I'm a new sound engineer and I wish to have new nearfield monitors.
I've heard the lower ADAM (ANF-10, A7), Dynaudio BM5, PMC (DB1+,TB2+), which are the more regarded nearfiled monitors in my price range.
I felt that the ADAMs had the best transient reponse. They have a ribbon tweeter (some custom Eton, as far as I know, not available to us) and are crossed at about 1,8k. nice. A bit colored but they were the most alive and revealed the shape and texture of the soundstage best. I believe that this kind of what we call "revealing" is at least important as the details themselves - this I believe what maxes a mix that sound correct on this kind of speaker translate well on others.
The Dynaudios were more analytical, natural, yet not as dynamic and brutal in the way the translate the music I know. Very nice to listen to, but didn't have depth in the midrange.
The PMC sounds the best as a fun speaker, but they didn't differ different recordings very well, the soundstage tends to be made of their sonic signature everytime, to a certain degree. However, I was impressed by the bass of these things, as it was clearly tighter then the ADAMs, and I demonstrated these when set far away from the walls. They are line transmission design, and the port is on the back. I wonder how they will function when they are close to a rear wall.
Look at the design:
http://www.pmcloudspeaker.com/transmission.html
I can afford the lowest ADAM monitors, which use that ribbon tweet. They are very dynamic, and I think that the lower you go with the XO point, the better it is, if you don't reach driver stress or breakup. A studio monitor should be able to take high levels, but however, in my case, this is for the time when you got a pop, or a wrong gain setting- in other words, just for brief moments. I try not to monitor at high levels as this is not profesional.
So, we have a low XO point. I can't remember how different XOs designs affect off axis response, but I assume that we should aspire to even off axis response as much as possible. I still didn't get how wide should the response of a studio monitor be - of coarse you want to be able to move around the desk, however, too wide probably meens too much reflections from walls and ceiling. I also remember that MTMs have narrow horizontal dispersion - I don't know if that's good, because this only applies about the highs. If the ceiling is acousticaly treated, it meens that the first thing to die are the highs - so the reflected sound is very non linear. Probably better to go MT - in that regard at least. If the tweet is crossed low, maybe an MTM is more of an option because less the chance for comb filtering. Just an idea.
Anyway, wheather it's an MT or MTM, the woofer has to complement the tweeter with a very fast response. Smaller woofers are faster sounding (how is this called, damping factor or something?), would probably wise to define the size of the driver according to the room size, and requirements for the type of music mixed. Actually I'm fine with 40-45Hz, which is quite the low edge of most systems. I care more about dynamics and accuracy, as the woofers must be up to the tweeter, otherwise it was all for nothing, right? (-:
The only reasonably costing, commercial option I can see is the Fountek NeoPro5i. XO point recomended is 1500Hz, lower then the ADAM. Maybe it can go lower.
It's also very efficient at a 102dB/SPL average.
There's also the Mark & Daniel Maximus Monitor, which I haven't heard, and is highly regarded. Look:
http://www.mark-daniel.com/english_m/Proucts/P1_2.htm
It uses a big custom made ribbon which is crossed at 800Hz! wow, covering that 1K range with such a fast driver! Well, dream on, dream on...
Woofers - seems to me that good options for woofers that has been used in sucessful studio monitors are Scan-Speak (ProAc Studio 100, which I intend to listen to soon), Dynaudio and Vifa (used by Genelecs, some at least).
I was impressed by the NTC transmission line and wondered how they made it sound right with such a small box like the DB1+ (it's a 5" woofer!). However, if such a designed would have been used, probably would be better to have the port on the front for a studio monitor application, for less reflecting bass from the wall, less dependancy. I base my last sentance on logic and not science, and actually many thing I've said in here, please correct me with my mistakes.
Don't talk too much tech as I don't know the small numbers... (-:
By the way, I think that biamping would be a good idea. maybe with a passive line level crossover. I just have to get the phase correct between my two amps..
MY GOAL? I can't design such a thing myself, honestly. I was hoping that since the DIY community is realy lacking in a realy good studio monitor, it would actually interest someone to design and have something that is available for many times the price, and maybe even make it better. Again, I don't know science, but having a low crossed ribbon and a small, fast driver which is complimented by transmission line to get the lows seems like the best of all worlds.
Adam