Our Philosophy

Strap in, because this is a long read! Our mission statement summarises our philosophy on speakers, but to really understand what we mean and why we feel so passionately about our philosophy, we're going to have to go pretty in depth.

So, what is our mission statement?

Our mission is in our name, ‘No Bullsh*t Audio'. We want to provide a quality, no bullshit product manufactured by hand, by us, right here in Australia.

As with our cables, we don’t claim to offer the ‘best’ speakers or claim the title of ‘Audiophile Grade’. We simply provide objectively good speakers, handmade here in Australia for a reasonable price.

For the longer version, read on...

Where do we even start...?

When it comes to speakers, consumers are very spoiled for choice, unfortunately, it's to the point where it can be overwhelming. What also makes the decision hard is the price range of speakers available. There are $1,000 sets of speakers that are well reviewed and look fantastic. But then you find out you can spend hundreds of thousands of dollars on a pair of floorstanders and you wonder to yourself "What's the difference? What makes this speaker so much more expensive?".

The law of diminishing returns has a strong presence in audio, especially for those with less experience and a less "trained ear". A good pair of floorstanders that cost $1,000 can (and often do) sound objectively good. To many, spending 10s of thousands on more expensive speakers will yield a small, if any, perceived improvement.

The truth is, speaker parts today, even those of high quality, are relatively cheap to produce. The majority of the drivers used by speaker brands are sourced from the same manufacturers which is why you will see many similarities in the appearance of the drivers themselves when comparing speakers. Companies like SB Acoustics, Peerless and ScanSpeak provide the drivers for some of the most highly regarded speakers on the market. In objectively "good" speakers, these individual drivers can be bought by consumers, often for less than $50 - $100 each. Sure, some of the higher end drivers can cost much more but even the most highly regarded drivers on the market, such as those offered by Purifi can be purchased for around $600 each.

Objectively vs Subjectively Good Speakers

You'll notice I continually use the word "objectively" when describing what makes a "good" speaker. So, what's the difference? What makes a subjectively good speaker varies from person to person. It's a subjective opinion meaning it's all personal preference. Many speaker brands have a "sound signature" meaning the speakers are designed away from what makes an "objectively" good speaker to tailor to a certain market. One brand in particular is known (which I won't name but starts with a "K" and ends with "lipsch") for being very "bright" meaning the higher end of the frequency range is louder than the lower frequency range. Some people love this type of sound signature, others describe it as fatiguing. Many party speakers are the opposite, being very bass heavy (because what party goer doesn't love some "doof doof").

So, what makes an objectively good speaker? This is a little harder to pinpoint but research has been done on the topic and consistencies identified. They are as follows:

Frequency response: A good loudspeaker has been known to have a relatively flat and extended frequency response across the audible range (20 Hz to 20 kHz). This means that it reproduces all frequencies accurately without significant peaks or dips.

Distortion: Low distortion is essential for a good speaker. Distortion can introduce unwanted artifacts and affect the "faithful" reproduction of the audio signal.

Directivity: The directivity pattern of a speaker determines how sound is dispersed in different directions. Controlled directivity can lead to better sound localization and a more "uniform" listening experience.

Transient response: A good speaker should have a fast transient response, accurately reproducing sudden changes in the audio signal, which results in better clarity and detail.

What this means in simple terms? At the end of the day, we want to replicate what the artist created as faithfully as possible.

NB Audio sits strongly in the "objectively good" camp. We don't want to cater to a certain market or create a "signature sound". We simply want to recreate what was recorded as accurately as possible. Any changes involving personal preference can be made with some simple EQ, available in even the most basic of equipment we use to power our speakers.

How does NB Audio achieve this?

The foundation is starting with good components. As the old saying goes, "You can't polish a turd"! If you start with bad components, you're only limiting yourself with how good the speaker can be. Quality components are built with the "objectively good" characteristics discussed above. Fortunately, as speaker designers we have access to a lot of good speaker components, all for a reasonable cost.

