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General speaker questions for audio and home theater.

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RE: Zu Soul Supreme sensitivity

Posted by RGA on May 30, 2017 at 23:37:55:
The speakers are measured from corners. Hi-fi choice for instance doesn't have corners and measured the AN J/Spe as 89.5dB - AN puts them at 92.5 or 93dB as they are corner loaded designs you obviously measure from a corner.

I think most people looking at Audio Note speakers are aware that the speakers are meant to be placed in corners or right up against the either the back wall or the side walls. Since every show for the last 20+ years they have been put in corners.

And given that 90%+ of the amplifiers they sell are under 10 watts - I think you should give the consumer some credit to be able to put 2 and 2 together - umm - this is an easy speaker to drive - otherwise they would be selling 300 watt SS amplifiers.

So i look at JA's measurements of 92.5db not from a corner - add 3dB for corners and his measurement would be 95.5dB (say 96dB). AN says the speaker is 97.5dB-98dB. So AN is off by 1.5dB and 2dB - hardly something to get into a snit over. But Audio Note is misleading right.

But wait - DeVore Orangutan (not misleading and completely honest) they rate their "free standing" speaker as 96dB. John Atkinson measured them as 91dB - a 5dB swing that has not explanation.

AN is off by 2db - Devore is off by 5dB and the AN E is still 1dB more sensitive! So which company is "misleadingly optimistic."

As for bass - Martin Colloms (Hi-Fi Critic) reviewed the AN E and measured them as attaining 17hz at -6db from room corners. Stereophile didn't do their homework much either - if you are reviewing a component and something odd comes up why did JA not contact someone at Audio Note and ask about the tuning port frequency versus their 17hz -6dB specification. It would be fine to disagree or whatever but when I review something I read the manual which clearly states that the best position (the one they want you to put the speaker in) is the corner. PS the manual is online so somebody could have checked no?

JA has also covered many shows and at every one of them AN has the speaker fairly hard in the corners.

I mean he introduced Wes Philips to the Audio Note room - Wes of the accurate loudspeaker/big power measurements first type. See link. see last paragraph - I wonder why Revel wasn't mentioned.

Lastly I like JA in that at least he covers mystifyingly bad measuring stuff like Audio Note CD players, croft amps and Zanden etc and that even with horrible numbers can understand why people like them. I just sorta feel like with the other AN gear - it all generally meets specs so why wouldn't you ring up and ask some questions where they got their numbers.

Then you can write that AN measures this way - corner gain, solid walls, in room bass response. Then you can say yes - the speaker pretty much gets all those numbers and THEN you can say - BUT - they should also post the standard free standing numbers. To me it would be more the right thing to do. And AN should post both sets of numbers IMO - post the free standing standard and then say But you should put them in corners and these is the numbers you will likely get.

Then again controversy is great advertising and it's free advertising.