New Event Opal Monitors - not your regular speakers

[Lux]

This is interesting! Me to noticed a difference big enough to be relevent for my work. It is kind of subtile but at same time obvious when you know the system well. I have small knowledge in electrics, but after my experience from switching from xlr-trs to xlr-xlr I met a man that worked with messuaring different industrial emissions. He sad that when a signal must pass thru a new material such as a connector, you can get different kind of reflections backwards in the cable. I suppose that this can cause phase shift.

[hop.sing]

Originally Posted by thetalkinghead

of course there is a difference between the quality of cables... obviously. a mogami will sound much better than a monoprice.

That is not my experience and and should not be the case. A cable is a conductor and has a resistance of a few ohms and a capacitance of a few hundred Picofarads (In the worst case). In critical applications, like speaker wiring where the speaker has a very low impedance of a few ohms that makes an audible difference (Thats the reason for those massive speaker cables) but NOT in a line level application. The HF rolloff is far above what we can hear.
I (at least) cannot measure or hear differences in cable quality on short runs of a few meters with modern line level impedances ( low output and reasonably high input impedance)
Tobias

[Fleaman]

Originally Posted by hop.sing

That is not my experience and and should not be the case. A cable is a conductor and has a resistance of a few ohms and a capacitance of a few hundred Picofarads (In the worst case). In critical applications, like speaker wiring where the speaker has a very low impedance of a few ohms that makes an audible difference (Thats the reason for those massive speaker cables) but NOT in a line level application. The HF rolloff is far above what we can hear.
I (at least) cannot measure or hear differences in cable quality on short runs of a few meters with modern line level impedances ( low output and reasonably high input impedance)
Tobias

I'm in this camp also, regarding the actual cable material.

But there appears to be something peculiar regarding TRS connectors with opals. The opal owners that had their low end problems solved when they switched from a TRS to XLR/XLR seemed to indicate there might of been an issued with the combo jack the opal uses, or their TRS cables were wired wrong.

It's still a mystery, but I doubt it has to do with the actual cable material. When things are wired correctly, the differences in cable material have never been able to be differentiated in a true double blind test, that I know of (assuming line level runs of average length).
I suspect the opal issue was either with a bad/wrong wired cable or the way the opal combo jack is wired. And perhaps not all opals have this issue (to make it even harder to pinpoint).

That being said, the actual connection point is usually the area that would cause issues, with oxidation. So I do use deoxit fairly regularly. The act of just unplugging-replugging can clean connection points, so putting a new cable in can make the connection better by that act alone.

[Fleaman]

Originally Posted by Lux

Have same experience- had own made xlr to trs to Opals (balanced) - ok quality, tried ordinarie mic cables, xlr-xlr. Result; even better low end, more overall defined sound, somehow more easy to make mix decisions. Now I am curios to try with quality xlr cables. ( By the way, Event recommend the use of xlr connection)

It's interesting that even Event mentions to use XLR connections. Either they're aware of an issue with their combo jack, or they are just not confident in the wiring of TRS adapter cables? I suppose if Event recommends an XLR/XLR, it guarantees that the gear it's being connected to is XLR balanced.

If anyone talks to Event about this (again), they should ask them 'why?' they recommend an XLR connection.

[hop.sing]

Hi

Ok, I tested the cable/connector issue and found that balanced xlr and trs connection gave exactly the same results, but trs unbalanced was, actually as expected, 6 dB down.
In a listening test, things sounded the same and sweeping showed me what I heard.
See attachment.

[hop.sing]

Originally Posted by CoolColJ

I've switched the cables at least 10 times already between 3 different types, and the differences are not subtle! And my ears/listening and perception are not crap. As much difference as there are between speakers. From flat and bright to coloured and tubey/transformer sounding...

It could be the DAC side coupling that is responsible, but your forgetting that we have a low level signal that is getting amplified a lot. I'm using a Lynx Hilo. As that Cranesong dude said, DAC chips have impedances that need to be taken into account of

The cable differences from hooking up a synth to a mixer is not that great, but it's there. But from a DAC to amp, amp to speaker is where it's quite big

Reading that again, I am really wondering what you experience. Either MY ears are crap, or there is something going on at your setup that is really special. Maybe you should attempt to measure the differences you describe.

