Upgrade from Neumann KH310 for home listening?

[Ype]

@Ype hey I didn't say do something radical or sacrifice lot of space not even to change placement a lot (far or off how it is). No construction work nor quiet expensive and easy enough to upkeep and clean. It sure ain't gonna work when left corner gives you early and wiled refraction from sub that ruins complete impulse response along with hole lot of gain while on the right you have a void and far less reinforcement. Sorry there is no substitute for proper placement and limited accustic treatment. I would probably pass to comment entirely if there whosent that small muppet detail there.

It is not my room and I am Dutch so you can be as direct as you'd like.

Wildly of topic but I actually dislike most passive treatment unless it is a space used for recording.
I had a huge suck-out in the bass in my room at listening position that is also irregularly shaped and the only way to fix it was with a sub in a corner to maximize the boundary effect, finding the phase where the bass summed up best with the speakers for my listening position at the cross over point and then EQing out the peaks.
I cannot fill dips in the frequency response with treatment after all.
Once that sounded right I left well enough alone.

As the OP has two subs and used PEQ I presume he found a proper place for them.
That does leave room modes that could be more easily be treated with acoustic treatment, but I have no idea how his room looks or what his wishes are.
Besides, the OP did not ask for advice in that area.


That does leave me with one more question for the OP, have you tried the KH310's with far field EQ?
In my room in mid field the difference was minimal, audible but not much preference one way or another.
I did ignore their bass EQ and added a filter for the small dip around 700Hz

Measurements for speaker Neumann KH 310A

www.spinorama.org

 

[ZolaIII]

@Ype well such deeps are produced from such violent early refractions in the first place and bonus you get ringing.
Did you ever asked your self why I specified depth for two rows of accustic curtains? Take a look at measurements of KH310 please!

https://www.audiosciencereview.com/forum/index.php?attachments/neumann-kh310ameasurements-spinorama-cta-2034-early-reflections-frequency-response-measurement-png.94740/

Should we now address ISO 3382-2 (hell no that's hypocritical question)? So primary intention is improve back to front ratio and we will cut corner gain with additional trap. I also advised a switch to 2.2 and close to main sub's and high crossovers which give KH310A's a lot of headroom and they already did good on their own to 96 dB SPL in near field each to some 83 Hz. They will pass with flying grade put like that to far field (-11 dB in room) wite noise calibration point 85 dB mono. I do this for a long time.

 

[Ype]

I think you are misunderstanding as
1: I am not the OP
2: Which means it's not my speakers or room being discussed
3: the OP asked us about different speakers to try, not for advice on room treatment.

So I have no idea why you are writing these messages and directing them at me
If I ever open a thread about my room feel free to share you thoughts as I'd love to hear them then, but this seems neither the time nor the place, so see this as my final response to you in this thread as we're trying to help the OP and we are getting of topic.

Edit: Should read slightly less direct now as I am sure you mean well and my Dutch was showing

 

[markstein]

Hi guys, I am the OP


Just to be clear: I am operating my KH310 high passed at 80Hz (LR4), and use two KH810 low passed at 80Hz (LR4) and in mono. One sub is located in the front left corner, one at the back wall, right side. Both are manually eq'd using REW and multisub optimizer to produce a reasonable flat bass across my listening sofa.
The KH310 are also manually eq'd to account for SBIR and room effects. In the meantime I changed my eq concept and went up to 1kHz (previously I stopped at approx. 300Hz), using the MMM method. I am still inconclusive which approach I like more.
Btw, I reduced the KH310 treble level to -1.5dB. this leads to less attack, however, voices sound more natural to me.

Let's be honest: the room is what it is, and the large listening distance and different reflection patterns left/right hurt the sound stage presentation. More directive loudspeakers could help here (the KH420 certainly did).

 

[markstein]

Hi guys, I am the OP


Just to be clear: I am operating my KH310 high passed at 80Hz (LR4), and use two KH810 low passed at 80Hz (LR4). One sub is located in the front left corner, one at the back wall, right side. Both are manually eq'd using REW and multisub optimizer to produce a reasonable flat bass across my listening sofa.
The KH310 are also manually eq'd to account for SBIR and room effects. In the meantime I changed my eq concept and went up to 1kHz (previously I stopped at approx. 300Hz), using the MMM method. I am still inconclusive which approach I like more.
Btw, I reduced the KH310 treble level to -1.5dB. this leads to less attack, however, voices sound more natural to me.

