Reviewing tech is a funny business: not quite as subjective as critiquing music or art and certainly not as confined to cold, hard facts as investigative reporting. Technology reviews walk a constant tightrope between stats, specs and subjectivity.
Just three months into my new role as a staff writer here at What Hi-Fi?, that tightrope has been where I’ve spent most of my time, cutting my teeth, veering this way and that, and learning an awful lot with each pair of speakers I test in our dedicated listening rooms. Luckily, the experienced staff at What Hi-Fi? are always on-hand to make sure that the final verdict is the right one.
Having previously worked in recording studios, and beyond that spending hours immemorial listening to all sorts of music on all (and I mean all) sorts of systems – I’ll always have a guilty affection for the sound of heavily aliased YouTube downloads on my early teens Blackberry mobile – these ears have been around the block… and back again.
But every day is a school day, and in the process of reviewing floorstanding speakers, standmounters and active speakers with Bluetooth from brands such as Dali, Monitor Audio and Fyne Audio, some of the things I’ve learned have come as a genuine surprise.
Lesson one: tighten your spikes
The first of these revelations arrived while testing a pair of floorstanders. After screwing in the spikes, getting them upright, positioned and plugged in, the speakers sounded muddy in the low end, somewhat unfocused in terms of their soundstage and dynamically, more than a little bit flat. In other words, they sounded pretty disappointing.
When I reported my dismay to our technical editor, Ketan Bharadia, his eyes lit up – not quite the reaction I had expected.
“How tightly did you screw the spikes in?” He asked.
And, lo and behold, once we turned the speakers on their heads and used a spanner to screw in the spikes, ensuring they were all level, all the issues I had been having with their sound cleared up.
This dramatic effect on sound quality arises because loose spikes add mechanical instability to the precisely engineered cabinets, allowing them to vibrate excessively against the floor, hindering the transmission of energy between the drivers and the air. Lesson learned.
Lesson two: Be fussy about positioning
A slightly more obvious surprise has been how significantly small adjustments in positioning can affect the sound of a pair of speakers.
While testing, we spend a lot of time finding the optimal placement for the speakers under review. Some manufacturers, as I discovered while reviewing Dali’s excellent Sonik 5 floorstanders, design their speakers to face straight out into the room, while others suggest angling them in towards the listening position. It is always worth consulting the manufacturer's advice on this front.
But angling is far from the only consideration. Generally, moving speakers closer to a rear wall will make them sound bassier, while bringing them forward will improve the stereo image at the cost of low end.
Angling speakers will have an effect on stereo imaging, as will widening the gap between them – the wider apart the speakers are, the broader the soundstage becomes, but beware taking things too far and causing a central ‘hole’.
Ultimately every speaker and room are different, so there’s no one-size-fits-all method for placement. However, because they are part of one system, it’s worth making sure your speakers and room are working together as effectively as possible.
My main lesson here: experiment with positioning for longer than you think you should.
So, with spikes screwed in and speakers in position, we can finally get down to some serious listening. And it is here, dear reader, that things get really interesting.
Lesson three: Get rhythm(ic drive)
While evaluating the sound of a speaker, there are certain obvious criteria: is the sound clear and free of distortion? Are the frequencies well balanced? Are dynamics impactful and expressive?
All fair, vital assessments of a speaker’s performance. But another critical feature, which I hadn’t thought much about before I arrived at the What Hi-Fi? offices, is the quality of a speaker’s rhythmic drive.
“Cut the jargon, boffin!” I hear you cry. “What do you mean by rhythmic drive?”
Rhythmic drive, put simply, describes a speaker’s ability to convey pace and energy. It’s a measure of how well a speaker provides a sense of propulsion and forward momentum.
If a speaker has weak rhythmic drive, fast, complex rhythms will feel sluggish and underwhelming. Conversely, a speaker with strong rhythmic drive will sound snappy and alert, pulling you along irresistibly with the music.
Stomping feet and tapping toes are a handy litmus test for this particular quality.
In general, the body’s response to music can be revealing. Wincing might indicate too much volume or harsh high-frequencies; feeling relaxed could arise from a well-balanced frequency response; unexpected tears might mean the speakers are squeezing every last drop of emotion out of that one Sufjan Stevens track that still reminds you of your ex – or perhaps the speakers are just that terrible.
All of which is to say, technicalities aside, that a great pair of speakers should make you feel. Music is expression and listening is an emotionally involved process. At the end of the day, a great pair of speakers shouldn’t distract from the communication between the artist and the listener. In the very best of cases, top-notch speakers will make that process even easier – just make sure you take the time to set them up properly.
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