Nothing this fellow says is wrong. Take home point, bass causes distortion in higher frequencies. This is why subwoofers with two way crossovers are so important.
Interesting ASR review of small GR Research speaker kit
I bounce between various kinds of analysis — more subjective listening reports, more quantitative measurement analyses and, my favorite, those that combine both strategies to tell a useful story about audio products.
Amir of ASR has just done a very powerful takedown of a fairly inexpensive kit being sold by Danny at GR Research. Not only does he prove his point about the speakers, he also makes (to my mind) a very convincing case that Danny put his finger on the scale in how he reported his own measurements.
I'm not in any camp — Danny's or Amir's or anyone else's. What I appreciate is thoroughness and meticulousness in exposition. Danny does that in his own videos. (Again -- to me. I'm really still learning and cannot easily spot gaps in argument in this subject matter.)
I know people with some of GR's best kits — and I've heard one of them. They sounded incredible. I've watched a bunch of Danny's videos where he criticizes other companies; I've come away thinking, "Wow, he really revealed some of the grift embedded in that product."
But here, the tables are turned, it seems, on Danny. I hope he responds, both to defend his reputation and methods, but also because it will set in relief where some of the distance may be between these two dominant online figures' methods in assessing what makes for a good speaker.
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I didn't need ASR opinion to know this speaker wasn't anything I would be interested in. I think the main point is it isn't a "Giant killer" by any stretch of the imagination. Anyhow they are buying and a well known speaker builder, the same guy who built these, have purchased a $95 set to put together for comparison. |
@james633 Thank you for a helpful contribution to the discussion, and especially for identifying those qualities of any speaker that are important and that can be measured. Speaker designers and those who evaluate speaker designs have learned to test single speakers for just those attributes you list. I’m not so sure about those who sell them however. Danny at GR Research strikes me as more a salesman than an engineer. I found Amir’s discussion of how to interpret the graphs quite helpful, and especially on how to ‘cheat’ by manipulating the test parameters. |
There is a very interesting thread on ASR at the moment where consumers who purchased a Topping PA5 are finding that 30% of them fail very quickly. The minion master recommended this product and now neither he nor the manufacturer have the courage to face the unhappy purchasers. The silence is deafening. |
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