Yamaha NS-F500/NS-C500/NS-B500/NS-SW500 Speakers Test

Yamaha NS-500 series loudspeakers use proven Soavo technology in a compact and elegant design. For movies and music the NS-500 sounds natural and comfortable, though it loses slightly in sound dynamics to its predecessors in the Soavo and NS-700 series. The NS-500, however, is also less expensive.

YAMAHA NS series speakers

CONSTRUCTION

The new series of speakers NS-500 appeared on the American market at the end of 2010. Like the NS-700 series that came out two years ago, the new speakers inherited their main features from the older Soavo family. The 500 series now includes the NS-F500 floorstanders, the NS-B500 bookshelf speakers, the NS-C500 center speaker and the NS-SW500 active subwoofer.

The 500s have a slightly more streamlined cabinet design than the Soavos, but have lost none of the elegance and structural strength. All speakers in the series feature trapezoidal cabinets with angled sides and rounded edges. The stiffness of the floor-standing models’ cabinets is improved by a full-length vertical strut, and the midrange and woofer compartments are isolated by an oblique bulkhead. Three-way mitered-joint construction is used to join the panels of cabinets. All speaker cabinets have high-gloss black front panels and the rest is vinyl-covered with black or brown veneer. The speaker’s tweeters are enclosed by a metal grid, the midrange/midrange speakers have round grilles and the combined bass and treble grilles on the NS-F500 are somewhat similar in form to a guitar pickup. The NS-F500 floor-standing speakers can be mounted on metal spikes of adjustable height. All 500 Series speakers use a pair of screw terminals, so there is no Bi-Wiring.

The speakers used well-known from the 700 series tweeters 30 mm in diameter, in which the aluminum alloy dome is surrounded by absorbent felt ring and recessed into the shallow acoustic lens, and the voice coil frame forms one unit with the diaphragm DC-diaphragm .

The flagship NS-F500 series speakers come with a 130mm tweeter and 160mm bass driver. The speakers are equipped with cast aluminum baskets, voice coils have an edge winding, the magnets are ferrite, diaphragms are made of Advanced PMD Polymer-injected Mica Diaphragm – polymer cone of polymethyl-pentene, reinforced by mica and talc particles. It’s very similar to the NS-F700’s woofer/woofer design, but there are still differences. The bass driver surround is now made of sturdier rubber, and the midrange coil is wound with a rectangular wire like in the Soavo. The NS-F500 is acoustically loaded on the rear reflex port and works up to 580Hz, followed by a tweeter that gives voice to the 4.1kHz region.

The NS-B500 and NS-C500 half-walls and center are very compact and enclosed. Both models are powered by 120mm diameter bass/midrange drivers.

The subwoofer of the NS-SW500 surrounds the speaker’s woofer. The unit is equipped with the proprietary Advanced YST-II technology and a built-in 250W amplifier. The subwoofer has an eye-catching design with a compact truncated trapezoid cabinet equipped with a 250mm diameter front woofer and side reflex port. The control panel is located on the rear panel and allows the user to access volume control, cut-off frequency 40-160 Hz , phase change and choose one of two movie/music programs. The unit has line inputs with separate connectors for LFE mode and high-level inputs and outputs with screw terminals. New mini jack service input makes it easy to integrate the NS-SW500 into a YSP series sound projector-based DC system.

SOUND

The NS-F500’s sound signature is similar to its predecessor the NS-F700, which can be attributed to the use of similar, albeit re-designed speakers and crossovers. Therefore, the advantages of the new speakers sound is smooth and even transition of ranges in the midrange woofer region, airy and detailed top with good working out of the cymbal loops. Speakers have very decent for their class sound microdynamics, they build a wide and echeloned musical scene, localization of images, which is enough to place dozens of performers. Sound detail is not lost at high volume, but with increasing sound pressure speakers start to emphasize the treble, the top becomes too excited. The NS-F500s give a deep, naturally layered bass, at the same time the bigger and heavier NS-F700s seemed to exhibit more assertiveness and sharp attack in the bass.

In multi-channel applications, the NS-500 series loudspeaker set created an evenly circular, surround sound panorama, with clearly defined virtual objects. Panorama transparency was blurred only in the far echelons, while the near-end work was excellent. I also liked the NS-SW500 compact subwoofer, which was not only capable of low rumble and roar, but it helped the front speakers a lot when playing soundtracks of musical movies and multi-channel concert records. The subwoofer bass melds well with the voices of the other speakers in timbre, so it blends in very well, remaining “unnoticeable” until you turn it off, which immediately makes the sound boring. Among the drawbacks of SW-500 one can mention not the most articulate low-register and rare overloading on the fragments with powerful infra-low bass, which are quite excusable for such a miniature woofer.

76,650 Dollars.