Consumer Reports: Speaker Ratings (1 Viewer)

[MickeS]

Brian, they calibrate the equipment they test.
And has anyone here listened and compared the speakers in the test, and so can honestly refute the results? Tests like these are usually only good to get a ballpark, meaning that the top half of speakers are probably better than the bottom half, but the order isn't really meningful. I haven't heard the Pioneer and Bose speakers that placed 1 and 2, but it seems like people here react just because their favorite speaker didn't end up winning...
And I agree with what Henry said, by the way.
/Mike
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[Justin Doring]

A friend of mine just got a pair of Dynaudio 1.3Mk.II SE "bookshelf" speakers. Boy, did he get ripped off! He should have saved $3350 and gotten the Pioneers. Although the Dynaudios weren't tested, based on the ratings of the other brands, I bet they'd be toward the bottom of the list or, at best, midpack.
It looks like a lot of members on this forum, myself included, got ripped off by manufacturers like PSB, NHT, B&W, and Mission. Well I'm selling my speakers and buying Pioneer tomorrow! I think I'll dump my Classe' gear too and get the top-rated Technics receiver. And to think I spent five figures on a stereo when I could have gotten better sound for three figures! I feel so...used.
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"Home is where the theater is!"

 

[Mike Knapp]

quote: Some of the so called experts who have their own forums seem prejudiced by ties to their sponsors.[/quote]
I would like to address this issue. Im not sure if it was me being referenced but I feel that I qualify to address it.
I have never claimed to be an "EXPERT", neither has anyone else that has their own site that Im aware of. Perhaps someone would be good enough to copy and paste where a site owner of any kind has claimed to be an expert....please, we are waiting anxiously!
I seems that because we have a strong opinion and happen to own our own site that many assume we think ourselves experts. That is erroneous. We are not responsible for anyones ill acquired assumptions.
Assume nothing and be safe.
As to the sponsor prejudice....
I can only speak for myself on this issue because I dont know the arrangements that other owners have.
All of my sponsors have come from my persuing a manufacturer AFTER I liked their product. I tried their merchandise and felt it was of superior quality BEFORE I asked them to take an ad. I only want top quality gear (in my opinion) represented on my board.
So, it should be no surprise that I would favor my sponsors equipment. I did even before they were a sponsor. Do you see any ads for Marantz or Audio Control or Mitsubishi or Sony on my site? I love all that gear (and preach about it) as well and yet no one seems to make some sinister connection.
Insinuating the lack of integrity of website owners seems to be good sport of late.
I am growing tired of it and I know for a fact that several other "owners" are as well. If any of you think a sponsor can buy my support with an ad or that I would tout an inferior product because of some revenue then quite simply you are mistaken.
As I said, I can only speak for myself.
quote: My advise is to listen and read everything-then evaluate and discern the truth as you see it.[/quote]
Most excellent advice....the same as I have been giving for 5 years now.
Mike

 

[Joe Cole]

Mike,
Good defense of your character! But you left out out rosey red......I am almost 50 so this is not an attack.

It seems to me that MarcS hit it on the head, these CR folks do have a slant. Knowing that it is easier to interpret their results and opionions. But I still think that anyone(professional organisations) who list Bose speakers as being at the top or neat the top have been drinking or in this case testing way too much of that american lager.

For crying out loud, Bose uses very cheap and thin paper tweeters. I bet they would burn well.
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Joe C.
quote:Who's scruffy looking?
My biscuits are a burnin.

 

[Mike Knapp]

I read my post several times and determined that the "kiss my rosy red ass" comment directed at those that may distrust my motives was a little overboard.
No need in me getting all huffy about this. I just wanted to point out that most readers know little of the process involved in "owning" a website and that presumptions based on surface information may well be in error.
Tis the nature of the beast.
Mike

 

[Brian Shannon]

Hardly an objective source for information.

