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There's an old saying in the cognac trade: "Consumers like their spirits pale on the label, but dark in the glass." "Pale" is a reference to the popular designation VSOP, an acronym for Very Superior Old Pale.
French law mandates that to wear the label VSOP, the youngest cognac in the blend must be aged in oak casks for no fewer than four years. But the naturally pale color of a cognac that has been in contact with the wood for such a comparatively short time conflicts with the consumer's deeply embedded idea that well-aged spirits ought to be dark. So as a concession to the exigencies of the marketplace, French law permits the addition of small amounts of caramel color to create a false impression of age.
This practice makes most VSOPs undrinkable by poor slobs like me, but ensures the continued patronage of the hairy-heeled savants who like their cognac pale on the label, but dark in the glass. Meanwhile, the outlandish prices for above VSOP-quality cognacs-the ones bearing such fanciful designations as XO, Napoleon, Hors d'Age, etc., have made them unaccessible to me.
But just as I have found succor in malt whisky and some excellent Armenian brandies, I and many other knowledgeable audio enthusiasts, excluded from the high end market by the outlandish prices (and having no taste for Kool-Aid), have turned to professional equipment. Many in our community have discovered that pro audio equipment offers vastly better value for money. And after all, isn't pro gear what's used to record our music, without which we'd all just be listening to white noise, and drinking VSOP?
As Our Forum's own John Elison and others will attest, there's no better way to stretch your hi-fi dollar than active studio monitors. Recently, in concert with my musician buddies, I've been evaluating this burgeoning field.
Follow Ups:
I've been trying to save up for a pair of those $20K JBL (active) Studio Monitors for a while but things, like the dishwasher started leaking, the vacuum cleaner burned up its motor, my pc finally s**t the bed (I just bought a new iMac), homeowners and auto policies came due (I pay them yearly) keep getting in the way;-(
bang for the buck 15 years ago
For some time, I've been interested in auditioning the Mytho studio monitors from Italy's RCF, a seventy year old manufacturer of some of the world's finest speaker components and fixed and portable high power installations.The two models differ only in size-one uses a six inch woofer, the other, an eight. Both use the same one inch aluminum-magnesium tweeter, and built-in AB Class amplifiers-100 watts for the tweeters, 200 watts for the woofers. The cabinets are beautifully executed aluminum castings-Enzo Ferrari, one of RCF's original investors, would be proud-and the tweeters, which are protected by a mesh screen, are loaded by a wave guide that's cast into the baffle. Everything is made in-house by RCF.
Although they've been in production a while, very few reviews of them have been published on the 'net. However, Resolution Magazine's hard to please editors named the Mytho 8 Best Monitor in 2012. Of the monitors tested by Resolution that year, only the Genelec 8351, at triple the cost, had greater bass extension and lower distortion, and only by a hair.
I was lucky enough to borrow a pair of Mytho 8s directly from RCF. After having fun with them in my home for a couple of weeks, I brought them to Larry Gate's Gater Music Studio, which provided an opportunity to hear the Mythos in a professionally treated room, and to compare them to Larry's new Neumann KH310As.
The other inquisitors were Ken Pine-seminal 'sixties rock musician, composer, and former lead guitar for the Fugs and many other bands of note-and studio major domo Larry Gates-Hit Factory alumnus, current member of the Hit Men, with far too many industry credits to list.
We took the Neumanns off their stands, and replaced them with the Mythos. The former are no lightweights, but the Mythos were noticeably heavier. (After humping them down Larry's stairs, this came as no surprise.) First up were the Mythos.
We listened to many musical genres, including some fabulous Capitol recordings of Sinatra with Nelson Riddle's big band (it was Frank's centennial week). The Mythos' virtues were immediately apparent, including their ability to achieve truly heroic levels without the slightest strain. Regardless of how imprudently we turned them up, they remained clean as the proverbial hound's tooth (indeed, cleaner than my own hound's teeth-while I was writing this, my pit bull Daisy ate my wife's new $40 bra, then threw it up).
The Mythos' bass extension and power would shame many good subwoofers. Quantitatively, the bass swamped Larry's medium-size room. Larry feels that this is an attribute of his room's peculiarities, which do not favor rear-ported speakers like the Mythos, and should not be taken as a criticism of its inherent design. He speculated that the Mytho 6s might be a better fit in his room.
Also apparent was a sizable midrange scoop. Though we were able to ameliorate this to some extent by fiddling with the dip switches, the midrange remained more recessed than we would have liked. The response seemed to come back again around 3kHz. Larry felt that this dip contributed to what all three of us agreed was the Mythos' major shortcoming-its lack of image depth.
