Apartment Audiophile: A ‘subjective’ review of Dutch & Dutch (D&D) 8c speakers for pop, electronic and rock music fans

[PCmusic]

This post is an ordinary audiophile’s ‘personal’ review of adapting Dutch & Dutch 8c's to enjoy pop, electronic and rock music in a slightly treated small apartment. Let me be frank: I am an ‘ordinary’ audiophile who has not done full room treatment (yet) due to domestic constraints and busy work. If you have a big listening room or full room treatment, my experiences may not be meaningful to you. My review is also a personal journey of rethinking how to enjoy rock, electronic and pop recordings in small rooms. If you dislike or already enjoy these music genres at home, my sharing is not so relevant to you.

 

 

 

 

I wrote this ‘subjective’ review for two reasons.

 

Most reviews of 8c focus on its excellent measured data. But it seems to be a noticeable gap between ‘superb measurements’ and people’s actual desire to adapt it at home. Some said it’s about the cost, the mindset of the ‘separate’ audiophiles, or the lack of home trial in some areas. All these reasons are possible, but another reason may be that most talks focus much less on how 8c can solve the real-world needs of traditional audiophiles at home. Some said ‘8c removes your room’. Some may ask: Oh really? How about my very small room? I am going to listen 8c in a small room with concrete walls – does it really mean that no or minimal room treatment will work? There’re no measured data for 8c’s performances in different room sizes or shapes with different furnishings, treatments and placements. Measuring these data is time-consuming and difficult.

 

Simply put, since many reviews’ strengths are objective measurements, they may not directly address the practical needs of audiophiles living in actual rooms. Some reviewers live in a very big house or a room with good room treatments. How about ‘ordinary audiophiles’ living in only slightly-treated small apartments?

 

Undoubtedly, I don’t know the needs of all apartment audiophiles. But I do know mine. I reside in an apartment with concrete walls, cannot do full room treatment, with little freedom on speaker placement in a multi-purpose listening room – 12’8” (W) x 25’11”(L) x 8’10” (H) (3.87m x 7.9mx 2.7m) , not too small, but certainly not big compared to many online pictures of audiophiles’ rooms. One thing that bugs me for long is that I could not enjoy listening to pop, rock and electronic music with my previous setup in my room. It was a nightmare to me.

 

Why stressing electronic, rock and pop music? The thing is, I love those music genres but for years I could seldom truly enjoy them. Worse still, I could not enjoy pop, rock and electronic music during my hundreds of visits to various audiophile’s homes, HiFi shows and shops. But 8c brings my electronic, rock and pop music back, making them enjoyable in my non-professional environment. It is not because 8c has completely ‘removed my room’; rather, under specific arrangement 8c does interact good enough with my restrictive room and helps me get my music back.

 

So why I chose 8c and how it solves my problem? My choice can be traced back to my audiophile journey.

 

My ‘audiophile’ journey

 

My ‘audiophile’ path may be shared by some users here – some of us grew up with pop, rock, and electronic music from the 1970s to 1980s. We bought gears made by JBL, NAD, Technics, Akai and so on, listening to Doors, Kraftwerk, Queen, Culture Club, Michael Jackson, Madonna, The Smiths or Cure. We at 15 didn't know room acoustics. We just enjoyed the ‘chaotic’ sound in our bedroom and took bass boom as strong bass.

 

Slowly some of us started working. We earned some cash, but we didn't forget music. We bought our first HiFi magazine and started to visit HiFi shops. Then we discovered the HiFi sales/magazines often used classical music to do demos/write reviews. We heard them saying frequently, ‘classical music is about real instruments and performances, with big dynamics’. I brought CDs of Depeche Mode to decent HiFi shops to ask for doing demos, and quickly I was being teased by many sales, saying ‘electronic music cannot be used to judge HiFi’, as if listening to good HiFi system I had to change my music taste.

 

 

 

Since I desperately wanted a decent HiFi system twenty years ago, my music taste did slowly change. I started to explore classical music and jazz. I actually like them a lot now, but this newly acquired taste in music comes at a cost. Well, some of us continued to explore rock and electronic music from the 1990s to 2000s - I personally love Massive Attack, Orbital, Chemical Brothers, Fat Boy Slim, Daft Punk, Placebo, Muses, Fischerspooner, Primal Scream, Bloc Party, Nine Inch Nails, The Dead Weathers, to name but a few. But for a long time, whenever I tried to listen to their music attentively, very quickly I could not continue, or could only let them be background music.

 

There were two key reasons.

 

First, I once believed in a discourse of caricaturing rock, electronic and pop recordings among many traditional audiophiles. This discourse suggests the following:

 

1.      Almost all pop, rock or electronic music recordings are not real performances but multi-track studio mixes. Any studio mixes done to mimic real performances is artificial, second-rate.

2.      The dynamic range (DR) of pop, rock or electronic music recordings are insanely compressed. For serious critics, rock or electronic music are not ‘real music’ (with big dynamic range).  

3.      The only listenable rock record is Pink Floyd's Dark Side of the Moon.

4.      The more high-end one’s audio system is, the more the owner will find rock, electronic or pop recordings ‘unlistenable’.

5.      In some cases, when an audiophile says ‘I don’t listen to rock now’ it almost means he is saying he gets a very high end system and only find classical music or jazz worth listening.

