Any objective measurements available for Audio Products ( eg Indiq audio)

[Vineethkumar01]

Hi
Seeing the popularity of Indiq audio speakers in our forum, I am curious to know if there are any objective specifications/measurements of the speakers available other than the manufacturer specs. For example, a basic on-axis frequency response measurement. Being a newbie to audio, and since a lot of forum members find the sound of these speakers very good, I am just curious to know if the subjectively described audio quality also reflects in the measurements.

Thanks

 

[Credoh]

Hi
Seeing the popularity of Indiq audio speakers in our forum, I am curious to know if there are any objective specifications/measurements of the speakers available other than the manufacturer specs. For example, a basic on-axis frequency response measurement. Being a newbie to audio, and since a lot of forum members find the sound of these speakers very good, I am just curious to know if the subjectively described audio quality also reflects in the measurements.

Thanks

+1
It would be great if any current owners with access to measurement equipment or Indiq themselves could provide some clarity on this.

 

[Vineethkumar01]

+1
It would be great if any current owners with access to measurement equipment or Indiq themselves could provide some clarity on this.

Hi,
Asking for measurements from IndiQ was a mistake from my part. I received ample flak and hatred for it in the past. So I don't bother about it these days. To me, measurements are nice to have as a reference for understanding more about the technical parameters of a speaker. But they are not the end. Subjective listening impressions and measurements maybe correlated with one's preferences while making purchase decisions.

I myself had talked to Amit from IndiQ audio regarding any publicly available measurements of their speakers. They told they measure on axis, 30, 45, and 60 degree off axis ,etc during design stage. They also make individual adjustments to suit their customer's preferences. However they were reluctant to make the measurements public at the time.

 

[Hari Iyer]

I don't understand what's so secret about making measurements public. Not providing measurements may actually hamper sales. Many speaker buyers ask me about opinions and i can't probably go around listening to them to provide my inputs. So I rely on measured results for my opinion. A friend asked me about India speakers and i told him it's your risk as I don't see any measurements to suggest. So atleast in this case they lost one customer.

If the measured results are good, the speaker designer will be happy and proud to publish them. Only if they have something to hide they won't provide. Again thats me.

 

[arj]

I don't understand what's so secret about making measurements public. Not providing measurements may actually hamper sales. Many speaker buyers ask me about opinions and i can't probably go around listening to them to provide my inputs. So I rely on measured results for my opinion. A friend asked me about India speakers and i told him it's your risk as I don't see any measurements to suggest. So atleast in this case they lost one customer.

If the measured results are good, the speaker designer will be happy and proud to publish them. Only if they have something to hide they won't provide. Again thats me.

Hi Hari, My understanding was that most global manufacturers do not provide specs. Whats available is done by 3rd party folks who either borrow or buy that piece of equipment so dont think its just about indian manufacturers

I would turn it around and actually consider how many people buy using these measurement since most of us would not even know what to look for.

I once remember asking Bobby Palkovich of Merlin speakers for measurements before buying it ( eg 10db point etc) but he got upset. I did end up buying the speaker and afterwards he did mention is that if you publish the specs there is so much of ignorance and grey areas around specs that anyone can interpret irrelevant conclusions or misinformation which would go against the speaker and get publicized

I would not be surprised if less than 1% of those who buy Hifi ( which might be less than 5% of those buying audio equipment) actually would be able to read specs the right way.

Owners almost always have an ownership bias. so taking an owners view has its own risk. In the end if you buy it you would not trash it since its either saying your decision was wrong or it affect its second sale, but a good indicator is how long they kept it and what they upgraded to. While an upgrade 2x+ times the price is understandable anything else could be a lateral and hence something they missed as many of the finer points only come up after a long term ownership.

Of course there are exceptions. .long term experience of owners who listen to other equipment usually may have a better relevance.

 

[raghupb]

<snip>
I would not be surprised is less than 1% of those who buy Hifi ( which might be less than5% of those buying audio equipment) actually would be able to read specs the right way.

<snip>

Absolutely true. The 95% of the folks don't care about measurements and other fuss.
They just listen once or twice. If it sounds okay they buy the equipment/speakers.
Many here are designers, agreed. Measurements may make sense to them.
For most it's a non issue.

Now waiting for this thread to descend into a tangential and bizarre debate.

Cheers,
Raghu

 

[Kapeel]

Do measurements define music? A discussion with Harley

 

[Vineethkumar01]

Coming back to measurements regarding IndiQ bookshelf-type speakers, I think they would have done a pretty good job for the money given that they could have (apart from the surface-mounted tweeters, which (I brought up in some thread) was what originally triggered the whole discussion that spiraled into a situation where mods had to close the thread down . ).
Take the tweeters, for example. If the peerless/tympany tweeter they use is this one (which I guess it was, back then): https://hificompass.com/en/speakers/measurements/peerless/peerless-bc25tg15-04

It has really good consistency in off-axes responses (upto about 15k). Clearly this is one of the best budget/ value for money fabric dome tweeters around.
Here, https://www.indiqaudio.com/diamond-achal-3-way-towers, they say they cross it to the 6.5inch mid around 2.8kHz, a point where this tweeter is comfortable and not even 3dB down from its axial magnitude response and about an octave high above its resonant frequency. This is a good place to cross for that tweeter.

