I have no experience with them as my Marantz was built in the early 70s, so I can't help you there.
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Speakers for Mac Studio
- Thread starter Akapplefan
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I have no experience with them as my Marantz was built in the early 70s, so I can't help you there.
Okay I've got a weird concern. I've tried two different external speakers. Edifier s8800db and the Kanto Yu2's.... Both sound okay... but to be completely honest... my JBL Charge 4 (bluetooth wireless, 1 speaker, cheaper) sounds much better and louder than both. I know speakers and sound are completely subjective but it doesn't seem to make sense to me. Why would a JBL portable bluetooth, sound better than two different pairs of wired, more expensive speakers? I'm so confused....
the quality dropoff may be from the digital analog converter going into the wired speakers
idk mate, i don't have experience with those speakers but i wonder if that dac isn't driving the signal enough for the speakers
edit: i see that it only has a headphone out. i think this is the likely source of your issue. you are gonna want a dac with dedicated rca outs to go into your speakers. i recommend topping dx3 pro+
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Quality speakers normally try to reproduce sound rather neutrally, while „boom boxes“ like the JBL try to sound loud and having lots of bass. They are applying a certain equalizer curve internally and using psychoacoustic mechanisms to achieve their goal.
Many people prefer that sound over the neutral sound of higher end speakers, so your experience seems completely normal to me. This issue gets amplified, because humans get used to a certain sound profile. So if you have listened to the “boom box“ sound profile for a prolonged period of time, you would need some time to get used to a more neutral sound profile again.
Quoted for emphasis. What a listener is used to can inform their tastes much more than what sounds "good" according to product reviewers. That both means that listeners should trust their own ears above all else but also keep an open mind and avoid snap judgements. Spend several hours with new speakers and headphones and see how you gel with them. I have a pair of B&W PX that sound boxy when I first put them on, but their detail and staging are really great and within five minutes I'm loving them.
If you know what you are doing, you should pursue a flat response across all reasonable frequency range (but towards the low end it gets increasingly hard). Then if you want “color”, only add or adjust this in a measurable way, such as a graphical EQ.
Anyone who goes out to get a certain speaker or cable or even power supply to change the color of their listening pretty much don’t know what they are doing (which describes 99% of the HiFi audiences)
Anyone who goes out to get a certain speaker or cable or even power supply to change the color of their listening pretty much don’t know what they are doing (which describes 99% of the HiFi audiences)
So you’re in the “enlightened” 1% of the HiFi audience and the other 99% are idiots without a clue?! Nice attitude …
I didn't really take that away from the comment, seems like more just a statement that a lot really expensive snake oil is pushed in the "audiophile" world that probably doesn't make any audible difference. Like super expensive cables and power cords.
Thanks for clearing that up for me. Yes I was being a bit cynical but the message was brought across.
I‘d add that not only do some “snake oil products” make no difference, some even make the sound worsen, creating peaks or valleys in the response curve so you hear way more than you should on some sounds, and way less on the others.
But I guess I should take a bit back on my comment on speakers; by limitation of physics and the fact they are placed in a given setting, you can find some speakers that work better for your specific room than otherwise. But it is more about room acoustics than a matter of taste.
some tech does have a sonic signature, for example tubes vs solid state, 3 way vs. 2 way. getting a speaker with a flat response and then trying to model the response of another sort of speaker topology with eq is putting the cart before the horse and it won't compare to the real thing. digital eq cannot completely reproduce analog harmonics (plus it involves da/ad conversion). it's more effective to start with what you want at the source.
buying different kinds of speakers amps cables etc. in pursuit of a different sound is not "snake oil" but there is a lot of ****** gear dressed up with technobabble advertising aimed at hobbyists who don't know any better.
i recently purchased a setup for my living room. a pair of vintage genelec 1029a and 1091a sub. got all of it for around a thousand dollars and i'm sure i'll like them much better than any contemporary hi-fi setup i could have gotten new at that price.
buying different kinds of speakers amps cables etc. in pursuit of a different sound is not "snake oil" but there is a lot of ****** gear dressed up with technobabble advertising aimed at hobbyists who don't know any better.
i recently purchased a setup for my living room. a pair of vintage genelec 1029a and 1091a sub. got all of it for around a thousand dollars and i'm sure i'll like them much better than any contemporary hi-fi setup i could have gotten new at that price.
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To fit comfortably on my desk I ordered the relatively small and hopefully decent sounding PreSonus Eris 3.5 BT monitor speakers. ($139) I also got a good deal on a used Focusrite Scarlett 2i4 USB audio interface ($90 - discontinued 2nd gen model). Will connect them with $10 balanced 1/4" TRS cables. Oh and probably will get $6 Monoprice foam pads to put underneath.