 

For quite a long time, I couldn’t refute the above views, even newer HiFi magazines or reviewers had started to use pop recordings to do gear reviews some years ago. Duran Duran’s Wild Boys not only sounded really bad in my home system but also in many audiophiles’ homes or HiFi shops I visited. These audiophiles or HiFi shops could reproduce classical and jazz works satisfactorily but when they played Wild Boys, the music was a mess and not enjoyable. Whenever a rock/electronic/pop recording did not sound good, these audiophiles/shop sales said, ‘the recording is too bad’.

 

But deep down, no matter how much I like Mile Davis's So What, another side of me crave to listen to Duran Duran's Wild Boys at crazy volume (95db). What’s the point of not being able to enjoy the music I like after I joined the HiFi game?

 

So, a few years back I decided that I must get my beloved rock/electronic/pop music back. Since then, I have read a lot on room acoustics, speaker designs, and music aesthetics and developed the following thoughts guiding my choice of the next ‘upgrade’:

 

My listening goals, possibilities and constraints of my listening environment

 

 

 

 

1.      My room is for both study and music (3.87m x 7.9mx 2.7m). I need to keep many books and Japanese toys, and I often work at home. There are a lot of constraints on speaker placements and listening position. Drastic change of furniture is undesirable.

2.      A few mid- to high-frequency absorption panels could be added if absolutely necessary and space allows. A matter to be decided after I find the right speakers.

3.      No space for passive bass traps.

4.      I have two modes of listening – critical ‘near-field’ listening at the sofa, and a less-critical mode when I work at the desk behind the sofa (very nice room sound needed). I need new speakers capable of satisfying both modes. 

5.      The new speakers must be able to play REALLY LOUD (100db peak or above at 2m without distortion).

6.      To achieve the above, electrostatic, open baffles or omni will be ruled out.

 

 

 

 

 

Reflections on the requirements for playing rock / electronic music

 

Bass problems: My previous speakers could not reproduce good bass below 50Hz. Most electronic music could be below 50Hz. Using gigantic speakers / subs however is impossible due to room constraints. Neither do I want to use complicated room correction software (simple setup is the goal). The key question is: could any ‘small’ speakers in the market deliver bass down to 20Hz without using subs?

 

‘Room reflections’ requirement for playing rock and electronic music: One thing much less discussed among audiophiles: do rock/electronic/pop/classical/jazz have different requirements of room reflections (sidewalls, front and rear walls, ceiling, and overall indirect sound field). For many years I settled on a system that let me enjoy some jazz and classical music in my relatively untreated small room (my photo shows that I only have some wool rugs, RPG diffusors on the ceiling; and a lot of home furniture). Jazz quartet, for example, sounded very nice and the ‘reverberation time’ sounded similar to that in some cozy jazz bars – acceptably lively, like Blue Note in New York. But this amount of room reflections seemed to be too much for playing full orchestra or big-band jazz nicely. Playing electronic and rock music was worse and too noisy. I strongly feel that the treble-rich and the fast and dense textures of many modern rock and electronic music recordings produce a greater intensity of reflected sounds in rooms than most (if not all) classical or jazz music. This creates severer problems of imaging and clarity of soundstage (compared to classical music and jazz).

 

So I go on hypothesizing four interrelated statements:

 

1.      The ideal amount of room reflections for reproducing rock and electronic music are actually less forgiving than many types (but not all) of classical and jazz music.

2.      Some who criticized rock/electronic music as ‘badly recorded’ may have a room good for playing classical music or jazz, but not rock or electronic music.

3.      Room reflections have to be suppressed much more for proper reproduction of rock/electronica. Many audiophiles’ rooms may be optimal for reproducing violin concerto or jazz quartet but too lively for producing the densely structured rock/electronica.

4.      Most rock and electronic music recordings are probably not that bad. Rather, very likely excessive reflections (plus bass problems) in many people’s room make those recordings sound bad. If these problems are solved, most rock / electronic / pop music recordings would sound ‘much better’, ‘good’ or even ‘excellent’.

 

The last hypothesis is also related to my last reflection of the aesthetics of recorded music.

 

Rock and Electronic music aesthetics

My ‘Malher Symphony No.2 Movement 5’ (FLAC) has a dynamic range (DR) of 17db according to Roon’s standard – abbreviated as RS hereafter.  The CD version of my beloved album Kiss Me Kiss Me Kiss Me by Cure only has 4db (RS), and I guess the DR of the original vinyl would not jump to 17db (putting aside that RS is debatable). In fact, most rock / pop / electronic music recordings I like, have noticeable degrees of dynamic range compression (DRC). The ‘loudness war’ theory argues that since the 1980s high DRC has been widely applied to in non-classical music genres, resulting in lifeless music and hence ‘bad recording’.

 

While the trend of increasing DRC is true and some recordings may sound better by expanding their DR, I take issue with the argument that high DRC always equals ‘bad recording/mastering’ in all circumstances.

 

My theory is - I always wonder what Kiss Me Kiss Me Kiss Me with no/very little DRC will sound like? If an audiophile version of Kiss Me Kiss Me Kiss Me is available (DR =17), does it mean our pleasure will focus on pinpointing exactly the location of electric guitars / drums in a more ‘audiophile’ sonic texture?

 

That album to me - in fact, many rock / pop / electronic albums – was supposed to have a darker, rougher, rawer sonic structure, and in some cases, the creation of various uniquely grotesque / exotic soundscapes which no real performances could produce. I feel that for Kiss Me Kiss Me Kiss Me and by the same token many other rock recordings, certain degrees of compression actually fit better their unique soundscapes created.