Once we have good components, we do have to pair them with a quality design. One cannot simply drop them in a box, connect them up and and expect it to sound good. I won't delve into design specifics and principles but in this day and age we are fortunate enough to be able to source very accurate measurement equipment and powerful software at a reasonable cost to measure our speakers and make tweaks as required. Using simulation software, we are able to accurately simulate a speakers frequency response and impedance, before even fully assembling the speaker. Once built, we then take measurements to confirm our simulation and make tweaks as required.

Our speakers are as faithful to our name as our cables are!

For those that are familiar with us and our cables, you'll be pleased to know we treat our speakers the same as our cables. Sure, there's quite a lot more to speakers than a humble piece of copper with banana plugs, but our intent is the same. We design our speakers based on what science has been telling us for decades, we give you objective information and allow you to form an opinion of our speakers based on facts. You won't find buzzwords, convoluted marketing dribble or pseudoscience in how we describe our designs.

Speaker design is driven by compromise

While we are able to build an objectively good speaker, there will always be compromise. Stating the obvious, budget is one of them! We can't build the speakers we do using nothing but dirt cheap components, because of that, our speakers aren't ridiculously cheap either. There is also always design trade offs. Small woofers can be put in smaller enclosures, but they won't play low. Bigger woofers can play low in smaller enclosures, but they won't be sensitive (meaning they require a lot of power to play loud). Sensitive woofers can be put in smaller enclosures, but they also won't play low. The realm of physics largely governs the limitations of the speaker.

Our intention is to build a speaker with a design goal in mind. If we want a speaker that can play loud and go deep, we know we're going to need a big woofer in a bigger enclosure so we base our design around that. If our design goal is to build a speaker we intend to pair with a sub, we can use a smaller enclosure and a smaller woofers knowing the low frequencies duties will be handled by a subwoofer.

How are speaker looks can influence how we perceive it sounds

Now we're starting to dig deep and I could write an entire essay on this sentence alone but I'll keep it brief. Research has shown over and over that our ears are deceived by our eyes. A study performed on Harman employees in the 90s found:

"...the sighted and blind loudspeaker listening tests in this study produced significantly different sound quality ratings. The psychological biases in the sighted tests were sufficiently strong that listeners were largely unresponsive to real changes in sound quality caused by acoustical interactions between the loudspeaker, its position in the room, and the program material."

In this study, when the listener could see the speaker, the sound quality rating of the higher end, more expensive looking speaker was significantly higher than blind testing. But when blindfolded, the sound ratings changed with the lower end speakers not only improving, but were preferred in many instances to the high end speakers.

We encourage you to treat audio as an experience, not just listening to something you like

While we are absolutely deceived by our eyes, this can be seen as a good thing if we approach how we experience audio as more than just what we hear. That most certainly sounds like a ridiculous sentence but bear with me. When one treats audio as a full "experience", not just what we hear, we can better understand what we love and enjoy about listening to our favourite music. It's about the dimmed lights, the comfort of your chair, the smell of the glass of port or whiskey you just poured, the feeling of a satisfied stomach after the fine meal you just consumed... the kids and and spouse being at your mother in laws that night while you have an entire evening to yourself. When you treat audio as an experience, you find the speakers themselves play a smaller part than you give them credit for.

The elephant in the room... is the room

This is simply not emphasised enough despite being, at times, more important than the speakers themselves. You can have the best speakers ever built sound shit, if placed in a poorly optimised room. Typically, a poorly optimised room will contain hard surfaces creating lots of reflections and creating a very "messy" audio experience whereas a well optimised room will contain softer surfaces resulting in a "cleaner" and more accurate audio experience. We've all stood in a large empty room and heard our echo reverberate throughout, now imagine trying to faithfully reproduce audio in the same room. This is why when you go to a theatre you'll see large curtains and sound absorbing panels.