It won't be a fancy setup by any means but the reviews on those all seem pretty positive, hopefully it will be a decent, very basic, entry level setup. You don't need the Scarlett interface to use the speakers, if you wanted you could go directly from the Mac Studio's 3.5mm headphone jack to the speakers' RCA or 3.5mm aux inputs, those cables are included with the Eris. (But I did see reviews saying the Eris sounded best when connected via the 1/4” balanced inputs, from an audio interface with those outputs.) I got the Scarlett for its mic inputs, to leave headphones connected without muting the speakers, 5-pin MIDI, 2 extra output channels, and direct monitor mixer.
My current desk setup is a Macbook Pro 15" with external displays, and I've been using its built-in speakers for casual monitoring, so the Eris should be an upgrade from that
I usually work with headphones but it's good to know how things sound over speakers too.
I'll use it for video editing work and I'm thinking these will be my mid-level "how will things sound on the average person's TV or laptop speakers." I also have a 5.1 home theater system close by I can listen to when needed. The actual sound mixing work for anything I touch will be done by far more qualified people thankfully, I just need to get things roughly in the ballpark.
I decided to pay a little extra for the bluetooth model Eris to have an extra option for random quick monitoring from a mobile device or other computer, also so they could have a more flexible afterlife around the house if they are retired later for something better. They also have an aux input in the front, and RCA inputs in the back. All the inputs including BT are always live and sum together, there's no input switcher or anything.
Spotted another person here with these speakers if you want to see how they look. Mine will arrive tomorrow (and hopefully so will my Studio!) so I'll let you know how they sound.
It won't be a fancy setup by any means but the reviews on those all seem pretty positive, hopefully it will be a decent, very basic, entry level setup. You don't need the Scarlett interface to use the speakers, if you wanted you could go directly from the Mac Studio's 3.5mm headphone jack to the speakers' RCA or 3.5mm aux inputs, those cables are included with the Eris. (But I did see reviews saying the Eris sounded best when connected via the 1/4” balanced inputs, from an audio interface with those outputs.) I got the Scarlett for its mic inputs, to leave headphones connected without muting the speakers, 5-pin MIDI, 2 extra output channels, and direct monitor mixer.
My current desk setup is a Macbook Pro 15" with external displays, and I've been using its built-in speakers for casual monitoring, so the Eris should be an upgrade from that
I usually work with headphones but it's good to know how things sound over speakers too.I'll use it for video editing work and I'm thinking these will be my mid-level "how will things sound on the average person's TV or laptop speakers." I also have a 5.1 home theater system close by I can listen to when needed. The actual sound mixing work for anything I touch will be done by far more qualified people thankfully, I just need to get things roughly in the ballpark.
I decided to pay a little extra for the bluetooth model Eris to have an extra option for random quick monitoring from a mobile device or other computer, also so they could have a more flexible afterlife around the house if they are retired later for something better. They also have an aux input in the front, and RCA inputs in the back. All the inputs including BT are always live and sum together, there's no input switcher or anything.
Spotted another person here with these speakers if you want to see how they look. Mine will arrive tomorrow (and hopefully so will my Studio!) so I'll let you know how they sound.
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At my desk I use some old Bose Companion 2 Series II and also a Cambridge Soundworks set with subwoofer connected via FiiO DAC. The latter sound quite good but cannot compete with my PeachTree novaPre DAC preamp hooked to Event Opal studio monitors and fedd by an AirPort Express/TOSLink sitting in the living room.
I also have 4 sets of HomePod stereo pairs, 2 mini and 2 standard size. Good for music. But for Logic Pro work you need a wired connection.
I also have 4 sets of HomePod stereo pairs, 2 mini and 2 standard size. Good for music. But for Logic Pro work you need a wired connection.
Quick update to say the PreSonus Eris 3.5 BT + Focusrite Scarlett 2i4 (2nd gen) combo with the Mac Studio is sounding pretty good on first impression.
Compared to my basic 5.1 home theater system w/ subwoofer, the Eris 3.5 speakers definitely don't have the same low-end bass. (They do offer an Eris subwoofer, not sure if the price of that total package would still be a good buy.) They do sound punchy for vocals, dialog, and the mid-low range down to about 60-80Hz. I’m definitely not an audiophile but I can say they are enjoyable to listen to, and my first thought was "man I should have bought these a long time ago."
(Oh - and a very quick comparison between the 1/4" balanced inputs and the 3.5mm aux input, I didn't notice a big difference in the sound.)
Also happy that the 2nd gen Scarlett 2i4 worked right out of the box on the Studio, I used one of its USB-A ports. I chose it because of its totally driverless class-compliant design, seems like that was a good choice. 3rd gen Scarlett interfaces seem to require software to assign output channels beyond 2 and set more advanced options. I was also considering the Arturia MiniFuse 2 or 4 USB interfaces with basically the same features as the 2i4, but Arturia says all their MiniFuse interfaces currently have an unspecified minor incompatibility with M1 Macs, so I stayed away. I haven't given the Scarlett 2i4 a thorough test yet, I'll report back if anything weird turns up.