 

I personally have no clues exactly why a particular DRC (3 to 7, RS) was adopted for millions of individual rock/pop/electronic albums out there. Loudness war theories attribute the entire phenomenon to sales pressure (so ‘common people’ in very noisy conditions can still listen to music). If this is true, I also suggest that one way to look at musical ‘loudness’ as a kind of music aesthetic of ‘ordinary people’. Many rock, pop, or electronic music recordings were recorded for ordinary folks or the young (like you and me thirty years ago), who tend not to have a very discriminating HiFi system. ‘Ordinary people’s electronic dance music and audiophile’s music are two worlds with radically different genres, feelings, aesthetics and conditions of listening. Underworld’s Dark and Long only has 6db DR (RS), but I love it and enjoy immersing myself in their ‘relatively compressed’ aesthetics and consistently pressurized world (but I also enjoy Malher Symphony No.2 Movement 5 with 17db DR).

 

In this regard, some producers have spoken about the ‘loudness’ aesthetics explicitly. Referring specifically to EDM, German mastering engineer Cem Oral once said, “Sometimes the totally compressed and pressed sound is wanted. People like stress, especially on the dance floor, they want some stress. It relates to the drugs and it relates also to the lifestyle and that sound is compressed, intense sound, fast forward, directly in your face that fits into the attitude that is wanted (i/v, 2015)”. (Taylor 2018: 386)

 

Alan Moulder, who produced Nine Inches Nail’s several albums, expressed that ‘aesthetically, the clipping process suited the style of the music and this of course leads to the subject of genre and how this can have a significant influence on the amount of hyper-compression that is considered appropriate’ (Taylor 2018: 386)

 

The article in this link even use a socio-political approach to discuss DRC and I find the argument very compelling: https://www.its-her-factory.com/2014/12/some-philosophical-implications-of-the-loudness-war-and-its-criticisms/

 

Dynamic compression and range isn’t just about music, or hearing, or audio engineering. The aesthetic and technical issues in the compression-vs-range debate are local manifestations of broader values, ideals, and norms … Dynamic range, or the ability to responsively attune oneself to variable conditions and express a spectrum of intensity is generally thought to be more “healthy” than full-throttle maximalization–this is why there are things like “digital detox” practices and rhetoric about “work/life balance” and so on. At the same time, range is only granted to those with specific kinds of intersecting privilege. Though the discourse of precarity might encourage us to understand it as an experience of deficit, perhaps it is better understood, at least for now, as an experience of maximal loudness, of always being all the way on, of never getting a rest, never having the luxury of expressing or experiencing a range of intensities.

 

Practically, the above views of music aesthetics do not necessarily take DRC as universally bad and invite us to ignore unconditional caricatures of rock / electronic music recordings. In sum my view is that, if the room and speaker setup is correct, most so-called bad recordings should sound so much better (reflection issues); or alternatively, the ‘rawer’ recordings just truly reflect the less-than-ideal production conditions of the musicians or simply their music aesthetics.

 

Have I thought too much? But the above is what my HiFi journey had led me to rethink the attitudes and room acoustics required for enjoying pop, rock and electronic music, which in turn also led me to give D&D 8c a try.

 

Final plan: Kii or 8c?

 

With the above goals and ideas in mind, I looked for speakers with these characteristics:

 

SUPERB speaker’s constant directivity. I have 13 ft to place two speakers. With speaker almost 7.5 ft apart, sidewalls and other reflections are bound to occur. The speakers whose off-axis performance must be truly close to its on-axis throughout, so that all the reflections with direct sounds could sound at least uniform, reducing the potential negative effects caused by the overabundant reflected sounds from playing rock / electronic music.

 

Unexceptional bass: Bass going down to 20Hz, with little distortion at high volume (90 to 100db).

 

Easy EQ: The easiest way to reduce bass problems without passive bass trap. Wanted: built-in measurement software and EQ correction with filters, integrated with the speakers. I don’t need perfect correction and effective suppression of nodes is fine with me.

 

During the search I discovered the intelligently designed Kii.  The active cardioid bass design is extremely smart. But during my audition in the local dealers (visited twice), the sales kept telling me not to turn on the speakers too loudly. I noted measurements showing that Kii’s distortion comes significantly when the volume reaches 90db (approx, can’t remember). During audition I did also feel the bass was a bit shy at normal volume. So Kii cannot let me play loud and throw a real party at home.

 

Then comes the D&D 8c. I originally took it as a ‘water-downed’ version of Kii since it doesn’t use active cardioid bass. ‘Passive cardioid down to 100Hz’ sounds a bit inferior at first to me. But more importantly, when designing my room years ago, I put a gigantic bookcase at the front wall; I have to drastically rearrange my furniture to fully utilize 8c’s unique bass boundary coupling system, which requires me to put the speakers close to the front wall. Pulling the (increasingly smaller) speakers out to the room had been the trend for thirty years (for some, this does lead to the real benefits of using more indirect sound to create stronger 3D soundstage) so when designing the room, I just went with the trend and did not foresee the need to put speakers close to the front wall (I repeated – I was stupid). 8c requires me to reverse engineer my room for the best bass, so it was not my option at first sight.