[DarkSky Media]

Originally Posted by Fleaman

...I suppose if Event recommends an XLR/XLR, it guarantees that the gear it's being connected to is XLR balanced...

Perhaps that was their thinking, but if so it is flawed. I've encountered various pieces of equipment at one time or another that have an XLR output but are not delivering a true balanced signal - in some cases, with pin 3 jumpered to the chassis. FWIW.

[CoolColJ]

Originally Posted by hop.sing

Reading that again, I am really wondering what you experience. Either MY ears are crap, or there is something going on at your setup that is really special. Maybe you should attempt to measure the differences you describe.

I could try loopbacks with the cables and my Lynx Hilo, maybe the tonal difference will show up. That cheap gold cable I have sounds like a tube/transformer!

I bought another set of that cable just to run my digital synths through it, in case the colouration I hear when used as speaker cables show up with the synths

[CoolColJ]

Ok I did some loopbacks with the cables I described before with the Lynx Hilo

The Hilo has dedicated monitor outs on TRS, with a volume knob controlled volume.
It also has fixed level main outs and inputs on XLR - I used these to do the loopbacks with adapters as needed.

I can hear the same tonal variations and character, but it's a lot more subtle when done like this, vs when going from the Hilo monitor outs to the Opals.
As I mentioned before - DAC to Amp just seems to be more sensitive and "amplifies" the cable sound...

I used a snippet of a house track sketch I did a few months ago - 24 bit 44.1khz

What I heard when used from DAC to Opals - still there but much less so when loopbacked

Silver TRS-TRS - colder, less bottom end, sharper top
Cheap Silver TRS-XLR - bottom end boomed up, a bit more muddy
Cheap gold TRS - more filtered, but a certain sweetness and glow in the upper mids

[hop.sing]

Originally Posted by CoolColJ

Ok I did some loopbacks with the cables I described before with the Lynx Hilo

The Hilo has dedicated monitor outs on TRS, with a volume knob controlled volume.
It also has fixed level main outs and inputs on XLR - I used these to do the loopbacks with adapters as needed.

I can hear the same tonal variations and character, but it's a lot more subtle when done like this, vs when going from the Hilo monitor outs to the Opals.
As I mentioned before - DAC to Amp just seems to be more sensitive and "amplifies" the cable sound...

I used a snippet of a house track sketch I did a few months ago - 24 bit 44.1khz

What I heard when used from DAC to Opals - still there but much less so when loopbacked

Silver TRS-TRS - colder, less bottom end, sharper top
Cheap Silver TRS-XLR - bottom end boomed up, a bit more muddy
Cheap gold TRS - more filtered, but a certain sweetness and glow in the upper mids

Hi. Thanks for test. I am not in the studio right now, so I have to listen on Headphones (HD580).
I would say, the differences, if there are any, are really, really small. I do not hear any difference between cheap silver and cheap gold, silver trs seems to lack a tiny bit of bottom, compared to the other two, indeed.
So I did reverse polarity on the files and see how they cancel.
The cheapos cancel very well, especially after I corrected a tiny volume and panning difference with the sonalksis freeG (Perfect for cases like this). There were no distortion or frequency leftovers, seems to be the same file with very tiny volume differences.
Silver is a little different, I can hear and measure it. Interesting, seems that I have to conduct a test like this myself.
To get back on topic, can we savely assume now, that the xlr and trs plugs on the opals are not responsible for any sounddifferences, but it is the cables only?

[CoolColJ]

Most likely the type of cables/solder/connector quality

Any differences in the recorded files are due to cables only as I played and recorded each one with exactly the same settings in the Hilo and Wavelab.

