Theory Audio SB25 Speaker System Review

[EJ3]

So, someone gets quality in-wall speakers to get rid of the clutter in the room and then...? add a sub?

Who's on first?

 

[nathan]

So, someone gets quality in-wall speakers to get rid of the clutter in the room and then...? add a sub?

In wall and on wall subs are quite common in the custom install market that is the target of this speaker.

I get it, we don't like the form factor but we are not the target market. This is a solid example of this kind of product.

Disliking the market segment is like saying "Your Jeep Wrangler is no good on the Nürburgring" when we are talking about using it to cross the Rubicon Trail in the Sierra Nevada mountains. Horses for courses.

———

They are the kind of speakers you use behind the movie screen and fabric walls in private screening rooms, along with slim profile subwoofers and hidden acoustic treatment.

 

[tomtoo]

So, someone gets quality in-wall speakers to get rid of the clutter in the room and then...? add a sub?

At least its only a sub and not more speakers? And witha sub you have some freedom to place? But ok you got me.

 

[Waxx]

Deary me!
Nothing serious, I hope.
If in your shoes, the sound quality of the background music would be the last thing on my mind, you must have nerves of steel!
Unless, you were the high class lawyer.
In that case, I hope you choke on'em.

I was there for work, i had was hired to program his new minidsp and dirac for an other system in the private part of the house. I just had to wait a bit in that waiting room because he was still busy when i arrived and asked him what system that was. The amp was in the server room of that office, and distributing music to all rooms in the office part of the building. His other system are older B&W 800D (MKI) with pass labs xa series amps and a pair of SVS subs with the minidsp flex as xover and room correction. So compared to that, the SB25 system is very cheap...

 

[speakers4me]

Long time lurker first time poster, I lent the speaker to Amir for review so I figured I'd post my opinion on the system. It's my primary home theater system, 5.2 setup using 5 sb25's and two of their ported 12" subs. I would comment that although the distortion measurements don't look exceptional, the typical use case for these would be on wall which involved shelving the bass down which probably helps the bass distortion a bit (their software has a DSP preset for on wall application). Subjectively what attracted me to these speakers was their dynamic range, I'm not sure what measurement captures the sense dynamic range or scale but as other subjective reviews of this product have noted it really has a very dynamic, large scale, room filling presentation, honestly kind of shocking for its size. (For reference my previous systems were klipsch and elac). I demoed it in store with some other products (Kef r meta series is what I had my eyes on) and I'm not sure how to describe it but they just sounded 'bigger', more authoritative, and (their distortion measurements notwithstanding) very crisp and VERY punchy. At the time their retail price was WAY lower than it is now, so I went with it and I'm very happy with them (typically listen around -10db 9ft from screen). Anyway, just thought I'd put my 2 cents in

 

[ocinn]

I wonder if designers like Kali do less correction for some valid acoustic reason or if they are trying to be economical with dsp.

Very interesting question.

I assume the Kali internal dsp, simply isn’t powerful enough to achieve this. Which is IMO totally fine considering their cost and the availability of affordable 3rd party correction (DIRAC). I’d rather take better dispersion/distortion performance with a less linear FR (which I would correct for anyways) over ruler flat factory FR with issues in the aforementioned areas.

I’d be curious to see a sweep of the theory audio amp, to see what exactly the DSP preset is doing.

The <1.9ms latency in the step response measurement suggests no FIR is taking place IMO.

 

[Bugal1998]

I've never seen 24" on center drywall, only 16" on center drywall.
I still wouldn't want it attached to just the drywall, though.

My basement's precast walls have integrated studs at 24" o.c. and the remaining theater walls were framed at 24" o.c. for sound isolation and additional damping of bass resonances; a relatively common practice in high-performance audio projects.

Agreed that attaching to drywall alone wouldn't be my first choice either.

 

[BrokenEnglishGuy]

Im pretty sure amir has much more insterestiing soeakers in his garage, lately there is no much reviews of soeakers and even less dloorstanding but weird stuff… like this
This speakers are a really klippel waste of time
Yet we dont even have a very common speaker like the bw 700 800 series, reading amir he have some great speakers in the garage waiting for months
But we get a speaker like this or a cable review

 

[Dougey_Jones]

I'm not interested in this product, but there is definitely a customer for it. I have great respect for Paul Hales. Still have a pair of Revelation III's that (IMO) still sound state of the art today.

 

[Gilbers]

Being in the market for slim on-wall speakers, these are of some interest to me, but the deal-breaker must surely be the crazy cost of the dedicated amplifier unit? (I have been quoted close to £6000 by a UK dealer, just for the amp). Given that these speakers use standard binding posts and have an internal crossover, does anyone know of a good reason these couldn't work just as well with third-party amplification? I'm aware that the ALC-1809 has pre-programmed DSP profiles, but surely those could be replicated with something like a miniDSP Flex HT?

 

[EJ3]

My basement's precast walls have integrated studs at 24" o.c. and the remaining theater walls were framed at 24" o.c. for sound isolation and additional damping of bass resonances; a relatively common practice in high-performance audio projects.

Agreed that attaching to drywall alone wouldn't be my first choice either.

(Please correct me if I am wrong): In your case, the studs are not there to support the precast walls but to allow you to have points of attachment to the precast walls.
Other than that, there is actually no need for a stud system at all.

 

[pseudoid]

Long time lurker first time poster, I lent the speaker to Amir for review so I figured I'd post my opinion on the system.

Thank you for lending them out for this review.
It is good to hear that you are totally happy with your results and have no misgivings.
Congrats!

 

[Bugal1998]

(Please correct me if I am wrong): In your case, the studs are not there to support the precast walls but to allow you to have points of attachment to the precast walls.
Other than that, there is actually no need for a stud system at all.