 

But in the past two years, I re-examined 8c. More measurements turned up: (1) Different measurements all reported that 8c really produces kickass bass down to 20Hz, and Stereophile took it as Class A full-range speakers; (2) Directivity measured by diverse sources confirm that its off-axis curve is extremely close to its on-axis down to 100Hz (for me 8c seems to have more uniform directivity than Kii but my friend disagree, and I haven’t further investigated it as I am too lazy); (3) Then I learnt REW was integrated to 8c – extra good news to me as a lazy ordinary audiophile; (4) Tailor-made speaker stands were introduced; (5) I use Roon but Roon-ready or not isn’t an issue for me at the moment (I am using a mixer as preamp).

 

So all things seemed excellent, except that I could not place 8c close to the wall (unless I rearrange my furniture). I wrote a post here asking for opinion. But I actually knew the answer - bass-wise, 8c will behave like normal box speakers if being pulled out to the room. Whether doing so will create uncorrectable standing-wave problems in my room can only be known through trial and error. I finally pulled the trigger to buy 8c last summer.

 

PS: I also explore other speakers made by Gradient, KEF, Genelec, Neumann but gave up since they did not fit my needs.

Result

Although my setup now is temporary (busy job), it already brought most of my beloved music back. Overall, 8c brought me both joys and difficulties, summarized below in 9 points. Point 1 to 4 are very positive experiences; the fifth one is a major problem caused by my way of using 8c; the rest are other positive experiences.

 

1.      Extremely loud: ‘We will Rock You’ (which goes down to 45Hz) rocks my listening room at 100db @4m. No signs of fatigue. Period.

 

2.      Micro-details available even at very, very low volume: I have never experienced such clarity of details at low volume (40db). All instruments were still presented vividly. Of course, at a volume so low, bass is subjectively much less. This is a gift for apartment audiophiles: at a sleepless night at 3am, 8c plays all the delicate notes of Glen Gould’s Golden Variations for you.

 

3.      Very convenient integration between REW and speaker’s filters: REW isn’t that complicated at the first level. I quickly learned how to suppress bass peaks through simple measurement procedures. REW also measures signal decay time, which is most problematic for my bass reproduction. Bass decay of my room was not ideal but 8c’s low end already sounds acceptably good to me.

 

4.      Two listening modes are excellent – The uniform off-axis sound makes both nearfield critical listening (2.15m away) and far-field casual listening (4m away, sitting on the left side of the room) extremely nice. I could consider installing more diffusors at the ceilings above my study desk to further smoothen the indirect reflections / room sound. But for now, the room sound is good enough. REW correction for suppressing nodes is done for the critical position, but the effects are partially applicable to the casual listening position – it may be coincidental. I could easily make and load different filter sets, but I feel no urgency for that.

 

5.      The trick of 45-degree toe-in in small rooms: This is the most difficult part! Initially I pulled 8c out to the room almost 180cm from the front wall with 30 degree toe-in (just like the figure here)

 

The soundstage was disappointing. 60% of the soundstage clustered around the center area of the front wall, but recorded sounds assigned to the left and right positions (SLP & SRP) shifted further left and right in the soundstage produced in my room. Worse still, these SLP and SRP could shift ‘up’ to the speaker driver positions. I had never experienced such a ‘curved’ soundstage in my room. Below is my attempted explanation (not sure if it’s entirely correct):  the cardioid design significantly reduces reflected sounds from the front wall, but it does not reduce sidewall reflections (if the speakers are close to sidewalls). This may potentially create peculiar problems for users who (1) place 8c not close to front wall and (2) close to sidewalls with no absorption treatments. The sidewall reflections will be more disturbing than conventional speakers. Conventional speakers often produce noticeable front-wall and sidewall reflections, both of which smear image clarity, but the interferences are more or less ‘even’ so the soundstage remains ‘horizontally presented’ at the front wall (this was my experience of my previous speakers). 8c’s unique design produces a much clear, but ‘curved soundstage’.

 

How could I solve the problem? The best option is to add absorption panels on sidewalls. I don’t have time to shop (I am picky on the look of the panels) and install them. Finally, I used 45-degree toe-in (recommended in the manual). Thanks to 8c’s extreme uniform lateral dispersion, at 45-degree toe-in I am still able to hear very smooth off-axis performance and have the sidewall reflections significantly reduced.

 

According to Stereophile measurement, at 90 degree, lateral reflection is 13.68db lower for 1953Hz, and 12db for 300Hz. In my setup, sidewall reflections come only 3.5ms later than the direct sounds, with only 3.86db attenuation. Adding all things up, it means almost 19db reduction for 1953Hz, or 15.68db for 300Hz.  According to existing research on perception of sound reflections (Sound Reproduction: p.87), the 45-degree toe-in let the sidewall reflections somewhere drifting between the ‘non-audible’ and ‘image shift’ region. The actual result varies with sources – luckily for many recordings, the soundstages become ‘horizontal’ behind the speakers; only some music produces slightly ‘curved’ soundstages.

 

 

 

 

 

My experience:

 

(1) If 8c is pulled out from the front wall and have slight or no toe-in, it could produce disturbing sidewall reflections in very small rooms, forming curved soundstages.

 

(2) 45-degree toe-in is a powerful tool and may help for scenario (1). But one must experiment as it may suit my room size and shape. I could foresee for small square room absorption panels at the back walls may be essential.

 

(3) If you can’t change your room, add sidewall absorption panels for (1) .