They say, they use 6.5inch polypropylene cone mid driver(s). Usually well made polypropylene mids have a "warm" sound due to their higher 2nd harmonic content. But they offer adequate resolution and are pretty forgiving drivers for the money due to lack of nasty cone break ups higher up in frequency. This means, a passive crossover-wise one may not need to spend a lot. So again driver-wise it is a good choice.
Crossing a 6.5inch driver to a direct radiating (without a waveguide) tweeter at around 3k may not be a good directivity match, in general, given that some of the baffle/cabinet diffraction artifacts are now in the passband of the mid. But if it doesn't matter in subjective listening, I guess it doesn't matter to people who are interested. For full information, one cannot go guessing like above and need to look at full speaker polar measurements in a format like above

Now put these in an appropriate sized minimal baffle, well-damped box, take care of bass alignment, axial modes and port pipe resonances, you got a reasonable good bass reflex speaker on a budget.

Disclaimer: The above analysis is just guesswork from my side for a speaker like the IndiQ speakers. I don't know the actual drivers used or their specs and measurements. So the above may not be accurate in terms of describing the Indiq speakers. But in general, looking at the speaker and looking at existing 3rd party driver measurements, this is as far as I can go guesswork-wise. For anything more, one needs more polar measurement data and listening impressions..

 

[Kannan]

https://www.linkwitzlab.com/Loudspeaker-Room/tests&measurements.htm

This is an old article but an excellent one in understanding speaker measurement, impact of room responce and how to evaluate sans it.

 

[Hari Iyer]

Hi Hari, My understanding was that most global manufacturers do not provide specs. Whats available is done by 3rd party folks who either borrow or buy that piece of equipment so dont think its just about indian manufacturers

I would turn it around and actually consider how many people buy using these measurement since most of us would not even know what to look for.

I once remember asking Bobby Palkovich of Merlin speakers for measurements before buying it ( eg 10db point etc) but he got upset. I did end up buying the speaker and afterwards he did mention is that if you publish the specs there is so much of ignorance and grey areas around specs that anyone can interpret irrelevant conclusions or misinformation which would go against the speaker and get publicized

I would not be surprised if less than 1% of those who buy Hifi ( which might be less than 5% of those buying audio equipment) actually would be able to read specs the right way.

Owners almost always have an ownership bias. so taking an owners view has its own risk. In the end if you buy it you would not trash it since its either saying your decision was wrong or it affect its second sale, but a good indicator is how long they kept it and what they upgraded to. While an upgrade 2x+ times the price is understandable anything else could be a lateral and hence something they missed as many of the finer points only come up after a long term ownership.

Of course there are exceptions. .long term experience of owners who listen to other equipment usually may have a better relevance.

In a world where designers don't use measurements in India ( i know couple of them btw but don't recollect names now) where they use their own ears and own source materials, own hardware, own room to decide crossover frequency and later built them using crossover components ( resistors, capacitors, inductors) and later even fine tune by their own esr and later say that it's state of the art loudspeaker tuned by ear ( btw it's their own ears / room) , expecting any final measurements like asking for too much.

IME, only those who don't understand how to read measurements are totally against it. No offence here. But how the heck can I otherwise judge them without listening. Do you expect me to travel 1000km spending 20000 rupees only to listen these speakers? Where i could have done reasonably well just looking at the graphs at no cost and time. Almost all Indian manufactrers don't have an anechoic room to measure loudspeakers. Those who claim they have measured have done it in their room. So the measurements may not hold true for the buyers room Even when i DIY speakers for others I keep this in mind and never measure below 200 Hz as frequencies below that are dominated by the room. I always tune speakers for their off-axis response as most off listeners are listening to off-axis.

One of the biggest issues with building with listening is you don't have any reference. It depends on the day you are listening, the source materials, your hardware, your mood etc which can drastically vary over the days.