After trimming the starts to match the original and running them through Audio Diffmaker - which aligns and then compares to the original - jitter, level difference and correlation depth

Cheap gold TRS to TRS
Parameters: -1.501usec, 0.046dB (L), 0.039dB (R)..Corr Depth: 46.7 dB (L), 47.3 dB (R)

Cheap silver TRS to XLR
Parameters: -1.507usec, 0.080dB (L), 0.005dB (R)..Corr Depth: 46.7 dB (L), 47.3 dB (R)

Silver TRS to TRS
Parameters: -48.37usec, 0.121dB (L), 0.042dB (R)..Corr Depth: 40.7 dB (L), 41.2 dB (R)

Looks like the third one is the least accurate, but Diffmaker does not seem to be able to extract the tonal/colour difference I hear between the cheap gold TRS to TRS cable (which I like the most) and the cheap silver TRS to XLR cable

Like I said the loopbacks are more subtle than what I hear coming from the Opals when they are used from the Hilo to feed the Opals. The same character differences, but turned up to 11
Seriously that TRS to XLR cable has really pumped up bass when it feeds the Opals! Pop and classical is OK on them, but any dance music is way too heavy with bass....

It just could be the Opals bring out the worst in cables - so don't skimp
When my Redco made Gotham GAC2AES-Neutrik custom cables get here, it will be interesting to hear for any differences...

[Fleaman]

Originally Posted by CoolColJ

Like I said the loopbacks are more subtle than what I hear coming from the Opals when they are used from the Hilo to feed the Opals. The same character differences, but turned up to 11

Try to get a friend to help out with a double blind test.

[Gax]

Im provoked to write this, especially because of the title description "Not your regular speakers"

I recently heard Event Opal, against Focal Twin and the new SE Munro Egg monitors, all in the same room, trough Crange Song Avocet D/A/Monitor controller, listening to few master reel transfers from HDtracks (24 bit 96khz) (all songs are brought there as my reference material that I know very well)


Now just for fun, since Im in the same room with tons of pairs of monitors on same desk, I decided to hear few low range (in terms of value) monitors against these "high-end" monitors mentioned above, which get highly praised on forums all the time.
The lower-range competitors were: Dynaudios BM6MK1, some cheap KRKs, Adams A7x and Alesis M1 520 Active (!!!), (all levels matched as much as it was possible due to differences in speaker size and their output power), and I found shocking that all these so called high end monitors against the lower-range competitors dint bring any new dimension of hearing music (mixes), I din't experience the forum hype about how cheap monitors are useless and big bucks ones are only way to make good mix. There was nothing to die for in sonic representation of Focals, Opal or Munro compared to low-end monitors, in my opinion these dont justify few thousands dollars more, as they all sound pretty similar to "low-quality" ones as they get classified on forums. Obviously the differences were there, but for the most part subtle, and I had totally different expectation, I thought they would blow away all these cheap monitors once put side by side with monitors in 3k $ range and higher.
Conclusion I made that day is that any of these monitors are fine enough for delivering a good mix, after all, tons of sonically amazing sounding records were mixed on old NS10s and Auratones 5c...

Some posts on these forums would make one believe that monitor A against B and C (all in different price ranges) would make difference (in favor of expensive ones) as hearing degraded low-bit mp3 mix against original 24 bit 96khz mix.

This may be blasphemy but all people who were in the room with me left with same impression as mine.

[CoolColJ]

I dunno, I have an old set of KRK Kroks here side by side with my Opals, and the KRK does not go as high or as low, and sounds less clear and provides a less accurate impression of what the sounds come across as. Plus the Opal sounds much closer to my Beyerdynamic DT880 headphones in responce and tone, especially on the low end extension and tightness

I know my Kroks like the back of my hand as they are the first studio monitors I ever had, after using Hifi speakers, since the early 90s. Yet when I listen back to my mixes from then, back on the Opals I can spot a lot of things I could not do on the Kroks due to the difference presentation/perception. Some elements were there all this time but I wasn't able to discern them due to masking or poor speaker cone responce

Sure they may sound similar in a general way - otherwise you would never get any mix to translate to other systems!
Maybe your just not focusing on the nuances.... because I have also had Focal Twins here for a while, side by side with Opals, and they both sound totally different and give different perception of the same mix. Opals also go lower and have superior transient responce and ommph. Sound wider and have more front to back depth.

