Friday, February 21, 2014

Sony SS-B1000 Bookshelf speaker frequency response and disassembly



Disassembly Images 

I bought this bookshelf about a month ago with the intent to tests and compare it along with some other budget speakers (Dayton B652, Monoprice 8250, Infinity Primus P153). I wasn't really interested in posting anything in depth on it because after even a quick ABX against the Dayton, it was clear the Sony B1000 was not a very capable speaker.

However it has recently been featured on WOOT

http://tech.woot.com/offers/your-choice-of-sony-speakers

and on a few audio/HT posts on Reddit so I wanted to give my Average Joe input. To be short, this speaker sucks for $68.00 at Walmart it cost. It sucks at any sale price you can find it.

The hump between 80hz and 180hz has been common in all the speakers I've tested. I'm thinking its some sort of room resonance, or possibly characteristic of the cheap speakers. I will have a better understanding when I'm able to test the Primus 153 and Def Tech 350's I have. And in this respect it is not all that dissimilar from the popular Dayton B652. In my original listening comparison I noticed that all the highs just seemed to vanish. When I began the frequency response test it became very obvious as to why. There is a 5-10db drop starting at ~1.25khz and continuing until 6khz.. Thats huge! Now thankfully there isn't any huge peaks in higher registers that would make this speakers especially tiring to the ears.

You could probably EQ away some of this and find a better middle ground but for me it wasn't worth the experimenting.

On the plus side, they are constructed very well. Better materials than the Dayton's or Monoprice's as far as the enclosure is made. So they at least look OK.

The graph is an average of 4 measurements taken of the speaker. 1) Mic ~5 inches from speaker, pointed straight on and along the center plane of the speaker.  2) Mic ~3 feet from the speaker, pointed straight on and along the center plane of the speaker. 3) & 4) ~ 3 feet from the speaker and 25 degrees to the left or right pointed straight on and along the center plane of the speaker

1 comment:

  1. Thats huge! Now thankfully there isn't any huge peaks in higher registers that would make this speakers especially tiring to the ears.2. el amfi

    ReplyDelete

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