In my own current build too I liked what I listened but later found some issues in midbass. Later I found with measured results issue with the mid bass. This week I have fixed them. Now i listen to them again and found the speakers very neutral. I have yet to measure them. Shall do this weekend and post results later

 

[arj]

True, most people buy stuff with the belief that the designer have used all measurements and engineering to make it good.
And just because you dont look at it does not mean you are against it. eg if I do buy a mercedes, I will not look at all engineering specs but buy with the belief that it is well engineered by people who have measured and specced it in the best possible way for that price

Point was not that measurements are bad. just that they are not published due to various reasons

 

[Vineethkumar01]

Just to add, we don't necessarily need anechoic chambers to take usable speaker frequency response measurements, at least for typical box shaped 2 way type speakers. Gated polar measurements with a calibrated mic is sufficient to draw useful inferences from the data for whoever understands them. We can argue a lot about room responses, but typically any frequency above 1-2kHz is speaker response dominated regime. This is where we also have better resolution with gated measurements. Hence having it offers more value to those who like to see it and make inferences.
Below 400 Hz is where one would do better with ground plane measurements and nearfield measurements to understand anechoic performance. But again this is room/environment dominated regime where EQ is almost a necessity to tame issues to some extent. Otherwise one would need alternate speaker concept like cardioid radiating ones etc where we sacrifice in level of bass (without going to big drivers) but have directional radiation not hitting front walls and to a limited extent, sidewalls.
Someone like Kimmo Saunisto, can compute directivity plots in his mind seeing the drivers and reading minimal information about it, but for the rest of us mortals, measurements are needed to understand technical aspects like those..
Anyways, measurements are a useful tool. I for one cannot do anything much without it.
But as I said before, it is not the end. To what extent manufacturers publish it and people use it in their purchase decisions is their choice.

 

[Hari Iyer]

Imo only the most talented and experienced designers can design by ears. For novice likee i will have to rely on measured results only. It also depends on how much exposure you have to live music - both electronics and non-electronics. If you don't have much exposure to live music it's better to stick to measured results as you don't have any reference to design your speaker. At the most you can record your own voice or your spouse voice, your other family members voice and playback to draw a comparison for voicing. I am currently recording my outdoor traffic noise and playing them to see how they sound on my speakers. Are they real or artificial.

 

[square_wave]

Almost always, widely accepted and most revered speakers in the world all have a base foundation on some basic measurements. But that is just the basic foundation. And measurements are taken in an anechoic chamber that does not resemble typical listening environment in anyway. Almost always, these speakers go through a further refinement where the ART comes into play. And this is where the final design and magic takes place. Usually this phase is quite long and the most critical. It determines the final personality of the speaker and makes or breaks the design in the market.

It is quite easy to make a well measuring loudspeaker. All the tools are now easily available. But that does not guarantee a great sounding speaker.

In your case, the speaker designer has probably gone though all these phases and made something that works in a typical Indian home and satisfy the demographic that it is targeted at.

I remember someone telling me that original Usher 718be had different voicing for the model sold in the US as compared to the Asian ones. They had take into account the furnishings of the typical American home when they finalised design. That speaker had awesome measurements. But there were many who did not like that speaker. I know people who totally loved them as well.

Listen and see if it works for you with your music and environment. That is what the designer wants you to do. Hence, that is the best approach. Like another poster said, measurements can be misconstrued by people who does not have real loudspeaker production and design experience. Forums like ASR have put measurements on a higher pedestal than it should be.

An additional observation about the Usher 718be since we are talking measurements. Many years back when the Ushers were very popular, a speaker designer told me that the Ushers are quite accurate speakers especially from an anechoic measurements context. On a mag like stereophile, it will win kudos. But will it be universally accepted ? No, it will not be. When you design to a price point, you may have to deviate purposefully from textbook measurements during testing in real world conditions and for the price point to make a speaker that works even better. Some bookshelf speakers that sound bigger ( bassier ) than it should be are actually deviations from textbook measurements. Purposefully done. But end of the day if what matters is musical satisfaction. So be it ! Ears are more complex than mics apparently. Some anomalies seen by a mic can look bad on a graph but they actually sound nicer to the human ear in a typical home environment and will evoke the same emotions that a live performance would elicit ( The absolute sound approach as compared to the stereophile one ). Take your pick!

 

[Enkay78]

95% don't care about measurements because they are being brainwashed by the influencers/marketing/boutique sellers and myth mongerers.


Once people get more educated about measurements, things will come around. Research has proven so many times that measurements related with speakers/sonic preferences of trained and untrained ears. Most of the people have a common preference of frequency curve.

Its actually the muddiness of voodoo in consumer hi-fi sector that's playing SPOILSPORT for a healthy hobby.

Personally I see changes coming around. In future measurement(s) is going to play a big factor in decision making. And yes evidences are mounting where the subjectives reviews are being ratified with measurements........and yes vice versa.

For me good measurements are a must foundation for my buying decisions. It's about transparency for design/engineering and trust. So much like Evidence Based Medicine (EBM), I am banking for a Evidence Based HiFidelity (EBH). (and yes its coming around to this....just watch the hifi space for few years more).

 

[Hari Iyer]

95% don't care about measurements because they are being brainwashed by the influencers/marketing/boutique sellers and myth mongerers.


