I have the Mission V63 floor standing speakers (these won EISA back in the day), they are a very large twin woofer speaker and although I really have enjoyed them I am starting to find them a bit too bassy (average size living room) so I decided to try an experiment, I brought my Wharfedale 9.1's from the bedroom which I use with a Denon M39 and hooked them up to my main hi-fi, I cannot believe how much more I am enjoying the sound, I don't miss the boomy bass and the vocals seem like she's singing in the room (I am listening to Rumer as I type this), anyway the Wharfedale's will need to go back upstairs tonight and I would like some new speaker suggestions to replace the Mission's, I am thinking standmount and a big bigger than the 9.1's, my listening range is vast, everything from BBC R4 drama's to Queen to pop and esp female vocal like Lana Del Ray, Rumer, Lorde etc, budget would be max of £500 not including stands. My amp is class A rated and max power (not in class A) 95 wpc. Thank you for any input.
New, less bassy speaker recommendations
- Thread starter kitkat
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TrevC
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You do what?
Put the Missions back on and if you have tone controls then set your treble to -/+0 and the bass has low as possible.
Then increase the bass in single increments till happy.
A pair of standmounts on stands will have the same footprint and leave you a couple hundred quid lighter.
Try the tone controls and then decide. Consider you're not happy with the 'pure' sound.
You have nothing to lose.
By the way what amp do you own?
Put the Missions back on and if you have tone controls then set your treble to -/+0 and the bass has low as possible.
Then increase the bass in single increments till happy.
A pair of standmounts on stands will have the same footprint and leave you a couple hundred quid lighter.
Try the tone controls and then decide. Consider you're not happy with the 'pure' sound.
You have nothing to lose.
By the way what amp do you own?
kitkat said:
TrevC said:
Don't discourage him, he has come to the realisation that big floorstanding Missions are in fact, in all but the biggest rooms, quite horrendous.
Tone controls are not going to effect the quality of the bass, it will be just as bad, just quieter.
To the op, do yourself a favour and check out good standmounts, if you can find them, try the new Epos K1, if you need to go close to a wall, the Neat Iota.
I have to disagree Dave. Which is why I suggest he 'try' ....
The bass tone usually allows the bass to be reduced pretty low - provided he had no loudness buttons turned on.
He should hopefully get a similar response to a large standmount. Turning the bass up in increments he may find a happy medium.
Them speakers have won awards being mission the mid range should be good....
A little adjustment is all that's required the footprint is the same has a standmount on a stand.
The bass tone usually allows the bass to be reduced pretty low - provided he had no loudness buttons turned on.
He should hopefully get a similar response to a large standmount. Turning the bass up in increments he may find a happy medium.
Them speakers have won awards being mission the mid range should be good....
A little adjustment is all that's required the footprint is the same has a standmount on a stand.
davedotco said:
How can you agree with that?
It makes no sense,
Have you used tone controls before?
It makes no sense,
Have you used tone controls before?
Vladimir said:
Thompsonuxb said:
He said quality, not quantity. Reducing bass with tone controls does just that, it reduces the amount of bass. But if you really want better bass in qualitative sense (performance), then you need better speakers. An upgrade.
I think the OP here is not after a real upgrade but change of sound. He liked SMs and he will use those now for a certain period. Nothing wrong with that. Certanly doesn't mean the Missions are bad.
Thompsonuxb said:
Speaker positioning should be tried before opening the wallet. The room modes are more likely to deserve a blame than the speakers. However, IME the OP just has an itch, he wants a change. Let's call it 'an upgrade' even though at £500 I really doubt there will be one. There will most likely be worse bass compared to the floorstanders but less of it, which is the lazy way of not fixing the real culprit - the room.
People who truly upgrade don't go from floorstanders to stoundmounts. They buy better floorstanders and fix their room acoustics. Those that really just want change often go from FS to SM.
Sorry Vlad that's just not true - reducing bass via tone controls will help to reduce boom and allow the woofer to operate within spec, like reducing the volume.
One of the problems with no tone control amps is the need for shifting your speakers around the room hoping to find a sweet spot.
If he has them use them.
One of the problems with no tone control amps is the need for shifting your speakers around the room hoping to find a sweet spot.
If he has them use them.
Vladimir said:
Thompsonuxb said:
If the floorstanders were any good then you might have a point, but they are not. Big boxes with cheap drive units are, more or less boomboxes. Reducing the level of the boom will not magically improve the quality of the bass.
Tone controls may help balance decent controled speakers to suit a room, no one is suggesting otherwise but in this case, the fact that the OP found beer budget 9.1s to sound better says it all.
As a minimum, I would think that playing with the tone controls may help to have a better idea of what's wrong with the bass—e.g., resonances, low damping factor, boomy speakers. Knowing this would be useful to narrow down possible solutions.
chebby
Well-known member
kitkat said:
Excellent. Go with your plan and get the standmounts. £500 should give you plenty of choice.
davedotco said:
If he tries the floorstander version of those Wharfedales, with those same drivers, just bigger box and better distribution of labor between drivers, he will still like the standmounts better. If the bass room modes are an issue, he can do speaker positioning, bass traps, DSP, tone controls etc. but he wont. It's not purist and traps are an eye sore. This is a specific paradox in hi-fi, called differentitis. IME what he will be getting is less and different, and that translates to less but better. Many times in Hi-Fi we opt out for worse thinking it is better simply because it sounds different.
