Yamaha NS-6490 3-way Budget Speaker Review

[akarma]

My in room measurements:

I had 2 pairs some time ago. Garbage is my verdict

 

[andreasmaaan]

Not so much a speaker as it is three speaker drivers in a box.

 

[beagleman]

I am sure some crossover changes would improve these, as would a sturdier cabinet, as would better mid and tweeters.....but...where does it end?

These are the anti Swan DIY 3.1 speakers. A far lower class of drivers and cabinet.

 

[richard12511]

That beam width graph is insane

 

[A800]

Superb review as always, concerning terminals, looks like there is some "territory discrimination"
[from user guide]:
View attachment 89611

Just not fair.

 

[xykreinov]

That beam width graph is insane

Right? Two people sitting next to each other would hear rather different things. Though, if they're wise, both would conclude what they hear sucks equally

 

[Cahudson42]

Not so much a speaker as it is three speaker drivers in a box.

Anyone have measurements of fr, distortion, and SPL of each driver individually? Maybe ask Erin, as he does a lot of these..

Measurements should put to bed questions on practicality of rework...

 

[YSC]

I like their look and driver appearance, but Yamaha having producing the admirable HS-5 speakers producing these are just shameful

 

[beagleman]

Anyone have measurements of fr, distortion, and SPL of each driver individually? Maybe ask Erin, as he does a lot of these..

Measurements should put to bed questions on practicality of rework...

That youtube video on page one, supposedly shows the individual drivers response partway through, but some of this video does not make sense to me, as in his response graphs before and after both look bad, unless I am not getting how he is showing things?

 

[gvl]

Not so much a speaker as it is three speaker drivers in a box.

I'm always suspicious about the buy 3 for the price of 1 type deals.

 

[BYRTT]

.....Man, do we have flaws! Have we measured a speaker with this bad of an on-axis response? I don't remember.....

.....Yamaha NS-6490 Listening Tests
Youtubers would go crazy if they tested this speaker: "wow, how detailed!" Well, it is detailed because it has hyper elevated response above a few hundred hertz. It sounds just like it measures.....

.....Conclusions
....In a showroom its bright nature will likely sound good for a a minute or two before you pull out the credit card.....

.....It pains me to give the Yamaha NS-6490 as it really looks good to me. But I just can't recommend it.....

.....umm resonant speaker. I don't think I've ever seen a speaker with this many resonances!.....

That beam width graph is insane

Ha ha great thanks for the review Amir you a hero put pro objective numbers on these acoustic reviews and get your ears charmed with false flavour additives to swing the credit card ...

About worst resonances or beamwidth or if NS-6490 is the most bad on axis response i had a look among 94 reviews and did find 22 reviews that on paper could look say over avarage bad or showroom/creditcard geared or track material content/genre sensitive or possibility to be a magnet to love headless panthers, Polk T15 and Bic America DV62si looks serious challenge NS-6490, now i dont say any of those 22 objective plots cant sound good for whatever owner or room but on paper they deviate some few bits from a ideal.

Because my charts use not more than 30dB span on Y-axis think could lead to someone could suspect that is to get the 22 comparisons looks worse than they are so let me explain that is not the case, ratio of the X/Y scales is exactly same as Amir's AP unit use presenting head phone curves its just Y-axis there is 50dB and mine is 30dB but ratio is the same, and as proof made below animation for the best objective performers in the preference rating list..

Based on Amir's shared spindata but for comparison the sensitivity is adjusted for 200-400Hz region @85dB..

Based on Amir's shared spindata but for comparison the sensitivity is adjusted for 200-400Hz region @85dB..

 

[wwenze]

I see that kind of tweeter I automatically assume it is not going to be a good performer

I see 2 woofers where 1 good one would have sufficed, and arranged without caring about directivity, I automatically assume it is not going to be a good performer

I see sealed design that is not expensive, I automatically assume it is not going to be a good performer

 

[wwenze]

That youtube video on page one, supposedly shows the individual drivers response partway through, but some of this video does not make sense to me, as in his response graphs before and after both look bad, unless I am not getting how he is showing things?

Ignoring anything below 200Hz since that's more room than speakers,

New one is rising response that is somewhat flatter

Old one is rising response that is up down up down

But I wonder does it really matter. The individual drivers with default crossover are flat-ish enough themselves, so those horrible peaks have to be due to baffle or driver interactions. That's not something you want to fix via EQ.

 

[CDMC]

Clearly the issue with this speaker is it is not marketed and priced correctly, they should be priced at $1,000 a pair and marketed as follows:

The NS series follows our philosophy of having having a small chassis produce a holographically huge, dynamic and immersive sound (stable image) from a more radically dynamic and speedy package.

