Neat's fall short after upgrade from XS to XS2 and from Dynaudio X12 to Neat Motive SX2

Positioning of your Dyn's is optimal and positioning of the Neats is not, this is hardly a fair comparison becouse of:

1) Interferance of the sound by the other speakers resonance, and

2) Position of the speaker influences bass response

The step up from the dyns to the neats is marginal when considering price (stands included) so it's a matter of taste and room compatibility here.

You are in a very luxurious position with both speakers in house, so defore you decide to drop the Neats try this:

Mask the floor exactly where your dynaudio speakers sit with some tape and place the Neats in this exact position. Move the Dyns away from the listening zone.

From this point, make small adjustments, this might be needed due to the slope of the neats, to get the bassdriver on the same distance from back and side walls.

The hight of the Neats has its influence but this is only little.

Take some time to figure out what position/toe in works best and what speaker suits your listening habits best. Then make your descision, Sell the obsolete pair and enjoy your music

Thanks for your reply.

I've kept them side by side so I can switch easily, because else I can find it difficult to compare when there is too much time between the switch.

I'll put your tips to practice tonight.

Specially the taping of the magic spots 

I really do think that the drivers of the speakers that are not connected can "suck up" some of the sound.

I like my Dynaudio X12's too  I have them on a Qute2/NAP100 little system.  Very musical and enjoyable.

With speakers, in some rooms, like with houses, there are three important things: Location, location and location!  The presence of the other pair of speakers can also affect the sound.

I suggest making some templates (paper, wood or card) to retain the position of the stands for your Dynaudios (I prefer templates to using tape on the floor).  If you decide not to keep the Neats, you can then know you've put the Dynaudios back in exactly the same location.

Then remove the Dynaudios (and stands) from the room and experiment with the position of the Neats.  You may be surprised (or you may not!).

Whilst there are guidelines for positioning speakers in regular cuboidal rooms, they are no more than guidelines as other things like furniture affect the result.  As speakers vary in bass extension and off-axis response, the perfect place for one type of speaker isn't necessarily best place for another type.

Yes great little speakers, but do neat a lot of care with positioning. Still in my room I can have bass problems even with more than 50cm distance from the rear wall. Also the soundstage and imaging is off with a slight position change. At leat in my room, all will be different somewhere else. 

Thanks for the tips and so true about the possitioning! I've experienced that with the x12's, Though in reviews and certain forums read that the SX2's would be easier with positioning, but maybe not in my room.

I do notice that at very low volume the XS2 has a balans problem 

First stereo image shifts to the left and when even lower only the left channel works.

At this forum read about someone else having the same issue. Asked the seller if this was the case with this amp and he said no. Salesmen, you can never trust them 

Although you have already found the ideal position for the Dyns, I'd try the Neats back towards the wall a bit for the sound to be less glued to them. Even if that puts them into a bit of conflict with sofas, other furniture, line of sight etc.

Chris

Most Naim preamps and integrateds use ALPS 'Blue' potentiometers for their volume controls.  For various manufacturing and mathematical reasons, despite them being a very high quality component, there's always a certain degree of variability between the channels and this is most obvious at the low volume end of the tracks.

It's a matter of chance whether or not any specific box has the problem to an audible degree, and if so  to what degree it's there (I'm very lucky - my XS-2 doesn't have the problem at any detectable level).  I was however aware of the problem when I used the same component in my own amplifier designs, but then I could make adjustments by hand to 'trim out' the effect to some degree.

hmm, ok so it isn't by default a defect if it occurs.

I'm waiting for a response from the shop, let's see wait they say

Thanks will try this tonight though afraid the bass will get too overwhelming.

Can a tile(marble?) underneath the speaker(bottom ported) have a positive effect on possible booming bass?

Buying speakers without hearing them in your room is always something of a lottery, but as you said, you bought them for a good price so can sell without loss.

There can sometimes be a feeling that if lots of others like a speaker it must be you that is somehow at fault if you don't like them. I tried some Neats once (the Motive 1, which I bought without hearing because they were cheap) and they were absolutely awful in my room. There was so much bass it was just unbearable. 

So if you don't like the Neats, get shot of them. Ported speakers are the work of the devil. 

Definitely worth a try. The Motive SX2s sound glorious at my dealer's driven by any Naim, with which they have a great reputation. I notice his are pulled out further than I could give them here. I'm trying to suggest that you will have to experiment with positioning, but I think you are saying that you have already pulled them out a bit further than the Dyns and that the sound is still glued to the boxes. Could be worth moving the Neats a bit closer together as well as further out.

