This is a review and detailed measurements of the Yamaha HS7 powered monitor. I purchased this last spring for testing and costs US $320 each including prime shipping on Amazon.
The HS7 brings its trademark and in my opinion, attractive looks to HS7:
It is a rather heavy speaker for its size with no sign of quality issues.
The back panel shows the now old-fashioned use of class AB amplifiers as indicated by the heatsinks:
I was surprised the date on it was 2018 seeing how I bought it year and half later (at Guitar Center -- large musician retailer in US). Must not sell many of them at that location.
Measurements that you are about to see were performed using the Klippel Near-field Scanner (NFS). This is a robotic measurement system that analyzes the speaker all around and is able (using advanced mathematics and dual scan) to subtract room reflections (so where I measure it doesn't matter). It also measures the speaker at close distance ("near-field") which sharply reduces the impact of room noise. Both of these factors enable testing in ordinary rooms yet results that can be more accurate than an anechoic chamber. In a nutshell, the measurements show the actual sound coming out of the speaker independent of the room.
I performed over 1000 measurement which resulted in error rate of around 1%.
Temperature was 60 degrees F. Measurement location is at sea level so you compute the pressure.
Measurements are compliant with latest speaker research into what can predict the speaker preference and is standardized in CEA/CTA-2034 ANSI specifications. Likewise listening tests are performed per research that shows mono listening is much more revealing of differences between speakers than stereo or multichannel.
Reference axis was the tweeter center.
Yamaha HS7 Measurements
Acoustic measurements can be grouped in a way that can be perceptually analyzed to determine how good a speaker is and how it can be used in a room. This so called spinorama shows us just about everything we need to know about the speaker with respect to tonality and some flaws:
As you see, on-axis response is rather variable especially for a studio monitor. We have a mid-range boost around 800 Hz and another peak around 12 kHz. Bass gradually shelves down (a bit of that may be due to cold temps I am measuring at).
We can see the reason for the peaking at 800 Hz in near-field measurement of each radiating surface:
We can clearly see port resonance pushing up the overall response there -- a common problem.
Early window response shows rather severe dip due to ceiling or "floor" reflections:
Best to avoid those if you can although as you will see, equalization worked well there.
Our predicted-in-room response is for far-field listening but my listening tests show that it applied just as well to my near-field listening:
Best not mix on this speaker as is or you will wind up with uneven response.
Directivity is good though due to use of waveguide:
Distortion is well controlled at 86 dBSPL but of course not at 96:
Some kind of limiter is keeping the sub-bass distortion from shooting up through the roof.
Yamaha HS7 Speaker Listening Tests and Equalization
My quick reaction to the sound of HS7 was that it was excessively bright. This was aggravated by lack of much bass. So I pulled out the EQ tools to correct this and other issues:
Once there, the sound was still a bit bright but otherwise, quite enjoyable. Bass now had good tactile feedback and overall fidelity was quite good.
Conclusions
As modern studio monitors go, the Yamaha HS7 cannot keep up in delivering flat and objectively correct response. It does however deliver on industrial design. With a bit of EQ, the sound is transformed and becomes quite accurate and pleasurable.
Without EQ, I cannot recommend the Yamaha HS7. But with EQ, I would.
------------
As always, questions, comments, recommendations, etc. are welcome.
Appreciate any donations using: https://www.audiosciencereview.com/forum/index.php?threads/how-to-support-audio-science-review.8150/
The HS7 brings its trademark and in my opinion, attractive looks to HS7:
It is a rather heavy speaker for its size with no sign of quality issues.
The back panel shows the now old-fashioned use of class AB amplifiers as indicated by the heatsinks:
I was surprised the date on it was 2018 seeing how I bought it year and half later (at Guitar Center -- large musician retailer in US). Must not sell many of them at that location.
Measurements that you are about to see were performed using the Klippel Near-field Scanner (NFS). This is a robotic measurement system that analyzes the speaker all around and is able (using advanced mathematics and dual scan) to subtract room reflections (so where I measure it doesn't matter). It also measures the speaker at close distance ("near-field") which sharply reduces the impact of room noise. Both of these factors enable testing in ordinary rooms yet results that can be more accurate than an anechoic chamber. In a nutshell, the measurements show the actual sound coming out of the speaker independent of the room.
I performed over 1000 measurement which resulted in error rate of around 1%.
Temperature was 60 degrees F. Measurement location is at sea level so you compute the pressure.
Measurements are compliant with latest speaker research into what can predict the speaker preference and is standardized in CEA/CTA-2034 ANSI specifications. Likewise listening tests are performed per research that shows mono listening is much more revealing of differences between speakers than stereo or multichannel.
Reference axis was the tweeter center.
Yamaha HS7 Measurements
Acoustic measurements can be grouped in a way that can be perceptually analyzed to determine how good a speaker is and how it can be used in a room. This so called spinorama shows us just about everything we need to know about the speaker with respect to tonality and some flaws:
As you see, on-axis response is rather variable especially for a studio monitor. We have a mid-range boost around 800 Hz and another peak around 12 kHz. Bass gradually shelves down (a bit of that may be due to cold temps I am measuring at).
We can see the reason for the peaking at 800 Hz in near-field measurement of each radiating surface:
We can clearly see port resonance pushing up the overall response there -- a common problem.
Early window response shows rather severe dip due to ceiling or "floor" reflections:
Best to avoid those if you can although as you will see, equalization worked well there.
Our predicted-in-room response is for far-field listening but my listening tests show that it applied just as well to my near-field listening:
Best not mix on this speaker as is or you will wind up with uneven response.
Directivity is good though due to use of waveguide:
Distortion is well controlled at 86 dBSPL but of course not at 96:
Some kind of limiter is keeping the sub-bass distortion from shooting up through the roof.
Yamaha HS7 Speaker Listening Tests and Equalization
My quick reaction to the sound of HS7 was that it was excessively bright. This was aggravated by lack of much bass. So I pulled out the EQ tools to correct this and other issues:
Once there, the sound was still a bit bright but otherwise, quite enjoyable. Bass now had good tactile feedback and overall fidelity was quite good.
Conclusions
As modern studio monitors go, the Yamaha HS7 cannot keep up in delivering flat and objectively correct response. It does however deliver on industrial design. With a bit of EQ, the sound is transformed and becomes quite accurate and pleasurable.
Without EQ, I cannot recommend the Yamaha HS7. But with EQ, I would.
------------
As always, questions, comments, recommendations, etc. are welcome.
Appreciate any donations using: https://www.audiosciencereview.com/forum/index.php?threads/how-to-support-audio-science-review.8150/