Let's be honest: the room is what it is, and the large listening distance and different reflection patterns left/right hurt the sound stage presentation. More directive loudspeakers could help here (the KH420 certainly did).

 

[markstein]

In the meantime I also listened to the Geithain ME901K1 (the "home" version of the original RL901K with a slightly smaller housing and detached amp in a separate housing). I am not sure whether there are sonical differences to the studio version.

Listening environment was new to me (the dealer's room), and I brought my KH310 to have an "anchor" to compare. Both loudspeakers were placed about 1m from the back wall, listening triangle approx. 3m, in an untreated living room with lots of shelf, sofa, carpets. Side walls were > 2m away.

The overall presentation of the large Geithains was very different to the KH310 and as well to KH420 and D&D 8C (subjectively, from memory, and I might be completely wrong because of the different room).

The ME901K has a much leaner sound than the Neumanns un-eq'd. You can clearly hear a "thicker" bass, however with much less authority, and the SBIR effects thickening up the upper bass & lower mids with the KH310. The Geithains, on the contrary, at first seemed unusually "thin" (I had a similar first impression with the 8C), but after some adaptation more correct. I think I have become used to SBIR effects and undercorrected them in the past. Voices sound thinner with less warmth than with the Neumanns. Still, very detailed and lifelike, much different than the D&D 8C which produced somehow too "clean", "synthetic" unemotional voices to my taste.

The Geithains produce a wonderful deep, clean bass. Very natural, totally effortless. Maybe the best I have heard so far. Listen to the drum intro on the track "Take Five" by John Morello at high volume and if you think you can see the differnt drums clearly lined up from left to right and clearly hear all the harmonics of the drum skins vibrating, you know what I mean - it is difficult to describe.

Imaging is less pin sharp and holographic than I remember the D&D 8C, but at the same time more natural. instrument have lifelike size. Listen to the track "Hey Joe" by markusphilippe, and the double bass on the right side is HUGE with the Geithains, super clean, very authorative and lifelike (I played this instrument myself when I was in school and know the sound pretty well), while the D&D 8C projected a very precise and super clean image of a much smaller "mini" double bass, simply not lifelike and - again- unemotional.

To sum up this very first listening impression: Did I like the ME901K? Well, I did not dislike it however I also did not fall in love with them instantly. They are clearly different sounding than the setup I am used to.
One thing that slightly distracted me is this slight lack of warmth to voices that I am used to and that I like with my Neumanns. The Geithains overall have a slight bright but not annoying bright character - in the specific room setup I listened to - and I would definitely need to listen to them in my room for a final verdict. The bass presentation and authority, however, were amazing.

Looking at the Geithain's technical concept (no waveguide, wide and not very controlled dispersion) I would expect that they do not work well in my room. Honestly I was a little bit shocked when I looked at the measurements from a German audio magazine. Look at the horizontal dispersion...

https://www.me-geithain-highend.de/assets/downloads/ME901K1/Audio%2005_2015%20ME901%20Sonderdruck.pdf

 

[ZolaIII]

Hi guys, I am the OP


Just to be clear: I am operating my KH310 high passed at 80Hz (LR4), and use two KH810 low passed at 80Hz (LR4). One sub is located in the front left corner, one at the back wall, right side. Both are manually eq'd using REW and multisub optimizer to produce a reasonable flat bass across my listening sofa.
The KH310 are also manually eq'd to account for SBIR and room effects. In the meantime I changed my eq concept and went up to 1kHz (previously I stopped at approx. 300Hz), using the MMM method. I am still inconclusive which approach I like more.
Btw, I reduced the KH310 treble level to -1.5dB. this leads to less attack, however, voices sound more natural to me.

Let's be honest: the room is what it is, and the large listening distance and different reflection patterns left/right hurt the sound stage presentation. More directive loudspeakers could help here (the KH420 certainly did).