When I'm playing a piano sound from Kontakt or a modelled one from Pianoteq - The Opals, Kroks and the Twins do not provide the same tone, especially different when you compare how the upper and lower octaves come across. A piano sound is always a good barometer IMO.

The Adams have a ribbon teeeter which again sounds very different from dome and inverted dome tweeters....

[Fleaman]

Originally Posted by Gax

Conclusion I made that day is that any of these monitors are fine enough for delivering a good mix,

For you.

I can make 'good' mixes on plenty of lower end monitors, but it will take longer and be less fun. For me, with gear, I'm about it taking less time and being more fun.

Originally Posted by Gax

after all, tons of sonically amazing sounding records were mixed on old NS10s and Auratones 5c...

...and the ______ (insert just about any gear bashed here including the 3630).

Originally Posted by Gax

This may be blasphemy but all people who were in the room with me left with same impression as mine.

So, does this mean you're gonna mix exclusively on NS10s and/or Auratones??

The truth in the pudding is how your mixes translate across many different systems and how easy it is for you to get to that point. Unfortunately that is a much longer process, i.e. doing mixes on each monitor pair at your studio.

BTW, you didn't mention what monitors you're currently using?

[CoolColJ]

Originally Posted by Fleaman

Try to get a friend to help out with a double blind test.

Here is a Loopback sweep in Room EQ Wizard using the Hilo in 0.5db steps.
Along with phase responce on the bottom curve

Used the cheap Gold TRS cable and not even 0.25db down top and bottom...
Yet it sounds different to the original.. harmonics baby
The silver TRS looks the same as well... either that or sinesweeps don't cause the same responce as broad range complex sounds....

[purplesky]

Originally Posted by Gax

Im provoked to write this, especially because of the title description "Not your regular speakers"

I recently heard Event Opal, against Focal Twin and the new SE Munro Egg monitors, all in the same room, trough Crange Song Avocet D/A/Monitor controller, listening to few master reel transfers from HDtracks (24 bit 96khz) (all songs are brought there as my reference material that I know very well)


Now just for fun, since Im in the same room with tons of pairs of monitors on same desk, I decided to hear few low range (in terms of value) monitors against these "high-end" monitors mentioned above, which get highly praised on forums all the time.
The lower-range competitors were: Dynaudios BM6MK1, some cheap KRKs, Adams A7x and Alesis M1 520 Active (!!!), (all levels matched as much as it was possible due to differences in speaker size and their output power), and I found shocking that all these so called high end monitors against the lower-range competitors dint bring any new dimension of hearing music (mixes), I din't experience the forum hype about how cheap monitors are useless and big bucks ones are only way to make good mix. There was nothing to die for in sonic representation of Focals, Opal or Munro compared to low-end monitors, in my opinion these dont justify few thousands dollars more, as they all sound pretty similar to "low-quality" ones as they get classified on forums. Obviously the differences were there, but for the most part subtle, and I had totally different expectation, I thought they would blow away all these cheap monitors once put side by side with monitors in 3k $ range and higher.
Conclusion I made that day is that any of these monitors are fine enough for delivering a good mix, after all, tons of sonically amazing sounding records were mixed on old NS10s and Auratones 5c...

Some posts on these forums would make one believe that monitor A against B and C (all in different price ranges) would make difference (in favor of expensive ones) as hearing degraded low-bit mp3 mix against original 24 bit 96khz mix.

This may be blasphemy but all people who were in the room with me left with same impression as mine.

Its not a big deal. Everybody has different ears and tastes in sound when it comes to speakers.

Everybody also has a different size wallet.

[CoolColJ]

Got my custom Redco made Gotham GAC2-AES Neutrik combo cables. Plus some coloured bands for the Neutrik plugs, Mogami word clock cables, and a bunch for 1foot Gotham "adapter" cables with various XLR/TRS/male/Female combos

Beautifully made, bundled, and nicely presented in ziplocked backs in a rather fetching Gotham purple colour
Cables are pretty flexible, not as stiff as I had expected.