When we hooked the Neumanns back up, voices and instruments suddenly returned to their rightful place in the mix. The KH310As are superb in every way. They make profound bass with very low distortion from an eight-and-a-half inch woofer in a compact, sealed enclosure. The alloy treated fabric dome tweeter is superlative; the three-inch dome midrange, sublime. Crossovers between the three drivers are seamless. Though capable of playing louder than any sane person would listen, the sound remained full and satisfying at conversational levels.
Try as I did, I could find absolutely no fault with them. At $4,500, they make an incontrovertible argument for the logic of active speakers.
I would be interested in comparing the Mythos to the Opals, which are similar both in both price and form factor. The Opals, which neither Ken, Larry, nor I have heard, are widely lauded for many of the positive attributes we found in the Mythos: the ability to play cleanly at very loud levels, and for their powerful and extended low end. (HotStamper's excellent 2010 write up on the Opals can be found in this Forum's review section.)
Like the Mythos, the Opals have been criticized on some forums for having a 'smily face' frequency response (as have the ubiquitous Genelecs, which seem to evoke a particularly strong love/hate reaction on the boards-I think they sound great). Interestingly, I cannot recall anyone citing any problem with the Opals' image depth-indeed, many posters and magazine editors have praised them for this very quality. So maybe the Mythos' lack of image depth is caused by something besides the scooped midrange, and is correctable by the designers.
Studio engineers sometimes refer to speakers with a 'smily face' response curve as sounding 'hi-fi.' This scoop makes a speaker less useful as an analytical tool than a speaker with a flat, or even, as is preferred by some, a slightly over-prominent midrange.
But do we necessarily want an analytical tool in our living room? Average recordings often sound better when played back over speakers with a scooped midrange, and many manufacturers-including some named in this string-design this smily-face curve into their speakers-flat on paper, scooped in the living room.
Edits: 12/31/15
Chef Henry,
Have you auditioned any ATC actives? If so, I'd be interested in hearing your impressions.
HNY!
Vbr,
Sam
Happy New Year to you and yours, too, Sam. No, I haven't heard the ATCs, but am eager to do so. I can't ever recall reading or hearing anything about them except raves about their performance, and complaints about their cost (invariably followed by how well they were worth it).
Thanks, Chef. I've heard the pro version of the 150 in a treated room and they threw a lateral sound stage reminiscent of the big Avalon or Giya flagship loudspeaker.
Vbr,
Sam
Looks like the Neumann KH 310 is a newer (and surprisingly cheaper) version of the very well respected Klein & Hummel O 300. I read a lot about the O 300 and it seemed like the only knock against it was the limited output capability in mid-field setups due to their use of EQ to extend the bass response, which limited them to moderate volume levels (still probably enough for all but the headbangers). They are supposedly among the best as near-field mixing monitors.
The frequency response is equalized to be flat under near-field conditions in a studio (as they were designed for), but when used in a typical untreated home listening room you will hear more of the power response, which isn't as flat. In the Sound & Recording test results (see first link below), there is a dip off-axis in the horizontal plane centered around the woofer to midrange crossover point of 650 Hz which will give them a slightly dished power response in the midrange. Similarly, there is a dip off-axis in the vertical plane at the mid-tweet crossover point.
I think this is a common characteristic of many pro monitor speakers which are optimized for flat on-axis near-field response, because they are commonly used on top of consoles in heavily treated, highly absorbent studio rooms. In mid-field or far-field setups in untreated rooms, they won't sound as neutral as a speaker voiced based on its power response.
It's interesting that you said the Mytho 8 seemed to have a scooped midrange and the response came back around 3 KHz. I suspect what you were hearing is a declining power response in the upper midrange due to the narrowing dispersion of the 8" driver. Sound & Recording also tested the Mytho 6 and it has a wide and even dispersion pattern in the horizontal plane (see second link below). It does have a narrow null in the vertical response at the crossover frequency when heard above or below the listening plane, but you probably wouldn't notice it. I suspect that in a mid or far-field setup, the Mytho 6 would be flatter than either the Mytho 8 or the Neumann KH 310.
http://www.neumann-kh-line.com/klein-hummel/globals.nsf/resources/neumann_kh310_review_soundandrecording_en_201304.pdf
http://www.arcadeaudio.com.pl/pdf/test_8_1.pdf
I heartily concur that Active Monitors are the way to go. I recently installed a pair of Neumann KH 420 (three way active monitors, 26Hz to 22kHz) midfield speakers up to 30' with amazing clarity from all three speakers. Pricey at $4,895 each? maybe, but consider no speaker cables and no expensive amp or pair of amps as I previously had. As noted by others, the active cross over does not rob the signal therefore leaving all of the dynamics and clarity the sound engineer heard when he mixed the media we listen to. Really, after 4 weeks in my listening room, I sit and am amazed it took me so long to get this sound. I've listened to the Quad 2812 at $12,000 a pair and then you need to add in your amp and speaker cables not to mention their size and need for positioning in your room. The Quads admittedly were my dream for quite a while but the reality of my Neumann's is so much sweeter than the Quads. Hard to find to demo but worth the effort and then . . . you'll be hooked like I am.