What you PEQ on? The 1 KHz is close to what you can aim with PEQ Q 50. I don't know how much you can but room is fixable. If you put one row of curtains you won't need to tilt highs and there will be less intervention in mids, if you put two it will even lower gain in bass (not because curtains but space in between acting as dumping chamber and room fundamental frequency (peek intensity) will also go down. You gain on stage depth by making ratio of back to front refractions better. When EQ-ing first PEQ room fundamental and not to kill it entirely but make it close to small ones close to it. Whit it in place and active mesure again and see what else needs to be done.
Higher you cut mains you make their job easier, lot easier when is high enough. Try it yourself for XO 80 and XO 120 and tuch the woffer dumper (cone outer ring) while playing. But then you need 2.2 because it becomes directional and sub's close to mains each doing chenel of main he is tied and place close to. You might lose a little bit of max output that way and you don't care how thew will sum naturally as they will do it as its bean don't in the mix it self. You gain much better equal loudness compensation integration meaning that with it you can listen on low SPL and still hear all 9 octaves as its in full SPL. Is it worth it judge yourself.
Those are all great speakers so sure as hell I ain't gonna recommend you buying more, just trying to help you get there with what you already have (and that's plenty). Not asking you to seriously or much rearrange or change anything. See if you can pass without bass trap (you can mitigate left corner gain to make it more close to right open side) with DSP and there is no early refractions in measurements, impulse is aligned and dosent ring, especially pre ring then you don't need one).

 

[markstein]

What you PEQ on? The 1 KHz is close to what you can aim with PEQ Q 50. I don't know how much you can but room is fixable. If you put one row of curtains you won't need to tilt highs and there will be less intervention in mids, if you put two it will even lower gain in bass (not because curtains but space in between acting as dumping chamber and room fundamental frequency (peek intensity) will also go down. You gain on stage depth by making ratio of back to front refractions better. When EQ-ing first PEQ room fundamental and not to kill it entirely but make it close to small ones close to it. Whit it in place and active mesure again and see what else needs to be done.
Higher you cut mains you make their job easier, lot easier when is high enough. Try it yourself for XO 80 and XO 120 and tuch the woffer dumper (cone outer ring) while playing. But then you need 2.2 because it becomes directional and sub's close to mains each doing chenel of main he is tied and place close to. You might lose a little bit of max output that way and you don't care how thew will sum naturally as they will do it as its bean don't in the mix it self. You gain much better equal loudness compensation integration meaning that with it you can listen on low SPL and still hear all 9 octaves as its in full SPL. Is it worth it judge yourself.
Those are all great speakers so sure as hell I ain't gonna recommend you buying more, just trying to help you get there with what you already have (and that's plenty). Not asking you to seriously or much rearrange or change anything. See if you can pass without bass trap (you can mitigate left corner gain to make it more close to right open side) with DSP and there is no early refractions in measurements, impulse is aligned and dosent ring, especially pre ring then you don't need one).

Thank you for your suggestions!

I guess I will look into the following modifications which would we helpful with any setup:
- Additional acoustic curtains on the windows side.
- Back wall absorber. Also thinking about a shelf with integrated absorbers.
- Maybe I could integrate an edge absorber in the front left area.

 

[ZolaIII]

Thank you for your suggestions!

I guess I will look into the following modifications which would we helpful with any setup:
- Additional acoustic curtains on the windows side.
- Back wall absorber. Also thinking about a shelf with integrated absorbers.
- Maybe I could integrate an edge absorber in the front left area.

You don't need absorber back, you don't even need diffuser if you aren't siting very close to the wall. Curtains are easy to live with and wash which ain't case with most of the accustic treatments. What you need to understand is absorbing coefficients of material, how it rises in multilayer with different materials and that it still needs a equilisation chamber to depth of 30 cm to get in useful range of mid bass, to get to high and even mids is much easier and that's where accustic treatment shines (focusing highs and straightening up the mids). A limited not massive accustic treatment. Acoustic curtains and paravans are actually older then accustic reproduction and used widely for a very long time for same purpose (and additional one's) in theaters to separate stage from public and isolate it while actors and scenography whose prepared and it worked then as it works now quite good.
Take it easy, don't rush and try at least some things I suggested.

 

[markstein]

You don't need absorber back, you don't even need diffuser if you aren't siting very close to the wall. Curtains are easy to live with and wash which ain't case with most of the accustic treatments. What you need to understand is absorbing coefficients of material, how it rises in multilayer with different materials and that it still needs a equilisation chamber to depth of 30 cm to get in useful range of mid bass, to get to high and even mids is much easier and that's where accustic treatment shines (focusing highs and straightening up the mids). A limited not massive accustic treatment. Acoustic curtains and paravans are actually older then accustic reproduction and used widely for a very long time for same purpose (and additional one's) in theaters to separate stage from public and isolate it while actors and scenography whose prepared and it worked then as it works now quite good.
Take it easy, don't rush and try at least some things I suggested.

