I'm very much a beginner to speakers and have a lot to learn, but here is the results of some testing I recently did to select speakers for my living room TV audio setup. Purely subjective, I just listened to them with my ears to decide which ones I liked the most. I got fairly cheap speakers.
I got 7 different in-wall speakers that I could try out to select the ones I liked the most. I built a simple connection box with banana plugs to use as a speakers selector. I connected the speakers to the center channel and played some of my favorite movies and listened to the actors' voices and other sounds in the movie like doors closing etc. I was listening for the speaker that made the scene in the movie sound the most like it happened right there in front of me. I repeated some moments and sounds many times over a couple days with sleep in between to "reset" my ears (very unscientific). The amplifier is a Pioneer VSX-D509S I got off craigslist and the input was Dolby 5.1 over optical S/PDIF from my TV.
First two enclosed in-wall speakers. These come in small plastic enclosures and I could listen to them without mounting them in anything. They sounded so bad compared to the other non-enclosed ones even played unenclosed in free air, so I returned them immediately. The main problem was the tweeters, they sounded to be severely lacking in the upper range. They're not even in the photo.
I built simple boxes out of particle board to mount the unenclosed in-wall speakers in. The boxes have a volume of about 110 litres, except the shorter one that's made of what was left of the three 4'x8' particle boards. I used double sided foam mounting tape around the edges to avoid having to engage the plastic drywall mounting hardware the speakers have (somewhat irreversible). I tested them with their grilles on but took them off for the photo. Forgot to take the grille of the Klipsch KSP-C6. The Klipsch KSP-C6 and the Dayton Audio B652-AIR are not in-wall speakers but I added them for comparison.
My subjective ranking of how much the speakers made the movies sound like they were happening right in front of me:
Conclusion
I learned that different drivers really can sound very different, and that a 6.5" diameter driver can have deeper low end than a 8" diameter driver (this one surprised me, please tell me if this can't be true, as I only listened using my ears and have no measured data to support that).
Since I love the Klipsch KSP-C6 so much I think I'm going to have to take the drivers out of the original enclosure and either create a new elongated equal volume enclosure that can fit in my wall, or try mounting them directly to the wall in a infinite baffle like setting (? please advise on this, I think I'll have to check out the suspension properties of the drivers).
During my journey into speakers so far I have learned that drivers are probably the most important part of a speaker. Please advise if otherwise. The enclosure is mostly there to baffle the canceling waves coming from the backside of the diaphragm. The enclosure only supports the driver up until the limits of the driver. Except for one resonant frequency perhaps where the enclosure will amplify that specific frequency. This is my understanding so far and I do want to learn more. I've only dealt with sealed boxes, no ported boxes.
Anyway, thanks for reading and hope this will be useful to someone looking at in-wall speakers.
Edit: After listening to these again a 3rd day I realize the Monoprice 6.5" does not go lower than the Monoprice 8", I think the 6.5 might be louder in some frequencies of a low pitch human voice but when you go lower the 8" does actually seem to play slightly louder in than the 6.5" in those frequencies. Only trust real measurements!
I got 7 different in-wall speakers that I could try out to select the ones I liked the most. I built a simple connection box with banana plugs to use as a speakers selector. I connected the speakers to the center channel and played some of my favorite movies and listened to the actors' voices and other sounds in the movie like doors closing etc. I was listening for the speaker that made the scene in the movie sound the most like it happened right there in front of me. I repeated some moments and sounds many times over a couple days with sleep in between to "reset" my ears (very unscientific). The amplifier is a Pioneer VSX-D509S I got off craigslist and the input was Dolby 5.1 over optical S/PDIF from my TV.
First two enclosed in-wall speakers. These come in small plastic enclosures and I could listen to them without mounting them in anything. They sounded so bad compared to the other non-enclosed ones even played unenclosed in free air, so I returned them immediately. The main problem was the tweeters, they sounded to be severely lacking in the upper range. They're not even in the photo.
I built simple boxes out of particle board to mount the unenclosed in-wall speakers in. The boxes have a volume of about 110 litres, except the shorter one that's made of what was left of the three 4'x8' particle boards. I used double sided foam mounting tape around the edges to avoid having to engage the plastic drywall mounting hardware the speakers have (somewhat irreversible). I tested them with their grilles on but took them off for the photo. Forgot to take the grille of the Klipsch KSP-C6. The Klipsch KSP-C6 and the Dayton Audio B652-AIR are not in-wall speakers but I added them for comparison.
