Speaker grills on or off?

philipwu
174 posts
10-21-2016 7:50am
geoff, i could not remember that magazine that was put up in the net. it wasn’t in english though. i used 3rd party app for translation, but the graphs are easy to understand.


Hi, Philip, one imagines test results can vary even for well intentioned careful testers. The test I linked to was also careful with easy to understand graphs and showed only very small differences that can easily be interpreted as inaudible.  Please note I’m NOT suggesting there aren’t audible differences between grills on and grills off. It's simply a case of measuring the WRONG thing. 

I have Magico speakers none of them come with grills for best sound.

Easy answer: whichever sounds best to you. In my experience, most sound a little more transparent and open with the grills off, especially if the grill is perforated sheet metal. But some speakers a resonically engineered for the grills to be in place, in which case removing the grills *might* make the speakers sound a little bright.

In the case of my Maggies with permanently attached grills plus that I'm deliriously happy with the sound makes it a very convenient non-issue with me.

The manual recommends removing the grills of KEF Reference 107/2s for critical listening.  I usually leave the grills on.