 

[John-D]

hmmmm why is it when some expensive subwoofers are measured the list is spread all over the internet like a gospel and no one comments that ruler flat responses and higher than high SPL's alone don't make a speaker better than the other, which is precisely what CR's test has proven.
Do your own listening after you've read the test results. why cast doubts on CR's intentions? they are better than those magazine reviewers who for the fear of a lawsuit from BOSE, and/or loss of ad revenues, have to date been unable to find a SINGLE product that sounds bad.
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The things we own end up owning us

 

[BryanZ]

I think it would be much better to see them do objective tests at several different price points. For example, all speakers below $250 would go into one category. Then you have those that go from $251 - $500, including the ones from internet only companies. Then from $501 - $750. Then from $751 - $1K. $1,001 - $1,500, etc. Then take the best of those categories and go head to head. You must use the same source equipment and same room. The main problem that I forsee is such a test would require at least six months to complete. However, such a test would be nice to see.

 

[Bill_Mazz]

Some of the responses here to CR's ratings are what I expected from this forum, i.e. Bose speakers are #$%^, therefore CR's rating are #$%^. I subscribe to CR and found the speaker ratings to be quite useful as long as you understand the measurements and their limitations. Even CR tells you that you may not prefer their highest rated speaker and to go out and audition them. CR states that it is difficult to tell which speakers are the most accurate if the ratings difference is 7 points or less and over half the speakers they rated fell into this range. The report really does not say Bose and Pioneer make the best speakers even though some people may interpret it as such.
CR ranks the speakers by their off axis response. This is because they rotate the speakers and take an average of the measurements. I vaguely recollect reading that the measurement is over a full 360 degrees but I'm not sure since they haven't specified this in the last several years. This type of measurement is aimed at a more casual listener that is moving about the room since it does not tell you how good the speaker images when you are in the sweet spot. This type of measurement gives a more diffused sounding speaker like Bose an advantage since they aim their tweeters in multiple directions, but it does not make the measurement invalid.
On the other hand the speakers I currently own are Klipsch and their horn design makes them very directional. They have a rapid dropoff in treble as you go off axis and the lower CR rating reflects this. Sound and Vision's measurements for Klipsch confirms this. (Klipsch's KSB1.1 measured less accurate as a surround than as a main speaker because the surround measurements were taken over a greater angle.) S&V's graphs shows similar results to CR’s for other speakers. For example, S&V charts have the same slow rolloff from mid-bass to treble for the PSB Images that CR commented on. Also both CR and S&V's measurements show that speakers with smaller drivers tend to be more accurate (because of the ease of doing the cross-over) at the tradeoff of bass performance. If you own a good sub and don't need the performance at higher decibels that you can obtain from a larger speaker, you might be better off with a smaller speaker as long as it goes down to the frequency where the sub takes over.
Interestingly, this CR report on bookshelf speakers has told me to go audition Polk. I have been unhappy with the performance of my Klipsch center when listening to dialog at low volumes (when the kids are asleep). Polk's 245i center is one of the most accurate according to S&V and their Rti35 bookshelf was in the top third of CR's ratings. Polk also makes a bipole/dipole surround which I think I need since I have an irregular shaped home theater room and have had to place my surrounds high up on the walls. So you see, the CR’s ratings are good for something other than an endorsement of Bose. Now if I can find someone to buy my old Klipsch's ...

 

[Steve_D]

I have a CR password so I can read for myself what all this madness is about, but the August issue isn't posted yet. Guess we'll have to wait to see the actual measurements they took and how they took them.
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Link Removed

 

[Kirk Gunn]

This thread reminds me of my first foray into HT. I read a CR report 4 yrs ago and happily bounced into Best Buy to pick up those "cute little cubes" my decorator-dictator found so appealing.
Fortunately that little voice in the back of my head said "check the 'net" as I wandered the BB hallways and I never looked back.....
Someone earlier inquired as to the testing source used. Was it a simple sine wave ? White Noise/HT Receiver Test tone ? Beethoven's Fifth ? From my recollection of the previous article, it was a simple wave ported to the speaker, and the "objective" audio receptacle compared the speaker output to the input signal. So, I guess I will give Pioneer/Bose credit for producing the best off-axis reproductions of a sine wave I will never hear (except for late Saturday nights in the anechoic chamber). Anyone ever seen music displayed on an audio-version oscilloscope ? I don't think it's a simple waveform (but I'm no expert, nor do I play one on the internet).
They developed a test to produce objective, graphable results. What this test compares with the complexity of music is anybody's guess.