- Monoprice Alpha In-Wall 6.5in
This one and the other Monoprice one had distinguished treble, I suspect because of the 1" tweeter and the 3" tweeter? They sound to me to both reach the highest frequencies (subjective), but also the whole treble sound range sounds great. The Monoprice Alpha 6.5" surprisingly has deeper low end than the Monoprice Caliper 8". I don't know why but I compared these two a lot and the Alpha 6.5" has better low range. The Monoprice 6.5in is my choice any day over the Monoprice 8". - Polk RC65i
Of every speaker I tested this shared 2nd place of overall best speaker with the Monoprice 6.5 (subjective). It had the most low end and mid range of all the speakers except for the Klipsch KSP-C6. It beat both the Monoprice 8" and Dayton 8" in low end. Maybe the Polk driver was just better at moving air than the other ones, even though it's a smaller diameter? This opened my eyes to that some drivers can really be a lot better than others. The only reason this speaker did not take a solo 2nd place was that the Monoprice 6.5 had better upper range treble, not by a lot but the Monoprice 6.5 was noticeably "brighter". - Dayton Audio ME825W
Very disappointing. 2nd worst of all the speakers in the photo. Very lacking in midrange, very noticeable in voice reproduction. Voices did not sound natural. Treble was greatly beaten by the Monoprice speakers and the low end was only ok. - Monoprice Caliber In-Wall 8in
Treble great but very disappointing in low end, and disappointing in mid range. I suspect that the 8" driver in this speaker is just not good? - Dayton Audio ME525MTM
This was the worst of all the speakers in the photo. No low end, bad mid range, sup-par treble. - Klipsch KSP-C6
I bought this older speaker off Craiglist. This speaker beat every other speaker in the photo. It did almost make the movie sound like it was happening right in front of me. I'm very impressed by this one. Voices sound the most real through this one and it also has the deepest low end of all the speakers I tested. Treble is great. Only the very highest frequencies are possibly reached by the Monoprice 6.5in which are not reached by the Klipsch KSP-C6 (not entirely sure, the Monoprice 6.5in just sounds like it reaches slighly higher). I'm not sure why this one reaches deeper than all the other ones with it's 6.5in drivers. Is it because of some resonance influenced by the enclosure volume or is it just a better driver? - Dayton B652-AIR
Good treble but lacking in upper mid-range (subjective). Voices did not sound as natural as the Monoprice speakers.
My subjective ranking of how much the speakers made the movies sound like they were happening right in front of me:
- Klipsch KSP-C6
- Monoprice Alpha In-Wall 6.5in shared 2nd place with Polk RC65i (I have a hard time selecting between these. Polk is better in mid and low range but Monoprice 6.5in is fairly good in mid and low range but is brighter than the Polk)
- Monoprice Caliber In-Wall 8in
- Dayton B652-AIR
- Dayton Audio ME825W
- Dayton Audio ME525MTM
Conclusion
I learned that different drivers really can sound very different, and that a 6.5" diameter driver can have deeper low end than a 8" diameter driver (this one surprised me, please tell me if this can't be true, as I only listened using my ears and have no measured data to support that).
Since I love the Klipsch KSP-C6 so much I think I'm going to have to take the drivers out of the original enclosure and either create a new elongated equal volume enclosure that can fit in my wall, or try mounting them directly to the wall in a infinite baffle like setting (? please advise on this, I think I'll have to check out the suspension properties of the drivers).
During my journey into speakers so far I have learned that drivers are probably the most important part of a speaker. Please advise if otherwise. The enclosure is mostly there to baffle the canceling waves coming from the backside of the diaphragm. The enclosure only supports the driver up until the limits of the driver. Except for one resonant frequency perhaps where the enclosure will amplify that specific frequency. This is my understanding so far and I do want to learn more. I've only dealt with sealed boxes, no ported boxes.
Anyway, thanks for reading and hope this will be useful to someone looking at in-wall speakers.
Edit: After listening to these again a 3rd day I realize the Monoprice 6.5" does not go lower than the Monoprice 8", I think the 6.5 might be louder in some frequencies of a low pitch human voice but when you go lower the 8" does actually seem to play slightly louder in than the 6.5" in those frequencies. Only trust real measurements!
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Nice review and feedback on the speakers. Thanks for sharing your experience with the community.
I've got a Klipsch KSP-C6 center channel speaker and I second it's the best.