 

(4) If you have a large room, place 8c away from sidewalls. Specially make sure that the ‘indirect sound path (distance from driver to ears)’ minus ‘direct sound path’ at least not less than 7m, which will reduce the early reflections by 10db due to sound energy loss (for 7m), arriving around 20.5ms later than direct sound. Furthermore, the early reflections coming from off-axis sounds at 90 degrees are already 12db to 15db less than the direct sounds (from 8c measurement data). Both factors lead to 22db to 25db attenuation of the early reflections, which interfere the soundstage much less according to the ‘perceived sound reflections’ research discussed above. If the reflection-direct distance difference is 8 or 9m – there will be no worries at all. But the question is – this will be a very big room.

 

Check this calculator:  http://www.sengpielaudio.com/calculator-distance.htm. This is strictly physics.

 

But the above experience leads me to ask: what if 8c is very close to the front wall and (totally reflective) sidewalls at the same time? I have no time to experiment, and I hope users shed light on this. Here’s my guess: sounds assigned to the far left or right position still create noticeable image shifts, but as 8c is close to the front wall, the ‘reflected sidewall sounds’ and ‘direct sounds’ are more likely to be heard as coming from the front wall area, creating a seemingly plain, horizontal 3D soundstage clustered at the front wall but not a ‘curved’ soundstage. Nonetheless I doubt that under this arrangement, the soundstage produced could be larger than the one intended by the recording engineers, and some shift of instrument positions at the right and left end would occur.

 

Having said all this, the substantial attenuation of front wall reflections from 100Hz onward is a super feature to me. This certainly saves the need for absorption panels at the front wall, so very apartment-friendly.

 

PS: The legendary Ken Ishiawata once used this technique in a hifi show and impressed a lot of people (this trick is discussed on the web from time to time. My understanding is that it is most effective for speakers with excellent uniform directivity):

 

 

6.      Being able to enjoy most densely structured rock, pop, and electronic music recordings finally: With substantially reduced front-walls reflections and adequately attenuated sidewall reflections, I could enjoy many pop, rock, and electronic recordings which I always quickly stopped listening if I played them in my previous setups. Fat Boy Slim’s Right Here, Right Now, has so many sound effects going on, and listening to it was terrible back then, but now I could dance with the song while listening. I could also sit down and enjoy shifting my focus on any sound / instrument / sampling / effect that simultaneously co-exist at any second of the song. K&D’s Speechless goes down to 40Hz and my friend, who is a veteran classical opera conductor, widely praised the extreme complex arrangement of the song. I could barely enjoyed listening to it before due to bass booming and too much reflections. With REW and 45 toe-in, the bass and reflection problems are minimized and I could play Speechless at 95db @2m or more without feeling listening fatigue.

 

7.      Enjoy the ‘low-fi’ or ‘intended aesthetics’ of pop, rock, electronic music recordings:  I double confirm, for certain recordings, I really like the ‘raw’ and ‘compressed’ versions more than ‘high resolution’ version. ‘Life’s a Struggle’ is a classic example. It was a song written and performed by Shawn Sung, a very talented Taiwanese young rappers, who was falsely imprisoned and died in prison. He did great raps in Mandarin – full of authentic emotion and anger. He had a very sad story. Later his family released his songs made by cheap tape recorders after his death. I played ‘Life’s a struggle’ (DR=4, RS) loudly through 8c. What 8c did was to reproduce accurately the ‘badly recorded’ song. But it is the magic of its song – its accurately reproduced rawness and the feeling that a boy’s anger had been severely ‘contained’ in the compressed space. This song was recently performed by a China’s female singer in a famous Hip Hop show in China. The song has been ‘remastered’ to get closer to the ‘high fidelity’ ideal, but the magic of the song is totally lost (the original radical lyric was tamed to suit the censorship standard in China’s TV as well).

 

The Taiwan version (only Chinese lyrics):

 

 

The ‘remastered’ HiFi version with domesticated lyrics (with English lyrics):

 

 

 

Yes, 8c, being very accurate monitors, can honestly offer us the intended sonic worlds of record producers. That’s a treasure to me.

 

8.      No need to buy subs, as my neighbor rang my door bell and complained only about the crazy bass (no complaints in seven years before 8c) – I can’t remember if I was watching Batman Dark Knight or John Wick. The neighbor said, ‘I could feel the bass in my house. Could you turn the bass down’. He did not say ‘turn your volume down’. I did not hear standing waves at my sofa but I didn’t know how the bass sounded when traveled to my neighbor.

 

 

 

9.      Classical music and jazz – I did say I like both! In fact, now I listen to jazz much more (but I still love pop, rock, electronic music).  Could I say something uncommon here? People used to say, when your system can play classical music right, it will play all other music genres right (but they have to be audiophile recordings). I just offer another way of doing: when you could get your system-room interaction accurately reproduce pop, electronic, and rock music right and can listen to their recordings without listening fatigue, your system will play jazz and classical music right. This was what happened. With the 45 degree toe-in trying to meet the more demanding room acoustics for playing rock and electronic music, 8c also shines with jazz and classical music. Yes, some friends may prefer livelier presentation for jazz trios, but without adjustable room treatments, there must be reasonable compromise for apartment audiophiles.

 

So simply put, 8c plays jazz and classical music beautifully in my room. I did have some problems in playing ‘high pitched’ brass as it’s more sensitive to the (reduced but not totally erased) sidewall reflections. I’ll work on that later.