It may just be that you prefer a rear ported standmounter to a floorstander with down firing port in your room. In which case sell the Neats and valuable insights into your room and audio preferences gained.

Chris

Hi,

Also look at this thread.

https://forums.naimaudio.com/to...26#37468652721354826

One person was complaining of low volume balance mis-tracking on a NAC 552, so it even affects Naim's high end products.

Try blocking the ports (e.g, shove a towel under each speaker, touching the bottom on the cabinet and the floor).

A ported box is acting as a Helmhotz resonator.  If the tuned frequency of the resonator is close to one or more of the main resonance frequencies of the room, the the bass will sound 'boomy' and have a 'one note' character.  Blocking the port can sometimes be enough to tame the bass in this situation.

How big is your listening room?

   Ha! Caught between the devil and the deep blue sea!

See above and just run them as sealed boxes!

Thanks for all the information and tips. Helps a lot!

Yes i've been moving a lot with the neat's and the x12's out of the way. Still not sure what's best.

My experience in my room with a ported is a painful one, previous year purchased 4 gik 244 panels, did improve, but would need bigger bass traps and don't wan't to go further that road, don't want my room to look like a studio.

My living room is mostly concrete and is a L-shap. the listening position is in the foot of the L with the speakers at the long wall. Long wall is 8 meters, on the right side 5 meters conservatory(mostly glass) and behind me also 5 meters. Woden floor with a carpet between speakers and listening position. The concrete is probably the biggest reason for the bass problems. Mids and Highs improved a lot with the gik panels 

I think best for my room would be front ported, no port at all or maybe the system pmc uses. So much want to try a pmc twenty 23, but too expensive at the moment.

About a towel in the bass port. The x12 I use without the plugs because it also destroys the mids. I've used these plugs now with the neat's and expected the same, but not really. Boomy bass almost gone and the rest still seems there, so that gives me more options with placement. Though would not be that happy if I need to use the plugs, because like to able to use a speaker with it's full potential. But with plugs far better at the moment.

Using the plugs in the ports doesn't remove the speaker's 'full potential', it's a way of tuning the bass response to particular rooms.

The reflex ports increase the bass output across one small range of frequencies.  If these frequencies are already being accentuated by the room acoustics, having them increased by two separate mechanisms isn't what you want, as the bass can then become overpowering in that narrow range.

If you can't tailor the room acoustic with bass traps, then putting the bungs into the speakers is the next best option (and the speakers will actually produce bass transients a bit faster).  If the room already increases the bass at these frequencies you aren't losing potential from the speakers, you're just loosing an overemphasis.  The bass extension remains the much same, the only thing that changes is how that's achieved (i.e. using the reflex port or using the room resonance).

Incidentally, my room is even worse, I have to use both bass traps and bungs in the reflex ports to control the bass!

I use PMC 23s and they are excellent. The transmission line exits at the front and there are no bass issues at all, it's just deep, agile and tight. Unless you are totally convinced that the Neats are overwhelmingly better, I'd take them back if possible, and save up for something that will really work. It sounds like you've got the Dyns working very well. You certainly don't want to be fannying around with towels.

HH, transmission lines aren't a silver bullet.  If the tuning of the transmission line and its port matches a room resonance, then you'll have exactly the same problem that occurs if a speaker's Helmholtz resonator matches the room resonances (and the answer to the problem is the same: block the port or the exit of the transmission line!). 

However I believe that the transmission line of the PMS 32s is tuned to a lower frequency than the reflex enclosure of the Neat SX2s , so they may work better in his room.

P.S. The towels was just a simple way to conduct an experiment to see if it was worth moving the speakers to properly install bungs into the reflex ports.

PMC23 bass was about a second behind the beat of the music in my room. 

That's one hell of a transmission line .

G

Where the 23s in the same room?

 My room has not been kind to speakers with any kind of hole in them.

Thanks for this clarification! And yes seems to work very well with the Neats. Not with the X12's but that's probably due to the small stand mount body and maybe gets almost all is lower tones from the bass port.

I'm not that technical with audio, just want to enjoy music, that's why I can get nervous with new stuff. Simply just want it to work so I can go through all my tracks again and relax, but often not that simple

Now with the bungs I can even put them closer to the wall. Measured from the speakers first rear  corner to the wall 25cm. Not sure what's the right method to measure this, rear, middle or front speaker? There's 2.5meters between them

Maybe I've reached to point where I might decide to keep the Neats.

Yes I had this thought a lot about selling them and waiting for a good PMC offer, but that changed after using the bungs. Still though would love to try the PMC's if I ever get the chance.