Hi! It's been more than three months since I've bought a pair of Mackie HR 824 active studio monitors. I promised to write some impressions quite some time ago, but I haven't done it mainly because of lack of time. I'm going to try it now. Unfortunately, I don't have many terms of refference - mainly a Technics / Yamaha (or Technics) / Vieta PL10i loudspeakers system, a Cambridge / Cambridge / Dynaudio Audience 42 loudspeakers and (briefly) an expensive Marantz / Marantz / Jamo Concert 8 loudspeakers, but all of them from the memory and in different rooms. My most reliable term of reference, then, is a headphone: my AKG K501. Maybe the Senn HD600 too (from the memory).
Please take into account that I put the Mackies a pair of stands improvised from some heavy, rectangular concrete blocks of the kind used (at least in my country) for building the side of the sidewalk. Also, my 4m width / 3.5m depth / 2.5m heigth room with too much furniture is less than perfect from an audiophile point of view, especially with respect to the low bass resonances. The speakers are positioned almost 1m away from the rear wall, 1/2m from the lateral furniture, almost 2m away one to each other and anything between 1.25 and 2.5m from my various listening position.
System:
- Cambridge D300 CD player - cheap, but good, especially with respect to the timbre and color of most acoustic instruments, warmth, smoothness and the feeling of space
- Yamaha KX690 casette deck - quite detailed sound for a casette deck, light tonal character
- passive DIY preamp with low quality pot
- cheap, but reasonable DIY cables made from microphone cable (actually an electric guitar cable)
- the Mackie HR 824 active monitors with their own power chords
I must say I'm impressed with the Mackies built quality. They seem to be built to last.
Strong points:
- very good bass extension and weight (for a 40cm tall speaker)
- very nonfatiguing sound - smooth up to the highest treble. You might be in danger of listening too loud without noticing it
- neutral sound - prehaps I should say extremely neutral by hi-fi standards. Might be ever so slightly on the warm side - I'm not sure, but the frequency response graphs that came with the speakers suggest the same thing. Also, the sound remains neutral when you greatly increase (or decrease) the level
- impressive loudness capabilities - I don't care for this too much, but in case you do...
- beautiful retrieval of the timbres of the instruments - especially piano, guitar, oboe, acoustic bass... The CD player helps here too (or at least it does not detract from the Mackies' performance too much)
- good detail (more or less similar to the detail in AKGs) and transients
- large sweet spot
- everything you throw at them sounds good, very good or excellent. They are forgiving without hiding the recording's faults
Possible weak points:
- could be a bit more impactful / dynamic. When I say this I do not mean weighty, I mean impactful, a characteristic which applies to midrage too. In my opinion the AKGs have very good impact, you can feel the pressure of the hit drums on your tympany even at low listening levels. This makes a sudden orchestral "tutti" impressive on these headphones regardless of their lack of bass. The Mackies are OK, but not that good as far as impact is concerned.
- also, the sound is airier on the AKGs and on the Jamo speakers. Not sure about Dynaudio, but maybe on them too. Same is true about imaging, but here the room interactions might play a certain negative role
- maybe the bass could be tighter and better defined??! I am really not sure about this, it could be because of the room and the CD player. On the AKGs the bass (the upper, existing bass) is tighter
- there is some hiss, slightly quiter if sensitivity on the back of the monitors is set to -10dB and if the 2m long mic cable used as interconect is disconnected - which means that balanced cables would make a (small) diference in this respect. In a very quiet environment the hiss is audible from 1.5m and barely audible, if you pay attention to it, from 2.5 m - it's not disturbing and cannot be heard when the music is playing
Overall, the sound makes me think of a pair of HD600 with much much better linearity, somewhat less detail, lower imaging capabilities and the treble of the K501 phones (but with correct extension). An allrounder - only some rock tracks, I think those both without sharp edges and without bass weight, are slightly disadvantaged. Acoustic jazz seems to sound best. I am very happy with my purchase.
If you have any questions please post them within this week as Sunday I will leave the town for more than two weeks.
All the best!
D.Q.
Please take into account that I put the Mackies a pair of stands improvised from some heavy, rectangular concrete blocks of the kind used (at least in my country) for building the side of the sidewalk. Also, my 4m width / 3.5m depth / 2.5m heigth room with too much furniture is less than perfect from an audiophile point of view, especially with respect to the low bass resonances. The speakers are positioned almost 1m away from the rear wall, 1/2m from the lateral furniture, almost 2m away one to each other and anything between 1.25 and 2.5m from my various listening position.
System:
- Cambridge D300 CD player - cheap, but good, especially with respect to the timbre and color of most acoustic instruments, warmth, smoothness and the feeling of space
- Yamaha KX690 casette deck - quite detailed sound for a casette deck, light tonal character
- passive DIY preamp with low quality pot
- cheap, but reasonable DIY cables made from microphone cable (actually an electric guitar cable)
- the Mackie HR 824 active monitors with their own power chords
I must say I'm impressed with the Mackies built quality. They seem to be built to last.
Strong points:
- very good bass extension and weight (for a 40cm tall speaker)
- very nonfatiguing sound - smooth up to the highest treble. You might be in danger of listening too loud without noticing it
- neutral sound - prehaps I should say extremely neutral by hi-fi standards. Might be ever so slightly on the warm side - I'm not sure, but the frequency response graphs that came with the speakers suggest the same thing. Also, the sound remains neutral when you greatly increase (or decrease) the level
- impressive loudness capabilities - I don't care for this too much, but in case you do...
- beautiful retrieval of the timbres of the instruments - especially piano, guitar, oboe, acoustic bass... The CD player helps here too (or at least it does not detract from the Mackies' performance too much)
- good detail (more or less similar to the detail in AKGs) and transients
- large sweet spot
- everything you throw at them sounds good, very good or excellent. They are forgiving without hiding the recording's faults
Possible weak points:
- could be a bit more impactful / dynamic. When I say this I do not mean weighty, I mean impactful, a characteristic which applies to midrage too. In my opinion the AKGs have very good impact, you can feel the pressure of the hit drums on your tympany even at low listening levels. This makes a sudden orchestral "tutti" impressive on these headphones regardless of their lack of bass. The Mackies are OK, but not that good as far as impact is concerned.
- also, the sound is airier on the AKGs and on the Jamo speakers. Not sure about Dynaudio, but maybe on them too. Same is true about imaging, but here the room interactions might play a certain negative role
- maybe the bass could be tighter and better defined??! I am really not sure about this, it could be because of the room and the CD player. On the AKGs the bass (the upper, existing bass) is tighter
- there is some hiss, slightly quiter if sensitivity on the back of the monitors is set to -10dB and if the 2m long mic cable used as interconect is disconnected - which means that balanced cables would make a (small) diference in this respect. In a very quiet environment the hiss is audible from 1.5m and barely audible, if you pay attention to it, from 2.5 m - it's not disturbing and cannot be heard when the music is playing
Overall, the sound makes me think of a pair of HD600 with much much better linearity, somewhat less detail, lower imaging capabilities and the treble of the K501 phones (but with correct extension). An allrounder - only some rock tracks, I think those both without sharp edges and without bass weight, are slightly disadvantaged. Acoustic jazz seems to sound best. I am very happy with my purchase.
If you have any questions please post them within this week as Sunday I will leave the town for more than two weeks.
All the best!
D.Q.
