The US online forum Audio Science Review is well known for its broad range of articles, reviews and measurements of audio products. It has a large following and a very active community. Some audiophiles look down on the ‘objective quality’ driven discussions, but in our opinion a good audio system should not just sound great but also measure very well. To measure loudspeakers, the editor Amir Majidimehr uses a highly sophisticated Klippel NFS ‘Near Field Scanning’ system that is capable of measuring a loudspeaker under standard acoustic conditions and then calculating its anechoic response down to very low frequencies through ‘field separation’ techniques.
We were delighted to see Amir’s verdict on the LS1c and copy some excerpts below. Please read the full review here, and don’t forget to read our ‘manufacturer’s comment’. Eelco Grimm explains that since the Klippel system transforms every measurement to anechoic condition, it judges the floor standing SB1 sub output 6 dB too low. And he explains why Amir’s near field measured distortion graph does not show the low distortion of the SB1 correctly. With this knowledge in mind, the result of the test is outstanding. Amir writes:
“This is one gorgeous and unique looking speaker! It nicely crosses the bridge between bland studio monitors and home speakers. Innovative mechanical engineering is employed to ship the speaker safely in multiple parts that you put together. Clever things such as magnets on side columns that attach to the sides of the main unit put a smile on your face. As does the SB1 subwoofer which tightly slides into the bass of the speaker, making it look like it is built in.
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Other than some tiny variations, the on-axis response is almost perfectly flat. We can see that the blue early window directivity is essentially a copy of that, with a tinies of dip at the crossover frequency of 1.5 kHz. There is little droop in that, or the power response for that matter, implying wide directivity (shown later). Usually with good directivity, we sacrifice wide response but we seem to have both of them here, indicating some clever engineering.
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The round edges essentially eliminate diffraction errors as evidenced by clean (relatively speaking) trend from red to white. Little jaggedness is to be seen.
The shocker, in a good way, came in the form of the waterfall: as you see, the response stops on a dime and that is that. I don’t think I have ever tested a speaker that was this good.
And fans of step response can rejoice in how the overall response is as if there is only one driver playing.
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“The number of times I have been sad to let a speaker go can be counted on one hand. One more finger was utilized to include the Grimm Audio LS1c system.“ Amir Majidimehr, Audio Science Review
Due to size and weight of the speaker system, I chose to listen to it in our living room as opposed to my dedicated music space. This is a very large space with 30+ feet ceilings. It is also highly reflective. Boy did the combo shine in this environment. I always start with female vocals and here, I was hearing an effect I had not experienced before: the vocals would separate out tonally and spatially from the rest of the band in the most delightful way. The halo was quite large around the (single) speaker I was listening to as well, making for a wonderful experience. This was still there somewhat with male vocals but really there with females. Maybe it is the wide directivity. I am not sure but whatever it was, it put the LS1c + SB1 combo in a class by itself.
It is a breath of fresh air to see a speaker be different from looks to functionality yet provide what we expect as far as ideal response. Not only the objective response is there, the combination of LS1c and SB1 delight this reviewer in ways he has not experienced. The integration provided through the external accessories is not to be underestimated in the way you can just plug everything and start playing and controlling the system without a glitch or any issues whatsoever.”
