sent them back. What was he thinking?

 

[ebslo]

The peak output of the port should be at its resonance, which we know from the impedance measurement is located between 25 Hz and 30 Hz. Yet, as you state, the graph indicates that the peak is just a hair below 40 Hz.I don't think there can be much doubt that this is caused by the mic picking up the sound from the woofer, the primary effect of which would be to shift the apparent response of the port to frequency slightly higher than it actually is.

You also said that the port's output appears to make no contribution to the on-axis response. When I looked at the graph it was not obvious to me why you had made this inference, but no matter the exact reason, the explanation is most likely the same, i.e., the individual curves you see in that graph are rough approximations where each of them is affected to some extent by the others, especially at low frequency. If you are able in your head to work out what corrections would need to be made to the individual graphs such that they would sum in agreement with the overall speaker output, then this mental image will probably be a more correct image of the individual outputs.

First, thanks a bunch for the detailed reply and explanation of the limitations of these measurements. Nevertheless, the near-field plot trace labeled "Port" indicates that something is outputting more energy around 40Hz than is present in the on-axis measurement. So I wonder where did this energy go? Is it being phase-canceled by something else? Or is the on-axis measurement just not picking it up for some reason?

Trying to form a mental image in my head of what near-field component outputs would yield the on-axis measurement, the possible combinations are numerous, but the simplest correction to the near-field traces that look to me like it would make them sum to the on-axis measurement is simply to remove the "Port" trace.

 

[MrPeabody]

First, thanks a bunch for the detailed reply and explanation of the limitations of these measurements. Nevertheless, the near-field plot trace labeled "Port" indicates that something is outputting more energy around 40Hz than is present in the on-axis measurement. So I wonder where did this energy go? Is it being phase-canceled by something else? Or is the on-axis measurement just not picking it up for some reason?

Trying to form a mental image in my head of what near-field component outputs would yield the on-axis measurement, the possible combinations are numerous, but the simplest correction to the near-field traces that look to me like it would make them sum to the on-axis measurement is simply to remove the "Port" trace.

I have to apologize because I just realized what you are saying about the output of the port being greater than the output of the speaker. If I were to guess, my guess is that it simply isn't valid to compare the SPL value of one of the individual outputs to the SPL value of another one, or to the SPL value of the speaker as a whole. In order for that kind of comparison to be valid, I think that a correction has to be applied to the close-up measurement, to factor in the piston area of the driver and the area at the opening of the port. I think that the individual output curves are meaningful individually (and as approximations), showing how the response of the individual driver varies over frequency.

 

[Coach_Kaarlo]

Slightly random but related comment.

An REW 192 KHz full range sweep does not produce audible port chuffing at 90 - 95 SPL with my F208's.

However, running a slower 48 KHz sweep at high SPL produces port flatulence galore, and increased measured distortion in that area.

Perhaps with musical content and fast sweeps the port output is different as the resonant frequency is passed through, rather than becoming excited and increasing its output?

 

[Descartes]

Does any one know how thick is the speaker enclosure is it 1” MDF or HDF?

 

[oursmagenta]

Hello, a bit late to the party, but is the peak in distortion around the crossover frequency (2.1khz) audible or an issue ?

 

[Laserjock]

3/4 MDF unfortunately they could have used 1” HDF or 1” of plywood

Everywhere? How’s curved portion done?

 

[Descartes]

Everywhere? How’s curved portion done?

Maybe like this

Everywhere? How’s curved portion done?

Like this maybe!

https://www.revelspeakers.com/on/de...ea88a53a/pdfs/Revel_Concerta2_White_Paper.pdf

 

[Emanuele74]

Hi hardisj,
first of all, thanks for your wonderful and objective review, I've bought a pair of F226be after reading your review

However I've recently viewed the subjective review from "New Record Day" on Youtube:

In this review he complain about F226be:
- bass has no definition and texture at all, because the woofer material is aluminium and not paper.
- midrange has not so much clarity, details or resolution like other speaker do
- tweeter is too polite without much "life"

However he praise the soundstage and all objective measurement.

Do you agree with his opinions ?

thanks
Emanuele

 

[hardisj]

Do you agree with his opinions ?

Nope.
Edit: I don't have time to watch that video so I am going simply by your paraphrasing.



And with all due respect to Ron, that whole 'paper vs aluminum' thing is ridiculous and it comes up way too often. The midbass drivers don't play anywhere near their beaming point; much less beyond that where cone type actually matters. They are crossed quite steep... IIRC L4 slopes. Aside from that, if you look at the NF measurements you can see that there is no cone breakup at all (a pointer to the proper coating and the slope). They are purely pistonic; there are no modal issues here. There is no reason at all to think the cone material will matter at these low frequencies. I really wish people would stop perpetuating that kind of stuff.