 

Summary

 

 

 

How could I sum up the above?

 

I would say, if you are an omnivorous music lover; if you want to enjoy diverse types of music at a small room with minimal to moderate room treatment; if you could learn how to use simple measurement and REW (or ask other people to do that for you); I truly recommend 8c. 8c is an accurate monitor which goes to 20hz. It lets you play 1812 ‘explosively’ but it also reproduces jazz quartet or piano solo beautifully. For studio-mixed music such as rock, electronic or pop, 8c reproduces accurately the sonic worlds created as intended by the producers, and it’s up to you to decide if you accept the special aura or soundscapes of these works, most of which have their DR more compressed than jazz.

 

Yes, 8c is not cheap. But if you really need the things I needed for a small room and my omnivorous taste: super accuracy, the phenomenal uniform directivity down to 100Hz, 20Hz capability, good room sound, the loudness it can achieve, the sonic details it can produce at very low volume; the minimal space it occupies, the less money needed to be spent on amplifiers, bass traps and acoustics panels … 8c is probably one of the few speaker models with all these characteristics in one single package, at this price. To me, 8c is not only for professional studios but very suitable for (small) apartment music lovers who demand high quality playback but do not have the time, energy or knowledge to do gear matching like traditional audiophiles. It solves too many problems ordinary apartment audiophiles need to tackle if s/he bought, for example, LS50. LS50 is a set of very affordable and excellent speakers but requires one to properly setup subs if you want deep bass and add room correction software (one could use Roon though);  LS50 can’t play as loud as 8c and do not have cardioid design down to 100Hz, which I found very useful for small rooms (check the funny video of how the loudness of YMO’s song change from recording the music at the front and then the back of the speakers).

 

Certainly, 8c will never be the best speakers (as some said exaggeratedly in some forums). It does not remove your room as effortlessly as some would suggest. But it does reduce the need to install pro room treatments, if space is an issue. 8c as a very accurate monitor will not deliver the pleasures of open baffle speakers – many open baffle speaker owners take ‘speakers interacting with the room sound’ as one goal of developing a special sonic aura. The result is often very relaxing, extremely holographic imaging – very good for playing instrumental music (but perhaps less so for rock and electronic music). 8c cannot do that. Further, 8c offer no joys for playing gear matching – a respectable and legitimate pleasure. 8c’s sound is very modern, anyone who only likes gigantic JBL/Altec speakers in the 1970s would find 8c non-appealing. I can understand this as I love Kissa – Japan’s audiophile Jazz Bars – very much, and the vintage JBL/Altec/ McIntosh combo actually has formed a sonic aesthetic of its own.

 

That’s it! In the future, I may rearrange my furniture and put 8c close to the wall and see how much improvement I can have; I may compare this with adding active bass trap with speakers still being pulled out away from walls. Very likely I will add panels to erase sidewall reflections. But even if I haven’t the time to do all these for now, 8c performance is superb for my needs.

 

I’d like to end my idiosyncratic review of 8c with a sound engineer’s sharing in Facebook:

 

I agree that a listening room with some natural reflections can be pleasant with acoustic, classical and quartets etc. I also agree that those same listening rooms are fatiguing and unpleasant when listening to pop and rock music. I don’t however, believe the reason is compression. I believe it’s the type of music. Pop and rock carry faster tempo, more dense arrangements, and more constant treble and brightness. It’s busier music with less space between notes. Reflective rooms (with an exposed hardwood floor or untreated walls) will exaggerate the upper frequencies even more. That quickly becomes harsh and ear-fatiguing. If we listen to a genre that is constantly energetic and fast moving in the upper registers, the busier treble becomes a tiring mess with repeated reflections. Compression doesn’t make modern music any brighter, but it makes it more constantly loud so it can add to what you’re experiencing as harshness and poor imaging in a reflective room. The louder you play it, the more a “live” room reflects the notes. It becomes harder to hear the details of the music when it is smeared with reflections. Hope that helps!

 

In this regard I see 8c is a treasure for apartment audiophiles who love pop, rock and electronica besides classical music and jazz.

 

[ecwl]

Very cool review.

 

I'm curious about the REW parametric EQ you had to dial in in the end.

Was this an automated process?

Just curious what room issues there were

[ShawnC]

Excellent review.  A refreshing way to see how the common apartment dweller deals with limitations and genres of music that they (you) enjoy that are not considered of audiophile grade. Kudos to you. 

[PCmusic]

11 hours ago, ecwl said:

Very cool review.

 

I'm curious about the REW parametric EQ you had to dial in in the end.

Was this an automated process?

Just curious what room issues there were

I need to check if I stored the data. I did my rew rather hastily. 

[PCmusic]

10 hours ago, ShawnC said:

Excellent review.  A refreshing way to see how the common apartment dweller deals with limitations and genres of music that they (you) enjoy that are not considered of audiophile grade. Kudos to you. 

Thanks a lot for your comment indeed!

[PCmusic]

I created a Facebook group called Apartment Audiophile. 
 

https://www.facebook.com/groups/1695122740670419/

I dont have any goals for this group in mind such as having 1.4k members ... I’ll go it slow. If no one joins so be it 😂 my job is too busy anyway. I spent two months to write this piece, since I wrote several lines a day.

 

[ecwl]

3 hours ago, PCmusic said:

I need to check if I stored the data. I did my rew rather hastily. 

No worries. Don’t waste your time looking for it.

