Outdoor Speaker Suggestions

Darren Cooke

Darren Cooke

Darren Cooke

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Joined
12 Mar 2017
Posts
11
Location
Burbage
Hi all,

I like accessible music and whilst I'm no audiophile I do like a decent sound, and have a preference for bass.

I've a main stereo with floor standers and an svs PB12 SUB. but otherwise I have B&W zeppelins and a few Sonos play:5 through the house.

I now want outdoor speakers (to avoid having to lift the play:5 out), ideally with a performance similar to the play:5 or zeppelin, is that possible?

I currently have nothing (no amp yet) so lots of options.

I don't fancy the Sonos outdoor effort with Sonos amp (£1400!!) But saw BOSE ones (the soundlink mini is small but impressive and I have and rate their headphones) but @ £500 I'd have to be 100% they're great).

Saw some Polk outdoor ones, Yamaha ones, I even saw a klipsch rock, but that's US only it seems; I liked that as it had a biggish driver.

It won't be on loud, but even low to mid I'd like a full sound.

Any suggestions for a full sounding outdoor speaker pair? (Or more)
 
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Although the JBLs are good in their own right, the bass that the Zeppelin and Play5 put out will eclipse the Control 1s. Thats the adavtage of £400-£600's worth of active ported speaker array. Also, they're not permanent-live-outside outdoor speakers.

Try one of your speakers outside and test how you get on for.bass in that open space.
 
Just the guy I was waiting for to respond! I bought a bathroom speaker from you a good few years ago (username Pug, but lost the login), still loving that daily!

The Play:5 sounds great outside, very low volume use, so not pushing it but "full" enough.

Looking at the Polk atrium 6 and definitive technology 6500 currently, but the latter aren't really over here, and some suggestion that the Polk are a bit light on the bass?
 
I'm glad that the bathroom speaker is keeping you happy.

On to the outdoor speakers; I wouldn't call the Polks bass-light. They get down to a similar bass level to other similarly-sized bookshelf speakers. The difference though is that indoor speakers are often ported. That gives a useful bass boost. Porting isn't possible with an outdoor speaker. Sticking a hole in the cabinet kind of defeats the object of a weather seal LOL :D So the Polks are Infinite Baffle (sealed) which means that the bass is more precise, but it does lack the ported note hump.

The Def Techs get around this by using an auxiliary bass radiator (ABR). Essentially it's a speaker cone minus the magnet and drive coil, so it isn't driven. The speaker cabinet is still sealed, so the amount of air inside is fixed. As the main bass driver moves forward, the air pressure in the cabinet would normally fall and act as a force pulling the cone back. When the main driver moves backwards the air pressure would increase and so work to push the cone forward. This is called an acoustic spring because it helpds to pull the driver back to a neutral position.

The argument for an ABR is that the backwards motion of the cone equates to lost sound energy directed inside the cabinet. Putting a undriven cone in to the same cabinet means that some of the energy can be used to make a bit more bass. It's known as a '.5' system. It's called this because it's not as much energy as an actively-driven speaker cone, but it's more than you get with a sealed cabinet. So the Def Techs are a 2.5-driver speaker. That means tweeter, woofer and ABR. The additional bass depth though is more to do with the larger driver in the 6500 (6.5").

The Polks are around £300-£350. The Def Techs are somewhere close to double that I think, but that's only based on some web info. One of my suppliers does list them as available, so I'm guessing that they are available in the UK, although not widely.
 
Thanks bud, my budget is much nearer £300 than £700!

I did wonder if a cheap pair of say Yamaha speakers (or others) and an Atrium 100 passive sub might be an option for £400ish? But some reports say the sub isn't great (and others say it's not great cos the amps not powerful enough)
 
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