Once people get more educated about measurements, things will come around. Research has proven so many times that measurements related with speakers/sonic preferences of trained and untrained ears. Most of the people have a common preference of frequency curve.

Its actually the muddiness of voodoo in consumer hi-fi sector that's playing SPOILSPORT for a healthy hobby.

Personally I see changes coming around. In future measurement(s) is going to play a big factor in decision making. And yes evidences are mounting where the subjectives reviews are being ratified with measurements........and yes vice versa.

For me good measurements are a must foundation for my buying decisions. It's about transparency for design/engineering and trust. So much like Evidence Based Medicine (EBM), I am banking for a Evidence Based HiFidelity (EBH). (and yes its coming around to this....just watch the hifi space for few years more).

+1 to this. Can't agree more with my own understanding.

 

[mbhangui]

Once people get more educated about measurements, things will come around. Research has proven so many times that measurements related with speakers/sonic preferences of trained and untrained ears. Most of the people have a common preference of frequency curve.

Personally I see changes coming around. In future measurement(s) is going to play a big factor in decision making. And yes evidences are mounting where the subjectives reviews are being ratified with measurements........and yes vice versa.

For me good measurements are a must foundation for my buying decisions. It's about transparency for design/engineering and trust. So much like Evidence Based Medicine (EBM), I am banking for a Evidence Based HiFidelity (EBH). (and yes its coming around to this....just watch the hifi space for few years more).

Totally agree. What you hear is not what goes inside the ears but a complex mechanism involving the brain. And the brain gets fooled. To the person listening the illusion, even if it is not the reality, is very real. And that's why there is lot of vodoo involved.
A good example is medicine. There are people who swear by alternative medicine even though most have been proven nothing more than placebo. I won't take any name of such alternate medicines because people get hurt if you tell them the medicine is nothing more than a placebo. There are other things too like religion, language, food choices, clothing and the slightest criticism of such things have actually started enough wars and caused bloodshed.
I too believe in measurements and proper science alone for answers. But the correct thing to do is accept everyone has their own personal choices and even if it sounds bizarre, we must learn to accept the plurality of choices.

 

[square_wave]

During the first few stages of a new loudspeaker design, the initial goal is to get to the best measuring iteration to set a baseline model. They usually sound non-optimal in typical listening environments. Are you guys okay with sending that to the market ?

If arriving at the best measuring loudspeaker using current methods is the pinnacle of loudspeaker design, then loudspeaker design is a very technical process and quite easy to do. Like KFC chicken process.

 

[Vineethkumar01]

A loudspeaker design is always a balancing act between goals that one wants to achieve and the trade offs one is willing to accept.
Here is a legend of a speaker designer's opinion about objective and subjective aspects involved in loudspeaker design. (Posts 176 and 177)

VituixCAD v2 - HTGuide Forum

For information, VituixCAD speaker simulator has been updated from version 1.1 to 2.0 with the following additions and changes (so far): Crossover schematic changed from formal block ladder to free form supporting unconventional topologies. Predefined passive blocks replaced with individual...

www.htguide.com

and here is his advice for those who want to achieve "accurate" reproduction of music through speakers as it would have been perceived if one was present in the place it was recorded.

Trade-offs in loudspeaker design

Isn't that generally understood just as it is generally understood we compare a best case against a best case not a best case against a worst case? Best case against best is utopia and still subjective - and so is best case against worst. For example I can compare some live events (possible to...

www.diyaudio.com

I especially like the last two lines, hence quoting here:
"Build personal church if realistic reverb, spaciousness and envelopment are the main interests in the music reproduction and that sound field is decided to be the only correct. If maximum dynamics, buy dynamite, explode indoors and listen as long as you hear and feed something."

How about that..

 

[Kannan]

95% don't care about measurements because they are being brainwashed by the influencers/marketing/boutique sellers and myth mongerers.

Pretty dogmatic and pompous, especially the brainwashed part.

You own the Kali speakers which possibly attracted you as they publish detailed specs and measurements which you porbably correlated to you listening justification aswell before buying.

Let me give an example of Dynaudio, a company in existence for almost 50 years.
They cater to
1. Home audio customers where the 95% so-termed brainwashed customers fall,
2. Studio professionals
3. Car audio (both OEM and open market)
4. Turnkey projects

If you look at their Home Audio offerings, you will find basic specs like 99% of all leading brands do, but no measurements
If you look at their studio series, you will find detalied specs and measurements
The same goes with open market car audio series as lots of customization take place due to vagaries of car environments

You will find this essential feature with almost all speaker manufacturers who build for both studio professionals and home listeners.

The intention of not providing measurements is not with an intent to cheat or influence. It is simply because it does not serve any purpose to a large percentage of home audio customers.

It is altogether a different scenario with studio professionals as these line of speakers are used for music reproduction is a professional environment like a treated space like a studio.