Audio About to replace my Audioengine A2 with Edifier R1280T

letmein

Adept
My 5+ year Audioengine A2's appear to be dying. Random drops in audio while watching a video on VLC or YT. Tried juggling the power cable and whatnot, but no luck. Seems to be a hardware problem.

For a replacement, I'll probably go for an Edifier R1280T.

Just wanted to know if there was anything better on the market. Would prefer 2.0 speakers over a 2.1 setup.
 
Are those edifiers really worth 8k ?
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ok i'm going down the rabbit hole reading about bookshelves (again for the 3425th time) on reddit...
 
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Edifier started out as pretty great, but in recent years they seem to have shifted focus to "decorational" speakers that manage to look god-awful and don't really focus much on sound quality.

These might still be good, but I'd suggest visiting a dealer if you can and having a listen before buying.
 
@letmein what's your budget?

Edifier seems to have a wide range of speakers, how are the ones priced higher than the 1280, like the 1850/2000?

Also how do monitors like the Mackie and presonus compare with these kinds of multimedia/consumer speakers for a) music and b) movies?

I'm very sceptical about overly positive reviews these days because people seem to be overrating everything and usually if speakers are un-distorted at loud volume, they're rated good, with no regard to the actually tonality and fidelity.
 
I have the Edifier R1850DB , which I use as speakers for my TV, the occasional music, etc So usual distance is about 8-9 feet from them. Serve my purpose pretty well. I use a set of PreSonus Eris 3.5's as my editing and mixing speakers. The Edifiers are pretty forgiving and I love the sound for things like movies, shows, etc.
 
The issue specifically for movies is that most V-shape tuned (for pop music) consumer speakers and also some crappy 5.1 home theatre setups even with a center speaker are terrible at dialogue and speech. So you turn up the volume. And then when a music/action scene comes up, it's way too loud and you have to scramble for the remote. Especially a problem for those living in apartments, maybe not so for a house or dedicated tv room.
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I have the Edifier R1850DB , which I use as speakers for my TV, the occasional music, etc So usual distance is about 8-9 feet from them. Serve my purpose pretty well. I use a set of PreSonus Eris 3.5's as my editing and mixing speakers. The Edifiers are pretty forgiving and I love the sound for things like movies, shows, etc.

Since you have both types, consumer bookshelves as well as monitors, which would you say are better for movies?
 
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@letmein what's your budget?

Edifier seems to have a wide range of speakers, how are the ones priced higher than the 1280, like the 1850/2000?

Also how do monitors like the Mackie and presonus compare with these kinds of multimedia/consumer speakers for a) music and b) movies?

I'm very sceptical about overly positive reviews these days because people seem to be overrating everything and usually if speakers are un-distorted at loud volume, they're rated good, with no regard to the actually tonality and fidelity.

Around 10-12k, but I can strech it to 15k if needed.

I've looked at the other models, but most of the higher end stuff seems to have Bluetooth. I'm not going to be using them as BT speakers, and it seems to me that the only reason for the extra premium is because of the BT functionality.

And I'm already struggling with BT interference with my other wireless devices, that's why I eliminated them from my shortlist.
 
The issue specifically for movies is that most V-shape tuned (for pop music) consumer speakers and also some crappy 5.1 home theatre setups even with a center speaker are terrible at dialogue and speech. So you turn up the volume. And then when a music/action scene comes up, it's way too loud and you have to scramble for the remote. Especially a problem for those living in apartments, maybe not so for a house or dedicated tv room.
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Since you have both types, consumer bookshelves as well as monitors, which would you say are better for movies?

In my experience the Edifiers sound great for movies. Dialogues are good. (This is the most important criteria for me) and I set the volume according to that. It also depends on your source and how the 5.1 is converted to stereo. I don't remember this anymore but there used to be certain files that I had downloaded that had the vocals/dialogues at a higher volume than the other stuff. The good thing is that even though action scenes get loud, the volume doesn't sound harsh.

Keep in mind that my Monitors are about 2 feet away from me and the bookshelf speakers {Edifiers} are 8-9 feet away.
 
Around 10-12k, but I can strech it to 15k if needed.

I've looked at the other models, but most of the higher end stuff seems to have Bluetooth. I'm not going to be using them as BT speakers, and it seems to me that the only reason for the extra premium is because of the BT functionality.

And I'm already struggling with BT interference with my other wireless devices, that's why I eliminated them from my shortlist.

What i got from reddit discussions on the subject are that edifier speakers are positioned and priced linearly, i.e. each higher model is better than the previous. This appears to be in volume/loudness though. Not sure if there is any improvement in audio quality as well.

These would be Rx only, so would they add to BT noise?
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In my experience the Edifiers sound great for movies. Dialogues are good. (This is the most important criteria for me) and I set the volume according to that. It also depends on your source and how the 5.1 is converted to stereo. I don't remember this anymore but there used to be certain files that I had downloaded that had the vocals/dialogues at a higher volume than the other stuff. The good thing is that even though action scenes get loud, the volume doesn't sound harsh.

Keep in mind that my Monitors are about 2 feet away from me and the bookshelf speakers {Edifiers} are 8-9 feet away.

Most of my sources have ripped ac3/dts 5.1 audio tracks. I use ac3filter which converts them to 2-channel. It has a mixing matrix in which you can boost the center channel more than the others. In spite of all this sometimes the dynamic range is too much and there's an abrupt volume spike.

It's not about harshness, loudness only, coz i would be watching movies late-ish and don't want to disturb the neighbours. These are basically meant to be headphone replacements as i can't use headphones due to a ear injury. Also why i can't listen too loud.
 
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What i got from reddit discussions on the subject are that edifier speakers are positioned and priced linearly, i.e. each higher model is better than the previous. This appears to be in volume/loudness though. Not sure if there is any improvement in audio quality as well.

These would be Rx only, so would they add to BT noise?
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Most of my sources have ripped ac3/dts 5.1 audio tracks. I use ac3filter which converts them to 2-channel. It has a mixing matrix in which you can boost the center channel more than the others. In spite of all this sometimes the dynamic range is too much and there's an abrupt volume spike.

It's not about harshness, loudness only, coz i would be watching movies late-ish and don't want to disturb the neighbours. These are basically meant to be headphone replacements as i can't use headphones due to a ear injury. Also why i can't listen too loud.

Well depending on how it;s mixed you will get spikes in Action/Horror films.
 
The bass will disappoint you coming from A2.
Go for swans m10 if you ok with 2.1 or Maudio AV32 / 42 if more budget.

Any recommendations for 2.0 speakers? I simply can't add a sub to my setup. Actually, I would not have minded replacing the A2 with A2s again, but they seem to be out of stock.
 
IIRC, they had only the 1280 and 1700. Flipkart had more variety at the time.
 
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