The Beldon 1800F cables can be had in a few colours, I'll be having blue, so it will be easy to tell them apart from each other and my other regular cables

Now to plug em in.... perhaps I will finally get the true sound of the Opals now

[Fleaman]

Originally Posted by CoolColJ

Now to plug em in.... perhaps I will finally get the true sound of the Opals now

But seriously, have a friend help you out with a true ABX double blind test.

ABX test - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Make sure you can't see the cables and even have him/her pretend to do a change, but in fact plugs the same cable back in.

[CoolColJ]

Originally Posted by Fleaman

But seriously, have a friend help you out with a true ABX double blind test.

ABX test - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Make sure you can't see the cables and even have him/her pretend to do a change, but in fact plugs the same cable back in.

Well I've been using the cheap gold cables for a last week or so, also had a brief listen again to 3 tracks I'm very familiar with, then did the swap

First impressions is the Gotham GAC2-AES sound a lot bassier. Swapped back and I noticed much less bass and things poke out less... swapped back... yeap bass is a lot more prominent and more rounded/pokes out more, more defined etc

Not subtle either
Can't tell if it's that much clearer up higher or brighter so, more or less the same there. Still fairly mellow, which I guess is the Event Opal character.
So it reminds me of the cheap silver TRS to XLR cable, but I haven't compared them directly yet

edit - hihats in a certain track is also more defined, but with that similar "sweetness" to the cheap gold cables, the other 2 cables sound dryer

[Fleaman]

Not gonna be scientific until you take subjectivity out of the equation (conscious or not). And assuming you're using the same connector styles (TRS to XLR, etc)

[CoolColJ]

Originally Posted by Fleaman

Not gonna be scientific until you take subjectivity out of the equation (conscious or not). And assuming you're using the same connector styles (TRS to XLR, etc)

Yeah I know, but I used to be a mastering engineer a decade ago so it's not like my ears and perception are not educated enough to tell what's there or not

I chose the Gotham GAC2-AES from the multitude of cables out there based on a blind shootout someone on this forum did, so it's at least passed one test.
Factoring in cost into the equation.


edit - but at least I can yes, this is now what the Opal character is more like or should be like.
Which will be a good base to compare it to the incoming Focal SM9, using the same Gotham GAC2-AES cables, and Neutrik connectors but of a different format - TRS to XLR
Once I confirm that TRS to XLR sounds no different to TRS to TRS with the same cable type on my Opals that is

[Fleaman]

Originally Posted by CoolColJ

Yeah I know, but I used to be a mastering engineer a decade ago so it's not like my ears and perception are not educated enough to tell what's there or not

Of course that's unknown until you take subjectivity out of the equation.

Passing one online forum test doesn't rule out chance, which is the whole point of a larger data test (multiple tests repeated).

Doing multiple rounds of double blind ABX testing is the only way to rule out chance and subjectivity. Though many don't go through the trouble if they might fear the result.

[hop.sing]

Originally Posted by Fleaman

Of course that's unknown until you take subjectivity out of the equation.

Passing one online forum test doesn't rule out chance, which is the whole point of a larger data test (multiple tests repeated).

Doing multiple rounds of double blind ABX testing is the only way to rule out chance and subjectivity. Though many don't go through the trouble if they might fear the result.

It is so easy to fool yourself with normal non double blind tests. And audio memory is very short, so the time it takes to swap connectors on the speaker could be too long to make an educated decision afterwards, especially with differences so small (or even non :-))
Everybody knows the situation where you turn the knob on an eq thinking it sounds really better now, just to find out the eq was not patched in at all.
Tobias

[CoolColJ]

One thing for sure is that these cables are much quieter from a microphonic perspective. The cheap cables were inducing low level radio signals or something in the Opals at idle - comes and goes.
And the lack of background "fuzz" in the music when active. It just sounds different, I can't put my finger on it

With some of the other cables I always felt the Opals were muddy sounding first thing in the morning, until either my ears got used to it, or the monitors warmed up.
These Gotham cables sound good/clear/punchy from the start

[Fleaman]

Originally Posted by CoolColJ

One thing for sure is that these cables are much quieter from a microphonic perspective. The cheap cables were inducing low level radio signals or something in the Opals at idle - comes and goes.

