Would you buy a pair of "giant killer" bookshelf speakers from Pioneer?

Does a 5 or 6 inch woofer provide worthwhile "base" unless its installed in a
transmission line cabinet ?

 

You're forgetting that not all audiophiles like the sound of flat frequency response. Some like 4 dB kicks around 300 Hz combined with 4 dB dips around 6 kHz. I find that even the most expensive speakers don't have a flat frequency response. In fact, some on this forum have even told me that flat frequency response is a bad thing. And that's OK if you're into that sort of thing. I prefer neutral, I want to hear what's on the record.

 

Nope. Not unless you add subwoofers to them.

 

All Your Base Are Belong To Us.

 

LMAO

 

What is worthwhile bass to you? If the room is small the bass from 5 or 6 inch woofers might be fine. I have Usher 520's and the bass is fine in my small room. 14' X 11'.

 

The thought of voicing a speaker never occured to me until now.... I think its strange to color sound coming from your sources by a loudspeaker. I'm with you, flat frequency response will always better reveal the music and subtilities within. I want to hear as the recording artist/engineer intended, and not to be dictated by the speaker. All HIFI should be neutral so not to influence the sound.

 

Actually, hi fi components are neutral and flat response so that they can be mixed and matched without compromise. Good luck with that.

You can put together a flat, neutral system from non-neutral speakers and non-neutral amps, when the result is flat.

Because people like to think they want the choice, all manufacturers have to bow to the flat response gods.

 

I know Stereophile is saying they are great, but during my brief listen didnt find them anything special at all. Maybe need to listen again. It was simply at best buy with whatever they had playing, but ive found the insignia to sound better I believe...oh well time for another listen I guess


EDIT. I heard the version with the 4 inch woofer....oops!

 

Considering most pre-amps/amps, receivers, integrated amps have an essentially falt frequency response well beyond the range of hearing, how on earth can a component counter the effects of a speaker with a ragged gfrequency response. Please don't say cables or interconnects becuase none of them are active and cannot t produce the postive frequency boost in the upper mids where the VAs dip.

 

"Wishful thinking and good vibes"??

 

I read the Stereophile review yesterday and looking at the size, these look like decent speakers and from my experience with Pioneer 2 way speakers as part of a great Pioneer car stereo set in the late 70ies I expect them to kick some serious butt. Will they kill speakers costing 1 grand ? Most likely not; but I bet they sound more Hi than Mid-Fi..
No one got these beauties as yet?

 

This is something I experienced myself, too. How bad most speakers actually sound even at higher prices than 200 bucks. Under 500 you won't find anything giving you a realistic impression of what is going on on the recording. Either you get decent desktop speakers or bookshelves that keep the lowest 2 or even three octaves to themselves and sound good above.
From manufactures you hear that more than half of the budget goes into wood for floorstands; so this may explain why most speakers under say 600 bucks simply fail. For 600 plus the question remains - if you want good quality chassis and frequency modules you have to spend at least another 300 bucks or you get a tiny bookshelve speaker...

Anyone heard JBL's new STUDIO 190's ?
For 800 Euro they have all the right ingredients - decent size, a horn and 3 more chassis plus they won the EISA Awards - European Image & Sound Association; so these should soud decent.
At this price level speakers start to sound like HiFi...

 

That's why I permanently set the equalizer on my system to flatten out the response. It's amazing how once you get the exact right EQ settings, within 1/2 dB, everything comes into focus. I couldn't stand not having an EQ unless the speakers were within 1 dB of being flat, which never happens.

 

Rumours are running amuck that people have been hearing bright interconnects after being returned from alien abductions.

 

How bright are we talking? 3 dB from neutral? 1/2 dB? 1/4 dB?

 

Below is graph listing the sesntivity of hearing.. the threshold at which we hear. Unless there a bunch of Chuck Yeagers in the audio world, 1/4 and 1/2db levels are undetectable by humans. Hence my skepticism of cables.

 

The Pioneer SP-BS41-LR bookshelf speakers are $100.00/pair (plus $5.00 for shipping) on woot.com....today only

 

No, 1/4 dB swings are definitely perceptible. I took an online test and could tell the difference 9/10 times. I think that anything less than 1/4 dB is pushing it though. Of course, that's when you're doing an immediate side by side comparison. 1/4 dB swings aren't really noticeable unless you're aware that you're listening for a 1/4 dB swing. 1/2 dB on the other hand, is very easy to hear the difference between.

 

Wow you have unusually good hearing then!

Seriously, 1/4 db changes are extremely hard to tell apart, and thats even with controlled pure test tones. Another issue is with actual music it totally changes our perception to levels. Humans can sense level differences far easier with test tones, than with actual speech or music.

 

I can also tell the difference when I'm mixing music, I frequently make 1/4 dB volume changes to individual tracks. But like I said, I did that when I was taking a test where I knew that the volume was increasing/decreasing/staying constant. What you said is true, test tones are purely continuous signals and aren't very dynamic. Throwing wider dynamics into the mix, especially the dynamic range of human speech, would probably be a whole different ball game.

On the other hand, if you were playing a continuous test tone for me, I'd NEVER be able to tell in a blind test...or if you changed out my interconnects without telling me. I'm not saying people can't hear the difference between interconnects if indeed they do have 1/4 dB deviations in frequency response...I just never tried and I'm pretty confident I would never be able to tell.

 

Don't care for Pioneer speakers, I would prefer Paradign

 

"giant killer" anything sucks.
Like you are pretending to be David playing against Goliath in the local pub.
I'll KEEP my Magnepans.

 

Boy, I'd say "extremely hard" is almost understating it! Hearing that kind of difference is truly extraordinary. Here's a fun test if others are interested (I got the .8 dB difference correctly, but that was it): http://www.noiseaddicts.com/2010/03/sound-challenge-can-you-hear-which-is-louder/

A very different ballgame indeed, not least because there is not only a wide dynamic range, but a range of dynamics at different frequencies, as opposed to the one volume level of a pure tone. Anyhow, remarkable hearing -- bravo!