You are correct. That's also true of the double-walls and false-wall bass-traps in my space; none of them are load bearing. Not an uncommon practice in the use case for upper-tier in-wall and on-wall speakers.

 

[EJ3]

You are correct. That's also true of the double-walls and false-wall bass-traps in my space; none of them are load bearing. Not an uncommon practice in the use case for upper-tier in-wall and on-wall speakers.

Since all the housing that I have owned/do own in this country has been "stick" built housing, that is not something that I see here.
But I have a couple of homes overseas & one of them fits what you are describing. I don't expect to go there for at least 2 more years but will look into that idea, as the place is reinforced concrete, inside and out. There seems to be enough built in closet space but no easy way to attach things to the walls And they will need some tapestries & other sound absorption technics used on them.

 

[amirm]

Being in the market for slim on-wall speakers, these are of some interest to me, but the deal-breaker must surely be the crazy cost of the dedicated amplifier unit? (I have been quoted close to £6000 by a UK dealer, just for the amp). Given that these speakers use standard binding posts and have an internal crossover, does anyone know of a good reason these couldn't work just as well with third-party amplification? I'm aware that the ALC-1809 has pre-programmed DSP profiles, but surely those could be replicated with something like a miniDSP Flex HT?

Since the crossover is in the speaker, you absolutely can use an amplifier of your choice. You have to make accurate measurements and correct for the response as they have.

 

[Speeddeacon]

Thanks for the informative post, as always, Amir. Of note, the pricing info that you quote, which I assume was provided by the loaner perhaps, seems to be possibly erroneous. Theory, being a sister project of Pro Audio Technology, chooses to provide products to custom installers, integrators and a handfull of dealers through regional distributors. They do provide some semblance of "MSRP" at trade shows and occasionally press, but don't readily provide them to the general public. These "dealers" then price the products, install, design, etc. based on their margins and business practices accordingly as a package. So it is sometimes hard to determine exactly what the products cost. There are some "reviews" out there that do list MSRP, but most of those are now several years old. Internet searching reveals no official MSRP for any of Pro Audio Tech or Theory products. If the loaner paid the quoted prices, it could reflect more than simply the product perhaps.

Theory, like many electronic brands, has increased prices over the past several years, particularly with the component supply shortage and production cost price increases seen industry wide. The ALC-1809 was $3,500 and SB25 $895 each when introduced in 2019. I have recently inquired from a couple of US integrators near me who were willing to sell just the Theory products to me and was quoted MSRPs of $1095 for the SB25 and SB25IW and $5000 for the ALC-1809. They are not inexpensive, but a pair of SB25s can be had for MSRP of under $2200 rather the $3200 mentioned, not an insignificant difference value wise. A little negotiation at times, can yield better pricing still in my experience .

Keep up the great work!

 

[speakers4me]

Thanks for the informative post, as always, Amir. Of note, the pricing info that you quote, which I assume was provided by the loaner perhaps, seems to be possibly erroneous. Theory, being a sister project of Pro Audio Technology, chooses to provide products to custom installers, integrators and a handfull of dealers through regional distributors. They do provide some semblance of "MSRP" at trade shows and occasionally press, but don't readily provide them to the general public. These "dealers" then price the products, install, design, etc. based on their margins and business practices accordingly as a package. So it is sometimes hard to determine exactly what the products cost. There are some "reviews" out there that do list MSRP, but most of those are now several years old. Internet searching reveals no official MSRP for any of Pro Audio Tech or Theory products. If the loaner paid the quoted prices, it could reflect more than simply the product perhaps.

Theory, like many electronic brands, has increased prices over the past several years, particularly with the component supply shortage and production cost price increases seen industry wide. The ALC-1809 was $3,500 and SB25 $895 each when introduced in 2019. I have recently inquired from a couple of US integrators near me who were willing to sell just the Theory products to me and was quoted MSRPs of $1095 for the SB25 and SB25IW and $5000 for the ALC-1809. They are not inexpensive, but a pair of SB25s can be had for MSRP of under $2200 rather the $3200 mentioned, not an insignificant difference value wise. A little negotiation at times, can yield better pricing still in my experience .

Keep up the great work!

Yeah I’m the one that donated the speaker, I’ve got a 5.2 setup using five SB25’s, two of their ported 12’ subs, and the ALC-1809 amp, and I paid $10,500 before tax last November, I think retail was about 15% above that. I tried not to sound like too much of a fanboy in my earlier post but honestly I love the system, I wanted a good looking compact on wall system that slams and that’s exactly what it is. One other thing is they occasionally update their speakers’ DSP programs (which the user can download to the ALC 1809) to improve their linearity. A new profile for this speaker was rolled out just after Amir tested it, I can’t imagine it is as flat as their website shows, but the spinorama they had on their site previously (before the update) was a bit choppier and was closer to Amir’s measurements.

 

[amirm]

So it is sometimes hard to determine exactly what the products cost.

Full MSRP is passed on to the customer by the CI channel for such specialty products. And likely there is MAP obligation for the same indicating that the online sale price is what a customer would get in a custom integration bid. But yes, as the owner mentions above, COVID price hikes are definitely in play here.

 

[Speeddeacon]

One other thing is they occasionally update their speakers’ DSP programs (which the user can download to the ALC 1809) to improve their linearity. A new profile for this speaker was rolled out just after Amir tested it, I can’t imagine it is as flat as their website shows, but the spinorama they had on their site previously (before the update) was a bit choppier and was closer to Amir’s measurements.

Which new dsp are you referring to, an SB25 preset or ALC-1809 firmware?

 

[speakers4me]

Which new dsp are you referring to, an SB25 preset or ALC-1809 firmware?

An SB25 preset, it went from version 1.4 to 1.6