[kitkat12012]

I am currently searching for a warm, musical, front ported active speakers and I'm wondering if you guys can give me a few brands/models to research.

I've been reading reviews the past couple of days and already have a few in mind but I just wanna expand my search a bit more before I decide.

I am going to use them solely for music listening, so something "musical" and not too "critical" would be ideal. Source is gonna be an ipod for now so I need it to be a bit forgiving of mediocre quality source.

I also want it to be warm and bassy, as oppose to flat and referencing like most of the monitors that came up in my search.

I will be placing it in my home gym so I need active speakers to lessen the clutter from amps and stuff.

Finally, I'm planning on mounting it on a wall so there's going to be very little space in the back and I'm gonna need it to be front ported.


Budget is around $300 or less


I was originally planning on getting the audioengine A5 but decided not to since it's rear ported.

Things in my research list are the following:
- krk rokits
- mackies
- audioengine a2

Things disqualified from my list:
- audioengine A5 (rear ported)
- swans (don't like wooden look)
- M-Audio bx5a (rear ported I think)



Thanks guys

 

[sizzlincok]

There's nothing wrong with putting rear ported speakers near a wall. I have my AudioEngine 5's about 1 inch from a wall.
 
From the opposite side of the room, it sounds like there's a sub when there isn't.
Basically, it uses the wall to resonant the sound from the port.
 
Get the A5's if I had to choose from your list.
Or the M-Audio BX5a's. Those are a good choice for actives as well.
 
People say the KRK Rokits have smoother highs than the A5's, but the A5's have the better overall low end sound.
The A2's don't have enough power. They sound like a big speaker, until you start to really turn it up.

 

[Lazerboy2000]

I have KRK RP6G2 and they are extremely musical and sound great. They are pretty forgiving even though they're near-field monitors and I really enjoy them. One of my main reasons for getting these is that reviews said that they were very musical but clear and forgiving.  I was able to get mine from ZZsounds for $313 shipped, including the "Free G2 package" which includes stands and Mopads. You'll have to shop around for a price like this but a lot of places do price guarantees so you can ask around for lower than advertised price. The RP5G2s can be had for even cheaper and the only downside is a small woofer. 
 
I'd highly recommend testing these out. 

 

[kitkat12012]

There's nothing wrong with putting rear ported speakers near a wall. I have my AudioEngine 5's about 1 inch from a wall.

That's interesting. I'll have to read up on this then because most of the reviews I've read suggest having some space in the back so it won't distort the sound.

I have KRK RP6G2 and they are extremely musical and sound great. They are pretty forgiving even though they're near-field monitors and I really enjoy them. One of my main reasons for getting these is that reviews said that they were very musical but clear and forgiving.  I was able to get mine from ZZsounds for $313 shipped, including the "Free G2 package" which includes stands and Mopads. You'll have to shop around for a price like this but a lot of places do price guarantees so you can ask around for lower than advertised price. The RP5G2s can be had for even cheaper and the only downside is a small woofer. 
 
I'd highly recommend testing these out. 

This is actually one of the ones I'm reading about right now. That's a cool price too for the speakers that also includes a stand.

I'm wondering though if a near-field monitor would be able to fill up half a room nicely. Like I said, I'm gonna be using this for my gym and I'm gonna be moving a lot around approximately half of the room so I would want speakers that can handle this space.


Thanks for the suggestions guys.

 

[jung]

 
Quote:

I am currently searching for a warm, musical, front ported active speakers and I'm wondering if you guys can give me a few brands/models to research.

I've been reading reviews the past couple of days and already have a few in mind but I just wanna expand my search a bit more before I decide.

I am going to use them solely for music listening, so something "musical" and not too "critical" would be ideal. Source is gonna be an ipod for now so I need it to be a bit forgiving of mediocre quality source.

I also want it to be warm and bassy, as oppose to flat and referencing like most of the monitors that came up in my search.
 

ESI nEar08
http://stereo.50webs.com
 
Many pro monitors want balanced connection.
 
