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I've had around half a dozen pairs of BeoLab 5's at home over the years - and I have to say they all sounded different in some way.
I had a pair from brand new up until they were almost 4 years old - and now have a 7 year old pair in my lounge. They do seem to sound nicer as they age - but that could be just my ears.
As mentioned, I always calibrate mine in the centre of a double storey 5,000 sq/ft warehouse and it really opens them up!
Lee
As mentioned, I always calibrate mine in the centre of a double storey 5,000 sq/ft warehouse and it really opens them up!
Lee
If b&o calibration is that bad in implimentation then the best thing would be for the manufacturer to skip it all together. The idea for a calibration with a microphone is to have a means for a pure soundstage in the listening room and not in a warehouse you don't listen in. I am shocked to hear this and if true b&o sound is totally of the list for me instead of lyngdorf or some other manufacturer.
This can't be true can it?
If b&o calibration is that bad in implimentation then the best thing would be for the manufacturer to skip it all together. The idea for a calibration with a microphone is to have a means for a pure soundstage in the listening room and not in a warehouse you don't listen in. I am shocked to hear this and if true b&o sound is totally of the list for me instead of lyngdorf or some other manufacturer.
This can't be true can it?
They're calibrated, I assume, to make them acoustically correct for the room they are in. A lot of software goes into this - and by the time they are calibrated they are what B&O consider perfect....
However, we don't always like 'perfect' as individuals. How many of us turn Loudness 'On' - or crank up the treble and bass? That's meddling with the intended 'pure' reproduction of the music and tweaking it to a sound we prefer isn't it?
I calibrate mine for a much bigger space than they are to be played in because I like that sound. Simple.
Lee
🙂
I calibrate mine for a much bigger space than they are to be played in because I like that sound. Simple.
Lee
🙂
Ok, so the old one take the speakers home to testdrive them is true as always, to listen if you like the sound yourself. Good to hear as that is easy to understand as everyone has different taste in sound.
If b&o calibration is that bad in implimentation then the best thing would be for the manufacturer to skip it all together. The idea for a calibration with a microphone is to have a means for a pure soundstage in the listening room and not in a warehouse you don't listen in. I am shocked to hear this and if true b&o sound is totally of the list for me instead of lyngdorf or some other manufacturer.
This can't be true can it?
They're calibrated, I assume, to make them acoustically correct for the room they are in. A lot of software goes into this - and by the time they are calibrated they are what B&O consider perfect....
However, we don't always like 'perfect' as individuals. How many of us turn Loudness 'On' - or crank up the treble and bass? That's meddling with the intended 'pure' reproduction of the music and tweaking it to a sound we prefer isn't it?
I calibrate mine for a much bigger space than they are to be played in because I like that sound. Simple.
Lee
🙂
I'd be interested to know more about the BL5 calibration process, never having (nor ever likely to have) owned them. Where and what exactly is the mic measuring and what can you tell the speaker about the room geometry? I hope Martin can shed some light on the science behind the auto-calibration process and show it to be useful, reliable and dependable rather than a gimmick on what is a top of the range speaker.
My own (maybe simplistic) thoughts are that rather than just measuring the speaker response where it's at, the mic should be at the listening position to properly know what is happening in a given space, as properly controlling bass in a corner (for example) still makes no allowance for room dimensions, reflections or furnishings etc elsewhere in the room.
My own feelings would be, mess with the manufacturers settings at your peril or only with your sellers agreement that if you run the calibration process and they are worse then they will take them back.
The measurement/adjustment of the BL5 only affects the low bass from what I understand. Recalibrating them in the center of a huge warehouse is about as close to rebaselining them in a anechoic chamber as you can get without actually having an anechoic chamber.
I suspect they may not calibrate properly in all rooms though you'd think B&O would have tried them in enough different rooms to not have that problem. I also suspect that more often it is the listener...very few people have ever heard properly calibrated bass without a ton of listening room standing wave and other issues, if you look at enough low freq plots of different rooms (back when I did room analysis as a hobby/part time gig) most rooms are awful. I think a lot of people perceive deep, ACCURATE bass as weak bass.
Well , I'll always found the BL5 to be lacking in the midrange department and therefore be a bit harsh/cold sounding, so it doesn't have to be a faulty pair.
Regarding calibration I used to place them in the middle of the room when running the calibration to get "ok" bass output.
I think the BL5 measures mostly reverberation in the room and that makes them overcompensate a bit in a more "live" sounding room.
Needless to say I sold my pair after 1.5 year and never looked back, but I do miss the styling!
Would it still be thin sounding if calibration was done outdoors?
I can't find the reference again but I think I mentioned this somewhere in the archived forum.
There was a publication covering the unintended consequences of engineering design, and the BL5 was given as an example. B&O considered how many times the BL5 might need to be recalibrated on house or room moves etc and designed the software to accommodate 200 recalibrations thinking that this would be more than enough.
The unintended and unforeseen outcome was that because many owners apparently like to demonstrate to visitors how clever their BL5's are with the little microphone popping in and out etc. the 200 recalibrations possible is often exhausted.
Perhaps Geoff Martin could comment.
Graham
EDIT
If the above is true, is it possible to replace a module or chip in the BL5's to restore the recalibration software?
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