Strange. Sounds like they weren't fully balanced. Did you open up the connectors and check how they're wired? Or, if you have a cable tester or even just an ohm meter....

[CoolColJ]

Originally Posted by Fleaman

Strange. Sounds like they weren't fully balanced. Did you open up the connectors and check how they're wired? Or, if you have a cable tester or even just an ohm meter....

They are balanced. If I hook up an unbalanced synth to them, pull the jack half in/out on the mixer, the level increases by 6db

The Gotham GAC2-AES sound clear, without being harsh and bright, deep and full without being muddy. Transients poke out, sweet without being coloured.
If all that make sense

Orchestral strings sound really different - almost crystalline and pure

[CoolColJ]

Loopback from the Gotham GAC2-AES + Neutrik gold TRS cable
http://www.gearslutz.com/board/attac...neutriktrs.wav

Here are the others to compare to
New Event Opal Monitors - not your regular speakers

Originally Posted by CoolColJ

After trimming the starts to match the original and running them through Audio Diffmaker - which aligns and then compares to the original - jitter, level difference and correlation depth

Cheap gold TRS to TRS
Parameters: -1.501usec, 0.046dB (L), 0.039dB (R)..Corr Depth: 46.7 dB (L), 47.3 dB (R)

Cheap silver TRS to XLR
Parameters: -1.507usec, 0.080dB (L), 0.005dB (R)..Corr Depth: 46.7 dB (L), 47.3 dB (R)

Silver TRS to TRS
Parameters: -48.37usec, 0.121dB (L), 0.042dB (R)..Corr Depth: 40.7 dB (L), 41.2 dB (R)


Looks like the third one is the least accurate, but Diffmaker does not seem to be able to extract the tonal/colour difference I hear between the cheap gold TRS to TRS cable (which I like the most) and the cheap silver TRS to XLR cable

also Audio Diffmaker results
Parameters: -1.491usec, 0.039dB (L), 0.034dB (R)..Corr Depth: 46.7 dB (L), 47.2 dB (R)

The least jitter and level drop

Listening to it is certainly different when it's feeding the Opals
It sounds more pristine, very punchy, deep and full.
Yet it's not that enjoyable to listen to music, play my synths and piano sounds on it. There is no "warmth". Seems more neutral, clincial and sterile

I have yet to learn the sound... so I will keep listening to it for another week...

---

Most likely the Hilo converters are masking the differences on the loopbacks, but they all sound different when feeding the Opals.

[toddreloaded]

"Event's 2030 3-way powered monitors give you accuracy and bass response that only 3-way monitors can provide." - Event

"The Opal was to be an 8-inch two-way speaker with the same dynamic and extended mid-range as the most expensive esoteric three-way systems."- Event

What do these two quotes mean?

The Opals just seem overpriced to me.They are more than twice the price of Events own 3-way monitors(Event 2030) so what does that say about them. Are the Opals that much better or are the 2030's that bad? Why does Event not have a three way monitor that sounds "better" than the Opals? This seems odd

Event claims to compete with "the most expensive esoteric three-way systems" but I have yet to hear anyone say they sold their Barefoots for a pair of Opals.

I'm sure the Opals are quality speakers but the quality 2-way monitor market is dominated by Adam,Focal K&H etc. (And you could add a sub to these for under 3k total). 3-way competition is still Focal+Adam around 3k and 4k+ gets you into super high-end 3-way land.

Bottom line, if these were priced around 2k I would have a listen to see if they were an upgrade from A7x, KH120 etc. But these are the most expensive 2-ways I've come across besides ultra boutique stuff. Just too many other options at the 3k price point.

[Ty Ford]

An appropriate response for anyone who hasn't heard the Opals.

(I'm on record for having heard them and liking them a lot.)

"Same as it ever was." 'the talking heads'

Regards,

Ty Ford