NS 1000 M Speakers

Posted by: ray dodd on 02 December 2001

I have the opportunity to pick up some very reasonably priced Yamaha NS 1000 M.
Has anybody had any experience of them and what are the pitfalls [if any ]?
Due to the distances involved..... I would like some pointers please .

Ray

[This message was edited by ray dodd on SUNDAY 02 December 2001 at 21:30.]

Posted on: 03 December 2001 by Tony L
quote:
I have the opportunity to pick up some very reasonably priced Yamaha NS 1000 M. Has anybody had any experience of them and what are the pitfalls [if any ]?

A friend of mine fairly recently borrowed a pair of NS1000s and tried them on the end of his LP12 / Ittok / Lydian B / 32.5 / Hicap / 250. I found them very good in the hi-fi sense, but really rather lacking in the groove / boogie area. They are big and powerful sounding, with what sounds like a very flat frequency response, but after the other speakers he had to hand at the time (Saras / Gale 401s) they just didn't do it PRaT wise, though they were definitely more tonally neutral than either of the others.

They are probably worth a try, but definitely listen first. They might make a very good starting point for some serious tweaking, if was possible to get them to groove they would be absolutely excellent.

Tony.

Posted on: 04 December 2001 by Noel
The NS1000 is an excellent speaker, it can be a touch bright/hard on the treble, but is a great monitor. The tweeters aren't titanium, but I can't rememeber which metal - boron, beryllium?
Posted on: 04 December 2001 by Eddie Pugh
I have been using a pair of these for nearly 20 years and have been very very satisfied with them. They are very sensitive 90db and perhaps a little bit bright in the treble compared with Epos/Dynaudio which I once flirted with buying as replacements. I decided I preferred the Yamahas.
I use CDX XPS 82(2*HiCap)& 250 I can hardly get the volume pot off the stops 9 o'clock is seriously loud in my 13 x 13 listening room

Yamaha stopped importing them to the EU many years ago. Some Health & Safety issue regarding the berillium metal coated domes of the tweeter and mid unit I was told.

Check the age and condition and/or spares availability. I believe the midrange drivers are seriously expensive £300 ish each.

They are great speakers if you have small kids or cats as all the drivers are well protected by wire meshes. I have looked hard for edge seals etc on mine to see whether they are deteriorating but none are readily visible.

They are infinite baffle full range "bookshelf" speakers roughly 700 mm high. I have mine sitting approx 450 mm on a purpose built very solid ash bookshelf base unit on some fancy enclosed spikes.

You really ought to have a listen. The 12" base unit really moves some air and the speakers look beautiful with the fronts off.

Eddie

Posted on: 04 December 2001 by Eddie Pugh
I forgot to mention they have very silly little spring clip speaker connectors on the back which are a real bugger to replace with proper connectors.

Eddie

Posted on: 04 December 2001 by Tony L
quote:
Yamaha stopped importing them to the EU many years ago. Some Health & Safety issue regarding the berillium metal coated domes of the tweeter and mid unit I was told.

Same thing happened with the Audio Technica OC9, the berillium is apparently toxic, so some bloody bureaucrat has dictated that we are not allowed to feed OC9s or Yamaha tweeter or mid drivers to children anymore. This must obviously have been a big problem in the UK in the past.

Tony.

Posted on: 06 December 2001 by Fraser Hadden
Like Eddie Pugh, I have been using these for 20 years. The relatively good availability and price has enabled me to use 4, the front two powered by 135s and the rear two being served by an AV1/250.

You can get round much of the brightness by twiddling the mid and treble potentiometers. This has to be done by ear as the markings are meaningless.

Fraser

Posted on: 06 December 2001 by Craig B
quote:
This is why many recording studios use(d) them as monitors (often in preference to LS3/5).
Daveyp,

I think that you will find that it is Yamaha's former bottom of the line NS10 (now flipped sideways and dubbed 'Professional Monitor') that many studios still use as near field playback monitors.

Having suffered the indignity of having heard them operating in free space, I find it amusing that we entrust the recording of our beloved music to those that are in such dire need of having their ears syringed!

Thankfully other manufacturers designs, like those of ATC, have made inroads into the pro sector.

Craig

Posted on: 04 January 2002 by JohanR
I think it all started in the mid 1970:s when the Swedish Radio ordered a lot of them. This was said to be after fierce competition with other runners. Just read today that the SR orderd them because they were cheap, very cheap. In fact, they got them for free! And then Yamaha sold lots of them to other, paying customers and made money.

About the lousy NS 10 M. They have of course been used a lot to mix pop records in the last 20 years, the idea being to simulate what lousy speakers "ordinary" people have at home. In fact, their response curve is similar to Kan MK1:s. No wonder why the Kan:s sound so good!

JohanR

Posted on: 04 January 2002 by Tony L
quote:
About the lousy NS 10 M. They have of course been used a lot to mix pop records in the last 20 years, the idea being to simulate what lousy speakers "ordinary" people have at home.

I have always wanted to try NS10s at home on good stands against a solid back wall. They are a sealed 2 way speaker of a reasonable size, something of a rarity in these days of bass reflex bloat monsters. The thing that baffles me with NS10 use in studios is that they are usually plonked just above the mixer in free space, I am sure that by design they are a wall proximity speaker just like the bigger NS1000. Using any wall proximity speaker out in the middle of a room is a total disaster, just try it with a SBL or Kan. No wonder many studios prefer AE1s, Dynaudios, or ATCs these days, as at least these can perform as designed.

Tony.

Posted on: 04 January 2002 by JohanR
After a couple of years Yamaha found out about the paper thing and changed the balance of the tweeter. But people kept on using paper on the new ones, and some of the old ones are used without. That must be four different permutations on how they might sound.
Also remember I read in the 1980:s about a Pro magazine that did a very serious listening test on the sound of different types of paper tissue! They are as crasy tweekers as us Hifi nuts!

JohanR

Posted on: 04 January 2002 by Stephen Bennett
Tony

I had for a while in the studio a pair of Yamaha NS 10's. I plonked them on my Kan stands against a wall (Driven by a Nait, LP12). They were just as horrible as they were in any studio I used. Nothing like Kans. Screechy, nasty, things.

I now use PMC TB2s - driven by a NAP 150 over christmas as I'm hunting for an amp now my Quad has bitten the dust. The NAP 150/TB2s was very, very nice - so nice that I may bite the bullet and get one.

Stephen

Posted on: 04 January 2002 by Jez Quigley
Yammy NS 1000's are a classic design that has stood the test of time and has many devoted fans. Not everyones choice due to the steely treble, but well worth having a good listen. Their strengths might outweigh the weaknesses for you, like the briks do for me (not that briks have any weaknesses of course big grin )