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Why do speakers sound different when they measure the same?

tikky

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Very interesting information from Klaus Heinz from Hedd Audio formerly known Adam Audio designer.

 

bkdc

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It is the single greatest source of distortion in your audio chain and the highest source of variability in listening windows, reflections, etc. Measurements on speakers are useful but not as definitive a test as measurements on amplifiers. They all sound different. Unlike amplifiers.

I don’t think it takes an expert to tell you that speakers and the listening room are the most important variables in audio.
 
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tomelex

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It should be obvious, that even with a pair of any brand speakers, the two do not perfectly match each other when measured. It should be obvious that moving those two speakers a foot away from where they are will cause different reflections etc to your ears or measurement device and thus if your ears are good enough, the SAME two speakers now sound different. I agree that the speakers and listening room and your location in the room are big players in the final sounds you hear.

It is these simplistic kinds of comments in the title of his video that cause measurements to get a bad rap. Speaker measuring, I mean complete measuring is not a trivial task, and finding two different speaker brands or types that are going to measure "close", in a full suite of measurements, is not likely and still "close" is not the same as the title of the video implies.
 

Sancus

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Seems like a mix of reasonable and sketchy statements. Video title is clickbait, there's really no such thing as two (different) speakers that measure the same. Klaus seems to interpret the question as referring to a simple on-axis FR measurement, which is a straw man to begin with, and spends a lot of time describing other well known types of measurements.

Same ol' same ol' basically.
 

Puddingbuks

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This jesco guy keeps hitting new lows with his clickbait titles. And the acoustic treatment in these hedd quarters :) are ridiculous.
 

AudiOhm

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It would have been interesting if they displayed two speaker measurements that were Identical, then proceeded to do a blind test and pick each one out individually, just another opinion...

Ohms
 

stevenswall

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They don't.

If you measure at the listeners eardrum and two speakers measure at your eardrum as playing the same frequencies in the same order in the same phase relationship with each other at the same volumes with the same measured distortion, they by definition sound the same.

Doesn't matter if one is eight feet tall and capable of 900dB and the other is one square foot and can only play to 110dB. You do not hear a difference. You may see one and tell yourself you hear one though.
 

Slyman

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They don't.

If you measure at the listeners eardrum and two speakers measure at your eardrum as playing the same frequencies in the same order in the same phase relationship with each other at the same volumes with the same measured distortion, they by definition sound the same.

Doesn't matter if one is eight feet tall and capable of 900dB and the other is one square foot and can only play to 110dB. You do not hear a difference. You may see one and tell yourself you hear one though.
Does this mean that my 250 usd Presonus Eris E5 which is +-2db from 50hz and up sounds pretty much like the Genelec Ones although much more expensive? (Discounting DPS options and how they would play different in my room)
 

KSTR

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Sound of two speakers, in proper blind A/B, is the always the same == all possible measurements must be the same (or close enough to be below audible differences). "All" is the important word... and it practically amounts to many hundreds, and of many different types. A ton of work if you are serious about it, even with the help of clever tools like Klippel NFS.
 

stevenswall

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Does this mean that my 250 usd Presonus Eris E5 which is +-2db from 50hz and up sounds pretty much like the Genelec Ones although much more expensive? (Discounting DPS options and how they would play different in my room)

If at your ear canal it measures the same as described above, then yes, it sounds exactly like any set of Genelec speakers at any price and in any number that also measure the same.
 

Digby

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They don't.

If you measure at the listeners eardrum and two speakers measure at your eardrum as playing the same frequencies in the same order in the same phase relationship with each other at the same volumes with the same measured distortion, they by definition sound the same.
In theory....in reality, can two different speaker models accomplish what you said would be needed, highly unlikely I reckon.
 

Chaconne

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In a timely move, Danny Richie of GR Research today posted a video pretty much on the very same topic:

 
OP
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tikky

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Which speakers measure the same?
I think they mean "IF they measured the same" they would sound different anyway. I have no idea but maybe 2 different speakers measured perfectly flat and their axis are the same they will still sound different they mean.
 

Mart68

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I bet there's lots of well-engineered speakers that don't measure the same but it still wouldn't be easy to tell them apart in a blind test. You could but it wouldn't be as easy as some seem to think.

We did a phono stage shoot-out, speakers were Focal Electra 926 and Urei 809, two very different speakers from design point of view. There was a vote on which should be used for the shoot out and it was an exact tie, nine voted Urei and nine voted Focal so we tossed a coin to decide.

That intrigued me that there should be such an exact lack of consensus.

Later on after the testing people were swapping the speakers and amps and so on about and I mentally took a step back and had a listen and really there was not much difference at all between the sound of the two.
 

Katji

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Because the amplifiers are different and th acoustic space is different, and they don't acknowledge that - because they're too busy being audiophiles - but the main reason is in the head.

...New theory: So in this case, it would be better to use the little head instead of the big head.
 

ahofer

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I bet there's lots of well-engineered speakers that don't measure the same but it still wouldn't be easy to tell them apart in a blind test. You could but it wouldn't be as easy as some seem to think.

We did a phono stage shoot-out, speakers were Focal Electra 926 and Urei 809, two very different speakers from design point of view. There was a vote on which should be used for the shoot out and it was an exact tie, nine voted Urei and nine voted Focal so we tossed a coin to decide.

That intrigued me that there should be such an exact lack of consensus.

Later on after the testing people were swapping the speakers and amps and so on about and I mentally took a step back and had a listen and really there was not much difference at all between the sound of the two.
I had this experience with a bunch of the speakers I auditioned four years ago, particularly the group I zeroed in on for longer auditioning. I perceived differences, but they were not huge.
 

Katji

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Only now did I see this:

1648731412111.png


Stupid arsehole.

I wouldn't mind so much if they [these people] said that they mean measure in the context of reviews, but I see it as meaning that test/measurements are generally pointless.

I think they're all running scared.
.....Disrupted.
 

miha

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At 32:45 Mr. Klaus mentions Klippel and AP measurements... :eek: I think @amirm would disagree lol
 
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