I was more curious about the parametric EQ integration of the D&D 8c.

And I suddenly remembered Mitch Barrett reviewed it too so I found his article:

Yes, these sound like phenomenal speakers and it’s fantastic you have it perfectly integrated into your room to enjoy your music. Not a Facebook person though. Thanks for the article again. I’ll have to check out these speakers at a store when I have a chance in the future.

 

[PCmusic]

8 hours ago, ecwl said:

No worries. Don’t waste your time looking for it.

I was more curious about the parametric EQ integration of the D&D 8c.

And I suddenly remembered Mitch Barrett reviewed it too so I found his article:

Yes, these sound like phenomenal speakers and it’s fantastic you have it perfectly integrated into your room to enjoy your music. Not a Facebook person though. Thanks for the article again. I’ll have to check out these speakers at a store when I have a chance in the future.

 

 

I know there're a lot of debates between smoothing ... but I can't find the answer. I am simply not an expert. I have these charts for psychoacoustics smoothing for left and right channel.

 

Several points:

1. Yes, that should be what the FR is like for now.

2. The increase of treble region seem to be sidewall reflections.

3. The valley after 100Hz is very likely due to ceiling, and I could take care of that later.

4. The notch around 50 to 60 ... I can't do anything for now. I either put 8c back to the front wall but I don't have the time now, or, I use active bass trap to take care of that.

5. I generate a RT60 decay curves for L and R measured at the center (cannot generate waterfall for averaged positions) - I am still learning and I dunno if it's correct. 

 

As said, I only know the basics of REW. The room is still on the livelier side, but has been much suppressed than before and listenable to me. 

 

 

 

[PCmusic]

Without being able to completely remove sidewall reflections and to cure cases where certain sources cause more treble problems, my easy solution now is to turn down the treble by 3 to 5 dB, easily done from 8c app. I like simple though imperfect solution, especially when I have no time to completely cure the problem. 😅that’s why I said I’m an ordinary audiophile ...

[ecwl]

Thanks for digging the measurements up. Super cool. I definitely have to find the speakers somewhere to listen to. 

[PCmusic]

11 hours ago, ecwl said:

Thanks for digging the measurements up. Super cool. I definitely have to find the speakers somewhere to listen to. 

 

I was both lucky and unlucky for audition. Lucky - the local dealer is willing to give me a room with a shape similar to me and let me pull out the speakers to the middle of the room and let me move the speakers around. I finally settled on a position, without REW correction, and checked the potential. I discovered if being pulled out, 8c is actually as sensitive as conventional speakers regarding positioning. A few cm left or right, back and forth, could remedy some soundstage problem, for example.  I believed when it is close to the wall, a few cm may make some differences too, even it has coupling adjustment supplied through the app - though overall the performance variation may not be as great as being put in 'free space'. I don't have enough experience to tell the whole story admittedly.

 

But it would be great if you're allowed to play around positioning, in either free standing or close-to-the-wall mode.

 

Unlucky - the dealer can't do a home demo. Some countries/cities can, but not mine. 

 

Here's my list of auditioned songs lol (I ended up playing 1/3 of them perhaps lol):

[Cadguy]

Hello PCmusic, thank you for this very detailed review. Can you help me understand what you mean by a curved soundstage? Also what do you mean when SLP and SRP are shifted further left and right in the soundstage? Do you mean that the L and R images appear to be coming right from the speakers themselves or from outside the speakers towards the side walls?

[PCmusic]

Hello Cadguy

 

before I explained further, just upload a funny video for you and please note the amount of the loudness decreased when my phone doing the recording, changed from the front of the driver to the back of the driver. I’ll write to you later as I am not at home ...

 

[PCmusic]

On 3/20/2021 at 7:16 AM, Cadguy said:

Hello PCmusic, thank you for this very detailed review. Can you help me understand what you mean by a curved soundstage? Also what do you mean when SLP and SRP are shifted further left and right in the soundstage? Do you mean that the L and R images appear to be coming right from the speakers themselves or from outside the speakers towards the side walls?

 

Hi Cadguy

 

When I say curved, it means 

1. 8c is being pulled out 180cm from the wall, and placed close to the sidewall (90cm away from the tweeter center) - it is my case.

 

2. For my case (stated above), and for many recordings, soundstage remains at the center, left and right 'plane' at the front wall location. It means the soundstage and the speakers are completely detached. This is the case even if I don't use 45 toe-in. The curved soundstage is 'source dependent' - which leads to point 3.

 

3. But for some recordings, some instruments / effects were panned STRONGLY to the far right and left. For these recordings, the left and right instruments / sounds could appear to be coming directly from the drivers. But since majority of sound coming from the center area of the front wall, the overall effect is a seemingly 'curved' soundstage. It's like an inverted smile.

 

4. NO - those tiny portion of sound in scenario 3 seems to be coming from the driver, but not outside the speakers towards the sidewalls - at least in my room.

 

5. I find it strange since I re-read Stereophile's John Atkinson's review, his 8c were rather close to the wall and he said he finds sidewall reflections had no problems at all. But I find it hard to compare since I don't know the details of the placement. His room size is "Room: 20' (left side), 25' (right side) × 16' × 8'.—John Atkinson" according to another review. But I actually don't know what he means. I can't figure out exactly how he placed his speakers by his descriptions, and he has abfusers. Simply put ... I cannot find experiences from another user who pull out 8c, close to the wall, like me. 