Hi, Dave. I never heard its O300 antecedent, but have read before that it was somewhat limited dynamically. On the other hand, the redesigned KH310As were able to achieve crazy levels listening midfield in Larry's room, and sounded great doing it.
We also wondered if the Mytho 6, by virtue of its smaller woofer, might make a smoother transition to the tweeter than the 8. When things settle down after New Years, I'll try a pair, and post the results.
The price difference between the 6 and 8 is almost non-existent. Given that the only physical difference between them is the size of the woofer and cabinet (and a nominal crossover of 1.8kHz for the 8, and 1.9kHz for the 6), this is perhaps unsurprising.
Have you actually heard either Mytho model? The 6 and a sub might be the ticket.
Sorry, I have not heard any RCF speakers, only read the reviews.
When you listened to the Mytho 8, did you have the equalization dip switch set to Linear Power Response or Linear Frequency Response? Setting it to Linear Power Response boosts midrange output with a bandpass filter centered around 1 KHz to compensate for the woofer's decreasing directivity with frequency.
Just going by the design, the Mytho 6 should have wider and more even dispersion which should give it better imaging, and less of a tradeoff between on-axis response and power response.
It sure would save a lot of fuss.
You're looking for the best performance for the money without regard to aesthetics. I'm a big fan of that approach. I'd be interested to know what's the least people have spent on a system they decided was good enough for them.
I bought a pair of custom built ATC 110s I found on hifishark. I run them with a benchmark dac1, $100 sony dvd player and some mogami balanced interconnects I paid about $115 for. Total cost around $6,300 and it's good enough for me. I hope to upgrade to the new ATC built tweeters when they become available but it's a fantastic system regardless.
My other system is based on Thiel 3.7s. I've got a pair of Cambridge 840 amps driving them, benchmark dac2 and cambridge 840 cd player as the source, and a velodyne dd18 sub to fill out the bottom end. Cables are nothing special. Total cost around 15k. It's easily good enough for me.
I spent a decade or so buying stuff cheap. I got a pair of vienna acoustics mozart grands for < $500 because I shopped around. I hook them up to my creek 5350SE and Cambridge dac magic and I have a system that cost around $2,200 that's really good nearfield. The vienna's don't suit my taste overall but for the price it's outstanding.
Who has a great system they're especially proud of because they didn't spend a ton to get it?
I don,t know anything about VSOP, but if I were recommending to a newbie, I might just as well recommend active loudspeakers because you know they will be matched and sound as good as is intended.
Gordon Holt, the founder of Stereophile, always believed that active speakers were the way to. The last speakers he purchased were a set of ATC SCM50A active 3 way speakers.
He often complained that most audiophile speakers were too proper and lost the life of music reproduction. He loved his ATC speakers saying this was reproduction that sounded like the live thing.
"Gordon Holt, the founder of Stereophile, always believed that active speakers were the way to. The last speakers he purchased were a set of ATC SCM50A active 3 way speakers.
He often complained that most audiophile speakers were too proper and lost the life of music reproduction. He loved his ATC speakers saying this was reproduction that sounded like the live thing. "
You're taking two separate topics and combining them as if they're one, which they're not.
Active speakers simply combine the amplifier and speaker into one box, and fundamentally has nothing to do with the sound quality. A company can build an active speaker which sounds great, or an active speaker which sounds like crap. This is no different than the design of "passive" speakers, which require an external amplifier.
The fact that somebody liked their ATC active (amp built-in) speakers is completely unrelated to active versus passive design.
Designing a loudspeaker with a built-in amplifier offers the designers an opportunity to ideally match the amplifier with the speaker. This is a huge advantage in amplifier/speaker matching. "Ideally." That doesn't mean that it is always the case for real products. It is just as likely that the built-in amplifier is an inferior match or of inferior sonic quality - as compared to various external amplifiers.
ATC and others may have done it right. Others may have not.
I will post this message as soon as the pop up ad at the bottom of the screen allows me to see the "post" button.
