Best 5 inch monitors in 2021

[ramseysounds]

when I did my blind shootout of about a dozen studio monitors in the Estrad studio in Stockholm, I was shocked how different the monitors sounded.

And the same monitors will all sound massively different in your room. I don’t get your comment.

[SparkySpark]

when I did my blind shootout of about a dozen studio monitors in the Estrad studio in Stockholm, I was shocked how different the monitors sounded.

And the same monitors will all sound massively different in your room. I don’t get your comment.

Ah, sorry if I was unclear. What I referred to was these: "Any speaker will look similar in your room, most monitors are far more linear..." and "I'm 99% sure most of that is the room". I'm not saying this is wrong, but there are two factors at play here:
1. the sound of the monitor
2. the room acoustics

In my opinion, people (not speaking of this thread but in general) overlook the first point... and also the second, to be fair

Maybe things have changed for nearfields during the last decade, but here goes:
So I went to the Estrad studio in 2006 or thereabouts with a bunch of well-produced CDs I knew well and representative of my music genre. I did a blind test for quite some time, first browsing through all fifteen or so monitors they had set up. Some of them I discarded easily. I then continued, and when the dust had settled, I had two "finalists", almost equal in sound but one much more precise. They turned out to be the Mackie HR-824 and a Behringer clone (which I bought).

The moral of the story is not which monitors I preferred, but how different they were! Having read a lot of reviews, I was very interested in the KRK Rok-Its. I was baffled when it turned out they were the first ones I discarded! Indeed I would never trust a mix on them. Still, I know others used them, so they are not bad monitors per se. It's just that I preferred the cleaner and fuller sound of the Mackies, and perhaps the Rok-Its suited other music (rock?) better. Also, everyone experiences sound differently, and it takes time to get accustomed to a certain monitor.

So if I were the topic starter, I would try to get to a wall of monitors, like I did, then buy whatever made most sense (sound- and moneywise), use Sonarworks and try to treat the room accordingly... plaus not buy too large monitors unless the room is quite big. Or simply purchase iLouds or so.

[VELLTONE MUSIC]

I didn't expect the topic to become so interesting as discussion and indeed there is so many things to consider when buy small monitors i haven't think before.
Only speakers in untreated room can't give good monitoring,i'll use headphones as reference as well.
Had chance by accident to by super linear headphones for nice price,some brands use same drivers/manifacture and sell their brand 2-3 times more expensive, so don't care about name and brand, but specs and real usage.
Check these two headphones specs,it's basically same with different name and price,probably some monitors are made this way too:
1.https://www.thomann.de/gr/superlux_hd681.htm
2.https://www.thomann.de/gb/presonus_hd7.htm

[Ploki]

Frankly monitors in the same price bracket will likely sound similar and 2. affects 1. way more than people realise.

Same speakers in different rooms will sound extremely different.
Even same speakers in the same room in a different position will sound radically different.
I have Trio11 and when i soffitted them they started behaving completely different across the spectrum, and this is a -heavily- treated room to begin with (budget for treatment was much bigger than budget for monitors).

And even after soffitting, i flipped them over (woofers top, tweeter+mid baffle rotated, so Woofer/tweeter/mid position) they started to sound and measure different. Low end cleared up because ceiling/floor SBIR was different because woofer wasn't centered between ceiling and floor anymore, and tweeters sounded different when straight to the ear as opposed to angled towards it from the top.

I have another sealed 6.5" nearfield pair that i made myself and juggling them around the room affects how they sound immensely, despite the fact that the room is limp membrane + porous absorbers all around, no diffusion, so essentially a NRE control room design.

Fun fact i also have subwoofers in top front corners, not on the floor. They're bolted to the wall

@Velltone
good point about prices.
There's Audio Optimum MS6 speakers that cost 4500€ / pair.
They use the same Wavecor woofers that cost ~150/€ per driver, i made my 6.5" with the same woofer driver and it sounds great - but some companies have inflated prices.

[ramseysounds]

I didn't expect the topic to become so interesting as discussion

It's amazing what people can achieve when discussing things in a grown up way huh

[Ploki]

And when they unblock each other!

[SparkySpark]

I agree. Thanks for a fruitful and interesting discussion.

Re the headphones: I have the Superlux HD 681 you are looking at, as well as the Sony 7506 and the AKG 702 Pro. What can I say, I have studio gear in two different countries, and realising the Superlux wasn't enough for me, I bought a second pair of 7506 (they're not THAT expensive anyway). I really think that is money well spent, ESPECIALLY if you're not so sure on the speaker setup. If you have access to Ozone 9 standard, you also have Tonal Balance Control, which works really well for balancing your mix (low-mid-high). We just discussed it in a thread in the Effects forum.

So, the way I see it, a monitor you like the sound of and get familiar with, a pair of 7506 or similar (depending on your style of music mainly) and Tonal Balance Control should go a long way for a home studio. (Of course, if you're serious about mastering etc, it wouldn't be enough, but then again this would have been another thread.)

[VELLTONE MUSIC]

Thanks for all opinions and discussion
Probably will buy Eris E5 from Thomann - seems most linear in 100-150 euro range.
If nothing better pop up browsing www
Cheers