Can you recommend manufacturers of such acoustic curtains or any internet resourced where I can learn more about this?

 

[ZolaIII]

Can you recommend manufacturers of such acoustic curtains or any internet resourced where I can learn more about this?

I use JYSK HERDLA gray (as that's what's available where I live) one's as they fit my needs (listening room is also a projection room so grey fits perfectly). They are much denser then darkening ones two layers (back layer is from different more fluffy material) and twice as heavy so a good strong hanger is more than recommended especially if it's two rows. Relatively easy to cut and iron with little better home scissors (even they are thick).
So it really depends what you can find locally.
I have some research white papers and studies if I can find them but I doubt you are interested in that. Best absorber belive it or not is old school gym gimnastic hard thick mattress (cammel/coconut) and healthiest one (based on mass and density of material). But you will find that too much obstructive and so do I. Try to go lite with curtains and see if that will be enough is my advice and hole wall behind speakers (back to front ratio again as crucial, of course not passage in the right tho you can do even that as a paravan if you fancy something like that) from almost the top to bottom otherwise there is no chamber and it won't really work (not even close as with it). If glass surface (windows) rings to how you may want to listen you do the same for them.

 

[ZM1]

You don't need absorber back, you don't even need diffuser if you aren't siting very close to the wall. Curtains are easy to live with and wash which ain't case with most of the accustic treatments. What you need to understand is absorbing coefficients of material, how it rises in multilayer with different materials and that it still needs a equilisation chamber to depth of 30 cm to get in useful range of mid bass, to get to high and even mids is much easier and that's where accustic treatment shines (focusing highs and straightening up the mids). A limited not massive accustic treatment. Acoustic curtains and paravans are actually older then accustic reproduction and used widely for a very long time for same purpose (and additional one's) in theaters to separate stage from public and isolate it while actors and scenography whose prepared and it worked then as it works now quite good.
Take it easy, don't rush and try at least some things I suggested.

I would personally recommend against any sort of "curtain" as they tend to be thin, cover large areas, and are likely to only absorb high frequencies, leading to unbalanced tonality. instead start by addressing first reflection points with panels made of either rockwool or basotect. treat the ceiling if possible too. there is plenty of information on youtube etc about listening position, speaker position, identifying reflection points, time vs. frequency domain, etc. the asymmetry of your room may actually work in your favor if it has lower concentrations of modal resonance than a rectangular room.

 

[Waxx]

acoustic curtains are never really doing much except damping the higher reflections (the reverb) of a room. But behind it you need real acoustic treatment to make it not worse than before in most cases. So on that i fully agree with ZM1.

But there are many ways to make acoustic panels, not only with rockwool or basotec. A diffuser certainly also can help. But what helps the most is first studying the basics about acoustics and measuring the room response. How to do that you can google (REW help files tell a lot) and start from those measurements and with the knowledge about acoustics. That is the way to go. Not just random placement of an "acoustic" thing because someone on internet told us to do it...

 

[jeffaegrim]

I would personally recommend against any sort of "curtain" as they tend to be thin, cover large areas, and are likely to only absorb high frequencies, leading to unbalanced tonality. instead start by addressing first reflection points with panels made of either rockwool or basotect. treat the ceiling if possible too. there is plenty of information on youtube etc about listening position, speaker position, identifying reflection points, time vs. frequency domain, etc. the asymmetry of your room may actually work in your favor if it has lower concentrations of modal resonance than a rectangular room.

I tend to agree, though what @markstein is describing does seem like an issue which could be alleviated to a degree with a trick rug, which would pull enough HF energy out of the room to tilt the direct / reflected sound ration more towards the former. (Quality) broadband absorption is difficult and intrusive anyway - similar to most room treatment options.

Besides that, I absolutely believe you already figured out the solution (for your room/preferences) @markstein - speakers with a higher DI should do the trick. Both irt the "diffuse" soundstage you described and the tilted phantom center - I had the same problem. The drawback is the smaller soundstage that narrow directivity speakers tend to have.