:)
Actually active(and I'd prefer the amps in a separate box) should perform better than a passive crossover. Separate amps for each driver decrease interaction between the band passes of each driver amp. And only having to drive a voice coil rather than a complex crossover which has to be more reactive is an easier load. So all things being equal an active system will ultimately perform better than a passive one. And Gordon Holt believed that(why he bought the active version of a speaker also available with a passive crossover0. And yes, I do know that there are some very well designed passive crossovers. My own speakers are 3 way passive with an 18" woofer crossed around 85 Hz where you'd normally expect an active crossover. But they're a custom design and that's the way the designer did it and it's quite good. But it was done because it was simpler given the design tools he had.The problem isn't performance in the audiophile, as opposed to professional, world. You can't sell active speakers in the USA because every audiophile thinks he can pick a better amplifier than the speaker manufacturer. And, in fact, it's almost impossible to market both passive speakers and amplifiers in the USA because amplifier manufacturers will quietly dis the speakers of the dual manufacturer and speaker manufacturers will dis the amps, affecting sales.
Edits: 12/30/15
Actually active(and I'd prefer the amps in a separate box) should perform better than a passive crossover. Separate amps for each driver decrease interaction between the band passes of each driver amp. And only having to drive a voice coil rather than a complex crossover which has to be more reactive is an easier load. So all things being equal an active system will ultimately perform better than a passive one.
I agree in principle. Line level crossovers offer a theoretically superior solution.
However, all things are rarely equal. In practice, I think there is a tendency for manufacturers of active speakers to short change the amplifier side of the equation. Or worse yet, to short change the acoustics and the amplification and paper over all the warts with DSP.
You can't sell active speakers in the USA because every audiophile thinks he can pick a better amplifier than the speaker manufacturer.
Yes and no.
Part of it is that audiophiles are accustomed to matching components to fine tune systems to their taste. And in the case of passive speakers, most manufacturers don't like to make specific recommendations.
Another part of it is that it's rare/impossible to find a manufacturer who is able to design high end speakers and high end amplification and able to integrate them at a reasonable price point.
Finally, speakers with passive crossovers keep improving. We haven't yet hit the point where passive crossovers limit what's achievable.
I agree with you. My argument is that a current state of the art passive system is not as good as a state of the art active system. This, of course, assumes state of the art electronics in both systems.
And I strongly suspect that an active system with minor flaws will still be superior to a passive one with slightly fewer flaws simply because of separating the band pass of the amps and the much easier load on the amps which gives you better power transfer and better dynamics. I've seen 100 watt amps that with some of the loads of todays' speakers(and many very high end speakers with great reps are difficult loads) putting out just a couple of watts at some frequencies due to the reactance of the speaker.
It doesn't matter with regard to active (built-in amplifier) versus passive (separate amplifier). What matters is the quality of the sound.
A manufacturer can put a shit amp or a kick-butt amp in a speaker box.
Who doesn't get that?
:)
It's not that simple. Read:These are among the many articles covering this topic. The first two articles, although wordy, do a pretty good job of covering the technical advantages of the active approach.
- Rod Elliot, Benefits of Bi-Amplification ( Part 1 , part 2 )
- Rod Elliot, Active vs. Passive Crossovers
- Genelec, Active vs Passive Loudspeaker Design (a concise distillation of the above)
- ATC, Active vs Passive Loudspeakers
- ADAM Audio, Active vs Passive?
You missed my arguement and that is that there are excellentpassive designs but ultimately we should do actives ones because at the state of the art a good active design will be better than a passive one. Perhaps for the US market it would be better to design an active design with an external active crossover and let the user pick his own amps since that's what this market prefers.
It isn't the built in amp that matters. It's the active crossover coming before the amps.
Active usually means line level crossover and one amp per driver.
The amps do not have to be in the same box as the drivers. ATC themselves supply rack-mounted amps with their bigger active offerings as do Genelec (who famously make nothing but active speakers), Quested and PMC.
As a long time user of active studio monitors I would agree that they can offer value for money. However do not believe that that means cheap. There are plenty of active "monitors" for a few hundred dollars that are fine for amateur bedroom studios. However genuine, accurate, studio monitors capable of being used in high class professional studios still carry a sizeable entry fee. I would guess $10k+ for a decent sized active monitor (40 -50 litres) that is relatively tonally neutral, capable of great dynamic extension and which extends down to 40Hz or below.
Curiously I was listening to a friend's pair of tiny, active, Genelecs last week ("spares" from his office). Great fun but tonally very "characterful". Not really a blood relative of their large soffit mounted studio monitors. Also not straightforward to integrate into many conventional home audio systems (e.g. balanced input only). Still as I say, fun.
My friends last request before he died was to get a set of active monitors. He lived in the UK. I always felt the UK was a decade ahead of us in the generalized use of technology.
Sadly he never got the speakers but he was taken care of too the end. Unlike how the dying are treated here.
Hope they have a nice selection of them up there Dave.
A friend in Florida just acquired the top Genelec monitors. Only $80,000
Definitely great valur for the money
Alan
I'll drink to that, Alan.
-Henry
I guess active monitors are like anything else; you can buy expensive ones and you can buy less expensive ones.
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