In addition to this, some speakers are better suited to certain size rooms. Put large horn loaded speakers in a small room and you're going to be underwhelmed however put those same speakers in a larger room and they will shine. Inversely, put a small, low sensitivity speaker in a big room and you're going to have a bad time, put it in a smaller room and the experience will likely be more pleasant.

Our speakers are designed to be used in a "perfect" room. We don't want a speaker design to start catering for the imperfections in the room as there's so much variation from one room to another and what may fix one issue, may create 5 more. Instead, we encourage those using our speakers to treat/optimise their room as best they can.

Crossover design and components

Fortunately, the audio industry has had a very good understanding of crossover design for many years. The 3 main parts of a crossover are inductors, capacitors and resistors which are used in different combinations to control what signal is sent to each individual speaker driver.

Measuring, simulating and tweaking crossover designs to achieve the desired frequency response is relatively easy and takes far less trial and error than it used to. Using simulation software and the measured characteristics of a speaker driver, we are able to design an optimal enclosure, build that enclosure, take further measurements and simulate crossover designs with scary accuracy before we've even lifted a soldering iron!

Crossover parts are not immune to snake oil. A small capacitor can range from just a few dollars to hundreds of dollars. While there are measurable differences in different crossover parts, it's largely attributed to tolerances. A cheaper capacitor may have a tolerance of 10% (meaning the actual value of the capacitor may be out by as much as 10%) vs more expensive capacitors having a tolerance of 2%. As with most things in audio, you'll quickly run into diminishing returns. A 5% tolerance 10uf capacitor can be had for less than $10 whereas a 2% tolerance capacitor can be $100+. We use often use 3+ of these capacitors in even simple 2 way bookshelf speakers so the costs can quickly add up. Similar rules apply to inductors and resistors. While this is a simplified analysis of one example and like all things in audio, it goes deeper than this, it at least gives you better understanding of how costs of speakers can vary so much.

There's also "active crossovers" which uses digital manipulation and has significantly more flexibly, but that's a conversation for another time!

So, where do we sit in relation to crossover parts and designs? Like everything we pick in our designs, we focus on value. The best value in crossover parts is had in that "5% tolerance" range. We are able to source these components for significantly less than the tighter tolerance alternatives but are comfortable in doing so as we know this minor difference in tolerance will have such a small effect on the response but such a significant effect on the final cost of the speaker itself.

Enclosure materials

Another touchy subject, who would have guessed?! This topic is done to death on DIY speaker building forums. The most common materials to build speaker enclosures are plywood and MDF.

The short version is, when using the 2 most popular materials (MDF and Plywood) there is almost no measurable difference between the two assuming the box design includes adequate bracing to reduce resonance. Enclosure resonance refers to the tendency of the speaker cabinet to vibrate and colour the sound produced by the speaker, leading to distortions and a less accurate reproduction of the audio signal. We are able to reduce this by using thicker material, bracing the speaker appropriately and lining the box with damping material.

We typically use MDF as it's more cost effective than quality plywood, is consistent in build and easy to work with. We do also employ solid hardwood baffles in some of our designs for aesthetics which does add a few challenges but nothing that isn't manageable with proper build techniques.

You've done a lot of waffling on, can you get to the point?

Honestly, it's amazing you got this far. I barely get 2 sentences into talking about speakers with my wife and she's losing interest, but here you are, over 2000 words later, still reading! At the end of the day, it comes back to our mission statement:

"Our mission is in our name, ‘No Bullsh*t Audio'. We want to provide a quality, no bullshit product manufactured by hand, by us, right here in Australia.

What this means is focusing on the scientific evidence built up over decades, sourcing components that offer the best value without having to make sacrifices to quality and assembling it all in an efficient and quality manner that not only produces an objectively great sounding speaker but one that looks fantastic.

We're really proud of our speakers which have been the culmination of 10s of thousands of hours pursuing our passion for audio and home theatre. For you to purchase our speakers and have a piece of that passion as part of your own audio/home theatre journey is truly rewarding and for that, we thank you!