We had most areas covered with our traditional lineup. Making larger speakers was not to our liking. I believe that a speaker has to intermesh in a room in a more fashionable, but also more discreet fashion. The trend is to incorporate intelligently rather than dominate a room. Things have to be timeless yet add to the visual (discreetly) and aural environment (hugely).

We believe the NS to be a huge step in Dynamic speaker design. The larger 8 inch driver stays out of trouble in producing anything above 20 Hz. Not having any crossover parts in front of it also helps in the correct phase interactivity in a room. It’s lightning fast throw in or out allows transients, speed and image size that seems completely out of proportion .

It’s radical internal radial magnet design allows incredible control over the voice coil and woofer movement. Depending on the electronics one can extract not only life size (stand up) imaging but excruciatingly wide and large staging. These speakers can easily be put close to the wall or positioned in as a statement in the middle of a room. It will image super tall and large 1 foot off the floor. It can also phase in (lock in imaging) very far apart.

Being vertically oriented Yamaha does all work internally and our smaller than normal margins allows the NS product to come out at the retail level at a very modest price point. We think that properly driven the NS line represents extraordinary performance at any price. Using crossover parts only in the tweeter section ( to protect it from excessive lower frequencies) and having this enormous magnetic control over the hugely dynamic yet smooth woofer allows things never before experienced.



Note, the above was taken from an interview of Vince Bruzzese, the CEO and chief "engineer" for Totem Acoustics. A pair of their amazing $1,000 entry level speakers: https://www.stereophile.com/content/totem-acoustic-skylight-loudspeaker-measurements

 

[SpaceMonkey]

If i sit with half a meter away from these and they just face me they should be ok with a bit of EQ.

 

[AnalogSteph]

My in room measurements:
View attachment 89655
I had 2 pairs some time ago. Garbage is my verdict

Yours seem to have had a problem with seal. Some sort of kiss from a rose assembly error I presume. The perils of ultra-cheap speakers I guess... That tweeter actually looks alright, it's easily the least problematic driver of the bunch. Crossover points are all screwed up because there wasn't even any budget for dropper resistors, and the drivers would have needed some attention beyond those.

At the end of the day it's an 8" 3-way from a major brand that sells for $130 a pair. Normally that sort of money buys you some 4" 2-ways, and it should now be obvious why. (The cheap terminals really are no surprise at all.) And believe it or not, they could definitely be even worse. This is the kind of speaker for a mostly broke teen who wants to throw a bit of a party or rock out every once in a while, or something. Pioneer used to sell similar cheap 3-ways with cone tweeters over here for many years.

Improving these substantially on a modest budget would be a nice DIY challenge. I would prefer a technically more advanced speaker (like the Behringer B2031P back in the day, but those have been unavailable for years), but these still are a better basis than some pseudo PA speakers with piezo horn. It could make for a nice "father and son (or maybe daughter)" kind of project if some sort of kit or online instructions were made available.

 

[Cahudson42]

Improving these substantially on a modest budget would be a nice DIY challenge

Mulled this too much a year ago..

Take an old multi-channel Marantz SR4300 or similar - 6 channels of amplification. (Many old Marantz on shopgoodwill.com have Line In for each channel. Buy 'em for maybe $30.)

Preceed it with a Dayton DSP-408 at $149. You now have 6 channels of DSP, one for each driver in a stereo pair. Set PEQ and HPF/LPF for each driver. 'Done'. Or so I thought. But now I see I'd need to get to my woodworking shop (1300mi away in Adirondacks while Covid-stuck in FL) and make new boxes...

Anyway...time passes and I bought a pair of R263 when they were on sale at $199 each..

 

[hardisj]

This is also definitely one of those situations where you can't just look at the DI curves and call it a day.

ha! You read my mind.

I was looking at the data and thinking to myself the exact same thing. The DI curves look reasonable (if you can get past the resonances) but then you look at the other data and it makes sense that the DI is just one part of the puzzle in understanding the performance.

 

[SimpleTheater]

"How anyone can speak against the sound or build quality is a wonder of Amazon." (15 seconds into the video)

 

[ttimer]

Improving these substantially on a modest budget would be a nice DIY challenge. I would prefer a technically more advanced speaker (like the Behringer B2031P back in the day, but those have been unavailable for years), but these still are a better basis than some pseudo PA speakers with piezo horn. It could make for a nice "father and son (or maybe daughter)" kind of project if some sort of kit or online instructions were made available.

Would that be worthwile, given the cabinet? Or are you thinking of replacing the cabinet? My knowledge of DIY speaker is quite limited, but i would imagine that modifying the crossover would only provide a modest improvement. Many of the issues seem to be caused by cabinet resonances and cancelations due to driver position?