 

[ZolaIII]

I would personally recommend against any sort of "curtain" as they tend to be thin, cover large areas, and are likely to only absorb high frequencies, leading to unbalanced tonality. instead start by addressing first reflection points with panels made of either rockwool or basotect. treat the ceiling if possible too. there is plenty of information on youtube etc about listening position, speaker position, identifying reflection points, time vs. frequency domain, etc. the asymmetry of your room may actually work in your favor if it has lower concentrations of modal resonance than a rectangular room.

It's about box and curtains acting as pasive dumpers. Two row 30 cm depth if you want to come to main bass, one row to focus the highs and get to mids and read his coment before that is reply to. Having hard time getting him even to try with curtains and you want him to put 10" panels? LOL.

 

[Arindal]

The ME901K has a much leaner sound than the Neumanns un-eq'd.

That is to be expected as a result of higher direcitivity in the lower midrange, resulting from the bigger woofer and cardioid midrange. But if you like ´warmer´ voicing, you can always add level by DSP. Reducing what is result of reflections, is much more complicated.

The Geithains produce a wonderful deep, clean bass. Very natural, totally effortless. Maybe the best I have heard so far.

Again, fullrange cardioid bass would explain that. Did you drive the lower bass to higher SPL?

Looking at the Geithain's technical concept (no waveguide, wide and not very controlled dispersion) I would expect that they do not work well in my room.

"No waveguide" does not necessarily translate to uncontrolled and wide. Narrower directivity can be achieved by other means, like cardioid, as the frequency response graphs at 60 and 90deg are showing. The only thing that looks unexpected, is the wider pattern around 1.5K. Kind of does not make sense to me.

 

[Ype]

@markstein
Figured I'd share this in the KH310 review thread but apparently it's locked.

Below is the corrected response with EQ, taking @Maiky76 his EQ's as a starting point.

Neumann KH 310A Review (Powered Monitor)

Genelec also uses cheap Peerless stuff in their monitors. 100€ is actually a good spending, consider that this $30 woofer is more or less what's used in the 8030C and KH120A: https://www.parts-express.com/peerless-by-tymphany-830860-5-1-4-ppb-cone-hds-woofer--264-1080...

www.audiosciencereview.com

I'll just thank you for those here Maiky!

My values are a bit more conservative as I don't want to bump up the on axis response to much.
I'd recommend trying the filters at 707Hz and 1550Hz first, seeing as you already EQ the bass and use a dip switch for the treble response.

Filter: ON PK Fc 89 Hz Gain 1.63 dB Q 2.21
Filter: ON PK Fc 707 Hz Gain 1.2 dB Q 4.9
Filter: ON PK Fc 1550 Hz Gain 1.5 dB Q 6.7
Filter: ON PK Fc 1930 Hz Gain 1.5 dB Q 10
Filter: ON PK Fc 4780 Hz Gain -0.9 dB Q 8.7
Filter: ON PK Fc 12878 Hz Gain -0.7 dB Q 1


Edit: added on axis response instead, red is after correction.

 

[Ype]

I see I uploaded them with a 40dB scale instead of the 50dB scale used here, as it makes it easier for me to see +/- 1 dB.
Rather then change it I will just add this graph just in case someone wants to directly compare.

 

[Pearljam5000]

Add Genelec 8380 to your list

 

[markstein]

I was about to pre-order them but then - basically in the last second - did not push the buy button.

Why?

First of all, I decided not to buy a loudspeaker without a listening test and based on measurements only. That does not mean that I do not trust measurements, on the contrary, however correctly interpreting them is difficult for me. Finding the "fault" in the measurements that annoyed me during listening is much easier than the other way round. And let's be honest: the C8C dispersion, while cardioid, is not perfect.

Second, I did not want to rely on Hypex MP amps with a manufacturer that far away and a distributor not being very responsive (Audiophonics). Maybe I am overly cautious.

In the end, it is the overall picture that counts when doing such a large investment, not only a single parameter. At least for me.

Update: I finally bought the Ascilab C8C. Without listening, based on measurement data only. And accepting the Hypex Fusion amps.

Now this might be positive bias after investing so much money, however, I like the C8C very much. (Upper) bass / (lower) midrange clarity in my untreated asymmetrical room with close-to-wall placement is subjectively notably better than with the KH310. Neutrality is superb. Bass is sufficiently deep (down to 20Hz) and loud and I do no longer use my subwoofers.