 

6. But as said, the curved soundstage has been largely resolved in my case. I also placed the speakers 210 to 220cm part ... if they're put closer, sidewall effects will be much more reduced. 

 

7. When I audited 8c in my dealer's room (in free standing mode), no such problems existed. So it's room dependent - that room is noticeably wider than mine, and has more absorption treatment. 

 

Having said all this, this is really my particular experience. And you can give me personal messages if you have other questions.

 

 

[cab33]

Did you try out the Kii's in your room at all?

[morespin]

Have you considered or tried Genelac 8351B with SAM? Or some such? Similar price range, I suppose, even cheaper.

[PCmusic]

No I don't have the chance. I just auditioned it in the dealer's room, one around 100 sq ft one over 300sq ft. Both in my view not very properly positioned. One thing I am sure is that the active bass cardioid worked! Bass was rather even in both rooms. But in the smaller room, room reflection problems did not go away (it was not toed in though). 

[skatbelt]

I fully agree that the impact that a room has on the playback quality of an audio system is enormous. I am also a great supporter of loudspeaker manufacturers (Dutch myself... :)) who recognise this and come up with smart solutions. But in your set of four assumptions/hypotheses about additional treatment needs for you beloved genres, I think you are totally missing the point. In these genres commercial interests and an acceptable reproduction on a boombox, in a car, etc., play a much greater role than a lifelike experience. And I'm not even talking about the loudness war and ignorance of mixing and mastering. Recalibration: bad recording/mastering = bad reproduction.

 

This is also easy to verify by listening to the genres you name on a very good headphone system. Although not completely comparable with in room listening, in any case there is no influence of a room with its reflections and other imperfections. By doing this you will also notice that there is quite a lot of good pop, rock, r&b and techno, but that the vast majority sounds mediocre or bad according to audiophile standards. In my system if an album sounds good on my headphone setup, it also sounds good in my loudspeaker setup. Regardless of the genre. Note that I heavily rely on DRC/DSP in my loudspeaker system with Lyngdorf's Roomperfect and additional PEQ in Roon.

 

 

[The Computer Audiophile]

Incredible write-up!

[skatbelt]

2 hours ago, The Computer Audiophile said:

Incredible write-up!

 

Thx! 🙃

[morespin]

I enjoyed the writeup even if I ended up with Dynaudio Xeo 20 for my small aprtment room (6 feet by 10 feet). I am sure 8C at four times the price would sound more 'refined', but Xeo 20s provide me great joy.

[PCmusic]

On 3/24/2021 at 6:14 AM, morespin said:

I enjoyed the writeup even if I ended up with Dynaudio Xeo 20 for my small aprtment room (6 feet by 10 feet). I am sure 8C at four times the price would sound more 'refined', but Xeo 20s provide me great joy.

 

I am not an absolutist insisting doctrines ... I actually wanted to buy LS50 but I really can't put subs (GAF) ... Love to know your experience of Xeo 20 and how you setup this in your small room and how it let you enjoy your preferred music. I have some friends living in apartments also have rooms similar to yours. If you could share a bit the best way to set up Xeo 20, I could share your post to them. 

[PCmusic]

On 3/22/2021 at 11:41 PM, skatbelt said:

I fully agree that the impact that a room has on the playback quality of an audio system is enormous. I am also a great supporter of loudspeaker manufacturers (Dutch myself... :)) who recognise this and come up with smart solutions. But in your set of four assumptions/hypotheses about additional treatment needs for you beloved genres, I think you are totally missing the point. In these genres commercial interests and an acceptable reproduction on a boombox, in a car, etc., play a much greater role than a lifelike experience. And I'm not even talking about the loudness war and ignorance of mixing and mastering. Recalibration: bad recording/mastering = bad reproduction.

 

This is also easy to verify by listening to the genres you name on a very good headphone system. Although not completely comparable with in room listening, in any case there is no influence of a room with its reflections and other imperfections. By doing this you will also notice that there is quite a lot of good pop, rock, r&b and techno, but that the vast majority sounds mediocre or bad according to audiophile standards. In my system if an album sounds good on my headphone setup, it also sounds good in my loudspeaker setup. Regardless of the genre. Note that I heavily rely on DRC/DSP in my loudspeaker system with Lyngdorf's Roomperfect and additional PEQ in Roon.

 

 

 

You have a great system and thanks for your comment. Why certain albums are compressed - I personally think there're many reasons. Economic, practical and aesthetic and some out of control, which I have mentioned already. But ultimately audio is also really a matter of taste and preferences. Let's enjoy our beloved music.

[PCmusic]

A user of Roon and 8c has created a Facebook group for 8c users worldwide. Given that many 8c owners are probably rather 'pro' and less an FB person, I guess users will join the FB group very slowly (or not joining). But I guess when the user base gets larger (like having 200 to 300 members if possible), things will start getting more interesting.

 

https://www.facebook.com/groups/449617959639445/?multi_permalinks=449948672939707&notif_id=1616820825950433&notif_t=feedback_reaction_generic&ref=notif

[skatbelt]

On 3/26/2021 at 7:41 AM, PCmusic said:

 

You have a great system and thanks for your comment. Why certain albums are compressed - I personally think there're many reasons. Economic, practical and aesthetic and some out of control, which I have mentioned already. But ultimately audio is also really a matter of taste and preferences. Let's enjoy our beloved music.

 

I think you will like this: