So I'm currently looking to replace the regular passive speakers I have in my office (14'x12' - do a lot of listening in there - work from home). Bear with me a second while I explain why I've created the thread in the first place. Sorry for the lengthy post...I tried to keep to just the bare facts though.
The room with these speakers is not very acoustically friendly and has sub-optimal placement of the speakers. But short of completely redesigning the whole room - which really, I don't think can be improved as it is anyway, I'm instead now considering DSP-based room correction (speaker DSP-EQ'ing). I definitely lean to the purist side of things (which is why I'm here at ASR) so I've not ever seriously considered using DSPs anywhere in my audio chain before. But I think that w/o it in this room, playback is always going to suck. (Also, I sit roughly 5-6ft away from the speakers...so I guess a nearfield situation too)
So....I began investigating powered/DSP speakers....for many, many....MANY hours. Here's my summarization:
Have to spend at least $1000 on a pair or else I'd be making compromises I likely wouldn't be happy with.
[EDIT]: Forgot to mention - A very common theme to nearly all of these speakers is tweeter hiss. With my setup being so close to me, this would be a complete show stopper if it was loud enough to actually hear - which I've found MANY comments saying is the case. What is up with this????
It seems like pretty much anything short of something like a Genelec is deficient in some way that would make my arse itch.
My biggest hope was for the Yamaha HSx monitors. @amirm review of the HS5 left me very disappointed with its performance though. No idea if the HS7/8 have the same issues and can't find anything online to validate hint, hint @amirm.
In case you're curious, models from the other vendors I looked and considered (in no particular order): Vanatoo, Kali, Mackie, Adam Audio, M-Audio, Neumann, Audio Engine, Fluid, JBL, IK Multimedia, and Presonus.
(Then there's the whole decision of...do I want a large/capable enough monitor to give me decent low-end? Or should I go with a 2.1 setup (more $$)
So finally....back to my original thread intent.
With all these $400-700/pair powered DSP speakers (which seems to be the price range that they're all shooting for), I just can't see how they can produce decent speaker (parts/drivers) and shove an amp and DSP in there for these prices. Just a decent passive monitor is going to be at least $400-500 pair by themselves!
My conclusion is that the speakers themselves are lower'ish end....and the amps are on the lower'ish end....and then they try to clean up the results of all that lower'ish end 'stuff' as best they can by using a lower'ish end DSP. That's the only way I can see them keeping the prices of these poweredDSP speakers down as low as they are. (But then you have the reliability concerns that go along with lower'ish end amps and DSPs)
What I'm wondering is...what would it take to replicate what these powered/DSP speakers are doing?
Can we do all of this by grabbing some decent speakers to begin with, throwing in a miniDSP(HD?) and a lower cost (but decent) Class D amp? Can we create a setup like this that would do everything that something like a Yamaha HSx does?
Sure...we're likely back up to near lower end Genelec prices by then, but would that be worth it?
Something else that most of these systems do that I really like the idea of is that they're bi-amped 2-way's. This would certainly seem to allow a lot of flexibility in how the DSP's can manipulate things. But to replicate this, it would take additional amp channels and more miniDSP's, right? Would that even be worth it?
Or, if I'm going to go the powered/DSP route, should I just stick a crowbar in the wallet and buy some Genelecs and be done with it?
The room with these speakers is not very acoustically friendly and has sub-optimal placement of the speakers. But short of completely redesigning the whole room - which really, I don't think can be improved as it is anyway, I'm instead now considering DSP-based room correction (speaker DSP-EQ'ing). I definitely lean to the purist side of things (which is why I'm here at ASR) so I've not ever seriously considered using DSPs anywhere in my audio chain before. But I think that w/o it in this room, playback is always going to suck. (Also, I sit roughly 5-6ft away from the speakers...so I guess a nearfield situation too)
So....I began investigating powered/DSP speakers....for many, many....MANY hours. Here's my summarization:
Have to spend at least $1000 on a pair or else I'd be making compromises I likely wouldn't be happy with.
[EDIT]: Forgot to mention - A very common theme to nearly all of these speakers is tweeter hiss. With my setup being so close to me, this would be a complete show stopper if it was loud enough to actually hear - which I've found MANY comments saying is the case. What is up with this????
It seems like pretty much anything short of something like a Genelec is deficient in some way that would make my arse itch.
My biggest hope was for the Yamaha HSx monitors. @amirm review of the HS5 left me very disappointed with its performance though. No idea if the HS7/8 have the same issues and can't find anything online to validate hint, hint @amirm.
In case you're curious, models from the other vendors I looked and considered (in no particular order): Vanatoo, Kali, Mackie, Adam Audio, M-Audio, Neumann, Audio Engine, Fluid, JBL, IK Multimedia, and Presonus.
(Then there's the whole decision of...do I want a large/capable enough monitor to give me decent low-end? Or should I go with a 2.1 setup (more $$)
So finally....back to my original thread intent.
With all these $400-700/pair powered DSP speakers (which seems to be the price range that they're all shooting for), I just can't see how they can produce decent speaker (parts/drivers) and shove an amp and DSP in there for these prices. Just a decent passive monitor is going to be at least $400-500 pair by themselves!
My conclusion is that the speakers themselves are lower'ish end....and the amps are on the lower'ish end....and then they try to clean up the results of all that lower'ish end 'stuff' as best they can by using a lower'ish end DSP. That's the only way I can see them keeping the prices of these poweredDSP speakers down as low as they are. (But then you have the reliability concerns that go along with lower'ish end amps and DSPs)
What I'm wondering is...what would it take to replicate what these powered/DSP speakers are doing?
Can we do all of this by grabbing some decent speakers to begin with, throwing in a miniDSP(HD?) and a lower cost (but decent) Class D amp? Can we create a setup like this that would do everything that something like a Yamaha HSx does?
Sure...we're likely back up to near lower end Genelec prices by then, but would that be worth it?
Something else that most of these systems do that I really like the idea of is that they're bi-amped 2-way's. This would certainly seem to allow a lot of flexibility in how the DSP's can manipulate things. But to replicate this, it would take additional amp channels and more miniDSP's, right? Would that even be worth it?
Or, if I'm going to go the powered/DSP route, should I just stick a crowbar in the wallet and buy some Genelecs and be done with it?
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