Quote:

I'm wondering though if a near-field monitor would be able to fill up half a room nicely. Like I said, I'm gonna be using this for my gym and I'm gonna be moving a lot around approximately half of the room so I would want speakers that can handle this space.
 

Pro-audio near-field monitors are as powerful as home HiFi speakers.
 
 

 

[kitkat12012]

 

ESI nEar08
http://stereo.50webs.com
 
Many pro monitors want balanced connection.
 

Pro-audio near-field monitors are as powerful as home HiFi speakers.
 
 

nice list on that site. I'll check them out when I get home thanks.

Focals and Wharfedales come up a lot in the forums too, I'm adding them to my research list.

thanks

 

[JRG1990]

If your considering the krk you should consider the prodipe monitors, there basically the same expect the prodipes have more powerful amps and sound better in the midrange but there are a bit more netruel than the krks, i wouldn't consider any of these monitors "musical" or  "forgiving" the krks are probley the closest though cause they have a u shaped frequency curve, monitors are generally designed to be netruel and revealing, proper musical and warm speakers are speakers like the monitor audio bx2 http://www.monitoraudio.co.uk/products/bronze-bx/bx2/ , and wharfedale diamond http://www.wharfedale.co.uk/Products/ProductSeries/tabid/77/PID/166/language/en-GB/Default.aspx#detail , they are passives though your best bet for warm and musical monitors is the wharfedale 8.2 if there anything like the passives i'm not sure how well they do in a gym, is it a big gym? and do you need loud or moderate volumes? , the wharfedales claim 108dB peak spl @ 1meter there continus spl is likely somewhere around 100db, that wouldn't be enough for a large gym, you would need something like the krk gp8 or prodipes pro8 that have continues spl in the 105db per metre range and larger 8" drivers monitors aren't designed for high spl output. Small monitors would sound lost in large gym, large gyms generally use pa speakers for there high spl and large drivers.

 

[kitkat12012]

If your considering the krk you should consider the prodipe monitors, there basically the same expect the prodipes have more powerful amps and sound better in the midrange but there are a bit more netruel than the krks, i wouldn't consider any of these monitors "musical" or  "forgiving" the krks are probley the closest though cause they have a u shaped frequency curve, monitors are generally designed to be netruel and revealing, proper musical and warm speakers are speakers like the monitor audio bx2 http://www.monitoraudio.co.uk/products/bronze-bx/bx2/ , and wharfedale diamond http://www.wharfedale.co.uk/Products/ProductSeries/tabid/77/PID/166/language/en-GB/Default.aspx#detail , they are passives though your best bet for warm and musical monitors is the wharfedale 8.2 if there anything like the passives i'm not sure how well they do in a gym, is it a big gym? and do you need loud or moderate volumes? , the wharfedales claim 108dB peak spl @ 1meter there continus spl is likely somewhere around 100db, that wouldn't be enough for a large gym, you would need something like the krk gp8 or prodipes pro8 that have continues spl in the 105db per metre range and larger 8" drivers monitors aren't designed for high spl output. Small monitors would sound lost in large gym, large gyms generally use pa speakers for there high spl and large drivers.

good point on "monitors" being designed as neutral and critical, because that's what they're meant to be. I'm new to this game though, any suggestions for a better set of search terms? I would guess "speakers" would be too broad and would give me a lot of junk results.

as for the prodpipe vs krk part, if you said prodpipes tend to be more neutral then I'm probably gonna stick with krk since it's the U-shaped sound that I'm trying to go for.

as for the gym size, it's half my basement, maybe about 20ft x 14ft. I don't really need it like club/party loud. I need it to be loud enough so I can hear the music clearly from any area on my basement. Ideally I also don't want them to be too loud so I don't disturb people upstairs


as for passives, I'm sure they're nice and I would like to own a set in the future. but I would wanna skip on them for my gym since I'm gonna be moving equipment and weights around and I'm trying to avoid non-gym equipment clutter (don't wanna hit a $1000 dac/amp with a barbell). hence the idea of having the speakers ceiling mounted.


thanks for the suggestions though. I'll definitely look at those wharfedales (I've been reading a lot of suggestions for them from other threads) and maybe take a quick look at the prodpipes too