 

[Manuel Delaflor]

I have a brother living in the USA, where can he find this CR? I assume it is a magazine... but Im beginning to doubt it because most people on this thread apparently have no access to it...
I will have to read it now, I feel it as "my duty"...

 

[Sean Oneil]

CR kind of reminds me of that old "Fight Back with David Horowitz" TV show.
These days, I believe that I saw ol' Horowitz making a play for some kind of public office.
Moral: Everyone has ulterior motives, even defenders of the public intrest.
Read in what you will.

 

[Bill_Mazz]

The report is now online at the following address:http://www.consumerreports.org/main/...=994786633036.
This report can be accessed for free until mid-August. The online report includes the response curves. It's interesting how some of the lower rated speakers have smoother curves than the top one. The top rated Cambridge sub-sat system's curve looks downright jagged.

 

[Tim_S]

Thanks for the link Bill, it was very helpful. I would say 5 things.
1. Taking these rankings and recommendations as legitimate rankings of speaker quality is questionable to say the least. I used to own some Bose 301's and Acoustimass and now own B&W 601's and 603's (bracketing the 602 in the report). Anyone suggesting the Bose sound better have never heard both or are deaf.
2. These ratings state they do not compare sound quality, in terms of what people hear, but in terms of a few measurements that, one supposes, they think should be highly correlated with sound quality.
3. I think it is quite clear that their hypotheses of which measurements have the greatest impact on sound quality are quite false.
4. I think it is fine that someone is trying to construct a hedonic index of speaker quality like this that tries to translate measurements into performance but I think their index is seriously miscalibrated.
5. Finally, I don't think bashing CR unmercifully as some have done is worthwhile as the article is clear about what they have done and what they think it means. That is, they took a few measurements, fed them through a formula and came up with some numbers and hit the "sort" button on a spreadsheet, but to pick speakers listen to them yourself. Sounds like fine advice to me.
I just wish they spent more time coming up with a decent formula and a better set of measurements. . . .
Tim

 

[Manuel Delaflor]

These ratings state they do not compare sound quality, in terms of what people hear, but in terms of a few measurements that, one supposes, they think should be highly correlated with sound quality.

This is the core of this discussion. To my knowledge, "normal" audio magazines rely to much on subjective evaluations (which in my opinion are useless) and few objective graphs to evaluate speakers.
On the other hand we have this CR evaluation, wanting to take only the measurements and "translate them" somehow, to subjective appreciation.
What they do is assume that their methodology can include the so called "quality" of the speakers. I don't know if they succeed, but surely they are pointing in the right direction.
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[Henry Carmona]

What they do is assume that their methodology can include the so called "quality" of the speakers. I don't know if they succeed, but surely they are pointing in the right direction.

Well, they don't succeed, nor are they "pointing in the right direction" if they think that "quality" is synonymous with a Bose cube array, constructed of paper and plastic!!
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"Charlie don't surf."

 

[MickeS]

After reading the test and the results, I honestly do not see what many readers here are so upset about. I haven't seen protests when other magazines have done anechoic chamber tests, and graphs.
/Mike
[Edited last by MickeS on July 10, 2001 at 06:39 PM]

 

[Mark Austin]

What it really points to is that you can't tell what a speaker sounds like by looking at a chart. Hearing is totally subjective, you can't take an objective test and make subjective claims about a speaker. Now I don't think that is entirely what CR is doing, but in a sense they are. If they weren't they wouldn't have printed the evaluation. TV and I had a discussion about this a few months ago regarding the Nousaine sub data. While some of the data can proport that a sub does well on the tests, it says nothing as to what sound signature that sub displays. In one instance one of the subs created great SPL's, but produced great SPL's of crap. CR admits they are only using test signals, not actual music. Take it for what it's worth, not much.

 

[Tim_S]

"What it really points to is that you can't tell what a speaker sounds like by looking at a chart."
I would phrase it as this proves you can't tell what a speaker sounds like from looking at these measurements in this way. If someone puts up a couple million in research money I could probably design a study that would be able to identify a decent hedonic index that would give a good rough scale of "quality" based on a wide range of measurements. The problem is that this is an incredibly difficult thing to do and I didn't see that they put much effort into it. To their credit, they put in a fair number of disclaimers though so, again, I don't think they are claiming to have produced a universal ranking.
Tim