M-Audio BX5 D3

I bought 2 of these without any tryout, only based on Youtube comparisons with a studio headphone (included in the Focusrite studio set).

I am very satisfied with the sound and the stereo imaging of the speakers, actually I love just to hear music on them, not just for studio work.

Many of reviews were about lack of bass, but even for just listening to music (pop, rock, metal, southern rock, modern metal etc, blues, jazz), there is enough bass I can confirm that.

For my taste these speakers are very natural sounding, round and the notes are very understandable. Hearing them from 0.5-1m, the result is perfect.

I have currently no time to make music on them, but I can imagine full mixing and mastering processing on these ones. Of course for super-lows mix I would prefer a good studio headphone, and at the finalisation hearing your music on different speakers and headphones is always a great practice. For D4 version I suggest to add a high freqency booster potmeter.

I recommend these ones, they are loud and great!

After two years: Finally after 2 years I found the highs rolled off too much, it is easy to
make too crisp/harsh mixes on them. I found my mixes became too warm sounding
not enough aggresive on them. With the acoustic space to -4db and cross reference
with a great studio headphone (like ath m40x) the results can be much better. Stereo imaging, amount of bass is ok. For less agressive styles it can be a good monitor.

Let's start with positive things:
- Great looking monitors, hands down
- They have good features such as low cut for -2 and -4 db

Negative things:
- Too much bass that can resonate and make an awful buzzing sound, once I bought soft pads it became better but I can't get rid of this sound even on -4db. I put them kinda close to the wall but it's a cheap equipment, so you can't expect a person buying it having a treated room with correct monitor placement, so I don't know who can find those useful and for whom they are built
- Volume knobs are too easy to rotate and they don't have any locking positions, so when you turn them on and off you can rotate them and not even notice

Overall: Maybe those are great when you have a correct placement and monitor stands / great soft pads but if you are searching for budget monitors for a home studio without a proper treatment - buy monitors that have ports (holes) on the front panel, this will minimize the chance of unwanted buzz on low frequencies

These are huge upgrade over any typical PC speakers with 3.5 TRS jack. They do have way too much bass at the "flat" settings but it can be dialed down with the switch in the back (sounding much better at the middle -2db settings). For the price they sound excellent. Sensitivity and resolution being quite good. They do get a bit muddy sounding with more distorted sounds like heavy guitars etc. I use these for video editing and casual music listening and they are more than good enough. They do hum a little bit when in idle.

I would not recommend these for any serious music production you should probably get Yamahas or Neumanns for that.

I use a set of these in my home studio: both for mastering and listening to music throughout my day.

They are solidly constructed and offer reasonable frequency response - perhaps a little lacking in the bass department for general listening duties. I have an aversion to shrill sounding tweeters so I personally find the silk domes very pleasing and unlikely to generate listening fatigue.

The main concern I have is that the internal amplifier runs quite hot. Unlike my CX-8's which have a large heatsink there is no external cooling, but it remains to be seen whether this will affect their long term operating life.

I got these for my second music production studio. The sound is perfectly balanced with a nice response on low frequencies.

The speaker is flat, good for the average bedroom producer or a studio that needs a balanced sound. You are not going to get the volume and bass feeling like the BX8, there are a completely different category, but I find the BX5 more usable for more situations.

My suggestion:
- For bedroom producers and DJs practicing at home
- Small studios, bedroom studios or small rooms
- For instrument players that need two good monitors for practicing at home