He will also get cheap £20 drivers in the £500 new standmounts, but with one midbass driver pushing both bass and trying to convey detailed midrange half way with the tweeter. Doesn't sound like an upgrade to me, more like a downgrade just with less bass due to the inherent limitation of the design (physics, doh!).
Ah. Nothing beats a fresh second cup of coffee and some useless generalizations at noon.
I would go with the stand mount suggestion though that by no means guarantees better (or less) bass.
There are plenty of floorstanders who's bass rolls off as quick as some smaller boxes.
Another thing the OP could of course try is stuffing or part-blocking the ports. I do that even with most stand mounts as I absolutely dislike boom and the time-smear often present with open ports. - It's not ideal as ported speakers have been designed to optimally function with the things open but it's the closest to IB and I often prefer it that way.
I have a small and very fast sub I can switch in if I wanted/needed more bass.
There are plenty of floorstanders who's bass rolls off as quick as some smaller boxes.
Another thing the OP could of course try is stuffing or part-blocking the ports. I do that even with most stand mounts as I absolutely dislike boom and the time-smear often present with open ports. - It's not ideal as ported speakers have been designed to optimally function with the things open but it's the closest to IB and I often prefer it that way.
I have a small and very fast sub I can switch in if I wanted/needed more bass.
Kitkat.
Try this, if you haven't already.
Place your speakers right in the corners of your room facing you (you can do this with your Missions and your Wharfedales plus any other speakers you try).
Play some music.
Slowly pull the speakers out into the room towards you.
At some point the bass should snap into focus.
Adjust the toe-in (the angle of the speakers) till you get the tonal balance that sounds best to you on a wide range of recordings.
Are the speakers in a position that is domestically acceptable to you? If not either change the speakers or change the room around or change the furniture or room treatment (or lack of it).
Do the speakers sound good enough to you in their optimum position (bass-wise in your room)? If not change the speakers.
If the bass never snaps into focus, change your speakers or your room (probably easier to change the speakers).
Try this, if you haven't already.
Place your speakers right in the corners of your room facing you (you can do this with your Missions and your Wharfedales plus any other speakers you try).
Play some music.
Slowly pull the speakers out into the room towards you.
At some point the bass should snap into focus.
Adjust the toe-in (the angle of the speakers) till you get the tonal balance that sounds best to you on a wide range of recordings.
Are the speakers in a position that is domestically acceptable to you? If not either change the speakers or change the room around or change the furniture or room treatment (or lack of it).
Do the speakers sound good enough to you in their optimum position (bass-wise in your room)? If not change the speakers.
If the bass never snaps into focus, change your speakers or your room (probably easier to change the speakers).
Lol....this thread is getting interesting,
Kit Kat we need an update from you. What amp do you have and does it have tone controls?
Have you tried turning the bass down, and what's your opinion?.... The suspense is murder.
:-D
Kit Kat we need an update from you. What amp do you have and does it have tone controls?
Have you tried turning the bass down, and what's your opinion?.... The suspense is murder.
:-D
Vladimir said:
If you actually believe that, then I despair for you.
Good hi-fi in the home is all about balance, balance the system and balance the system to the room.
Your obsession with bandwith is taking your eye off the ball, you have been coming out with some very strange things lately, perhaps you should return the 'Bluffers Guide' you seem to have recently aquired, before you really start believing all the garbage you have been purveying lately.
The OP is beginning to wise up, understanding that all the boom and bluster of cheap floorstanders has little to do with hi-fi and nothing to do with music, you should be encouraging him to move forward, not holding him back.
A decent pair of stand mounts can often be the best choice in a smaller room, room reinforcement with floorstanders in such a room can give unwanted bass depth & in most domestic setting there is often a limited amount of adjustment in speaker placement & adding bass traps etc. may not be conducive to marital happiness (I can vouch for that) - In the room my system is in I'm much happier with stand mounts than several floorstanders I tried over the years.
The argument that a single driver will be struggling to convey bass & midrange doesn't hold much water IMO, though it's a nice party trick & would mean all full range drivers are useless? - Stand mount speakers cannot have some resonance issues that a larger speaker has (and will need work by the designer to suppress) simply due to physics - IMO you have to pay substantially more to get the same quality in a floorstander than in a stand mount albeit at the loss of some bass frequencies that lots of people don't miss, this can often for some include neighbours.
The argument that a single driver will be struggling to convey bass & midrange doesn't hold much water IMO, though it's a nice party trick & would mean all full range drivers are useless? - Stand mount speakers cannot have some resonance issues that a larger speaker has (and will need work by the designer to suppress) simply due to physics - IMO you have to pay substantially more to get the same quality in a floorstander than in a stand mount albeit at the loss of some bass frequencies that lots of people don't miss, this can often for some include neighbours.
davedotco said:
Since you've increased in viscosity to 3 insults per post, it's pointless for me to try and discuss with arguments like gents any further.
I think a more balanced sound can be had with wide bandwith floorstanders rather than midbass humped standmounts. You think otherwise. So be it.
Myers said:
Standmounts have sifgnificantly higher distortion, less linearity, less bandwith, less efficiency, less SPL, smaller wall of sound, and the tweeter on ear axis is really playing on knee axis. Less cabinet resonance really outweighs all that?
If your room reinforces bass, just turn the bass control down. Or is that not purist enough?
Vladimir said:
The highest distortion in speakers is, oddly enough, most often not from the drive units (though they can easily distort into double figures) ... but the port. As with everything, there is no free lunch.
If you want less distortion, buy an Electrostatic.
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