PS - I happened to see that Guitar Center is currently having a sale on powered studio monitor speakers like these, if you're interested. The $79 Mackie CR3-X Gold trim limited edition look like a pretty good deal... (hey only $69 at Musician's Friend!)
Compared to my basic 5.1 home theater system w/ subwoofer, the Eris 3.5 speakers definitely don't have the same low-end bass. (They do offer an Eris subwoofer, not sure if the price of that total package would still be a good buy.) They do sound punchy for vocals, dialog, and the mid-low range down to about 60-80Hz. I’m definitely not an audiophile but I can say they are enjoyable to listen to, and my first thought was "man I should have bought these a long time ago."
(Oh - and a very quick comparison between the 1/4" balanced inputs and the 3.5mm aux input, I didn't notice a big difference in the sound.)
Also happy that the 2nd gen Scarlett 2i4 worked right out of the box on the Studio, I used one of its USB-A ports. I chose it because of its totally driverless class-compliant design, seems like that was a good choice. 3rd gen Scarlett interfaces seem to require software to assign output channels beyond 2 and set more advanced options. I was also considering the Arturia MiniFuse 2 or 4 USB interfaces with basically the same features as the 2i4, but Arturia says all their MiniFuse interfaces currently have an unspecified minor incompatibility with M1 Macs, so I stayed away. I haven't given the Scarlett 2i4 a thorough test yet, I'll report back if anything weird turns up.
PS - I happened to see that Guitar Center is currently having a sale on powered studio monitor speakers like these, if you're interested. The $79 Mackie CR3-X Gold trim limited edition look like a pretty good deal... (hey only $69 at Musician's Friend!)
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Coloring the sound with equipment is the same as over saturating the colors on your monitor.
In both cases the content (video and music) was painstakingly produced by talented professionals, so the more accurate and neutral your equipment, the closer you will get to what the artist intended.
So yes, you want a flat frequency response from the speakers, but you also need to take your room acoustics into account as well as your hearing. An uncompressed 20hz to 20khz sine sweep is a good audio piece to have (not mp3 or aac) so you can hear all the frequencies and make sure they all sound at the same volume to your ears in your listening room.
In both cases the content (video and music) was painstakingly produced by talented professionals, so the more accurate and neutral your equipment, the closer you will get to what the artist intended.
So yes, you want a flat frequency response from the speakers, but you also need to take your room acoustics into account as well as your hearing. An uncompressed 20hz to 20khz sine sweep is a good audio piece to have (not mp3 or aac) so you can hear all the frequencies and make sure they all sound at the same volume to your ears in your listening room.
There is this handy website tool:
Online Tone Generator - generate pure tones of any frequency
www.szynalski.com
It generates a stable mono tone at any given frequency of the whole (audible) spectrum, click the drop down it lists the tones in musical keys instead of Hz. This does not give you a graphical frequency response curve but you can hear each tone by your own ears in a given position of your room (especially the listening spot). Towards the lower end you may find your furniture vibrating if something isn't bolted or like loose screws.
That’s a great resource. Bookmarked it.There is this handy website tool:
Online Tone Generator - generate pure tones of any frequency
It generates a stable mono tone at any given frequency of the whole (audible) spectrum, click the drop down it lists the tones in musical keys instead of Hz. This does not give you a graphical frequency response curve but you can hear each tone by your own ears in a given position of your room (especially the listening spot). Towards the lower end you may find your furniture vibrating if something isn't bolted or like loose screws.
I picked up a pair of Audioengine HD6 speakers. I have listened to a ton of speakers and own or have owned speakers at various price points including Magnepans, Sonus Faber, Wisdom Audio, Triad, Sonos, et al. These, to me, are pretty good, a reasonable value, simple to install (I run them wired) and convenient. In other words, just what the doctor ordered for casual listening run through my Mac Studio.
Aren't they pricey for that purpose? That's one of the reasons I got the Kanto Yu2's... same size... better colors and potentially loud.
I did not consider the Kanto speakers. The HD6 colors are fine for me especially since I went with black. As for playing “loud” that is not my priority. The HD6 plays loud enough for me though I primarily listen to classical and jazz. I guess a sub would help, but I have not found it necessary. If I want to do more serious listening, I have other options at home. As for price, everyone has different comfort levels price wise. I wanted self powered wired speakers. Yes, I also own Sonos speakers (1,5,sub) which are amazing for wireless speakers but still think sound is best wired. Perhaps there are better options for less out there. At this, to me, reasonable price, I am not going to worry about it.
Someone else already mentioned the Vanatoo T0, and I just want to give them another +1. They don't take up much space on the desk, and sound great. I'm running them through a Zen DAC v2, of which I'm also a huge fan.