KRK Setup and Measurements

In the past, I have set my Swan S200A speakers on stands flanking my desk in my AV Rant podcast room. The room is heavily treated with 19 Ready Acoustics Chameleon panels. Echos are a thing of the past in this room. The Swans may be a bit smaller overall than the KRKs but they are rear ported and I needed to keep them off the wall. With the stands, I could do that without taking up too much desk space. The KRKs were easier to place with their front port and large pad on the Rokit 6s. This actually allowed me to hang them off the back of the desk a bit without worrying if I would miss whatever "feet" were on the bottom of the speaker. One thing about all the controls on all the speakers is that they "click" into place rather than being continuously variable. While a more continuous pot would give you finer control, one that locks makes it easier to ensure that you have both speakers at the same level. The sub controls are continuous giving you finer control on how the sub blends with the speakers and where the crossover lands. Level matching the speakers is a matter of sending a few test tones (you can get some online or from the Rives Audio Test CD 2 disc) and measuring them with an SPL meter. For my setup, having the speakers at the same volume was fine since I was equidistant from them and while I initially set the sub with a meter, I ended up doing it by ear in the end.

I placed the sub on the outside of my desk. It was probably only a couple of feet or so from me. The speakers were on the desk and about anywhere from a foot to two feet depending on where I sat. I connected the sub and speaker combination in every available way. The system worked as advertised in just about every way. You'll want to start with the volume of the speakers and sub at the minimum and then work them up to an acceptable level. I found that if I had the speakers up too high, I got a buzz from them. My only real problem was that I was getting output from the sub far above the crossover point. Even when I bottomed out the crossover, I was hearing output all the way up to 125Hz. Not faint output but strong output. This could pose a problem with sub/monitor integration.

Measurements & Analysis

For laboratory measurements I used the Sencore SP395A FFT Audio Analyzer plugged directly into the internal amps of the Rokit 6 speakers and 10s subwoofer. The first thing I did was take the sub outside and do a groundplane measurement at one meter.

KRK10s Subwoofer Groundplane Measurement 1 Meter

As you can see the KRK10s subwoofer has very strong and linear output from about 100Hz to 35-40Hz. The bass response is definitely more linear at lower volumes (which is most likely how this sub will be run). Depending on the placement, your in room response might be a bit lower.

I measured the KRK Rokit Powered 6 speakers in-room on- and off-axis frequency response with 1/12th octave resolution.

KRK Rokit Powered 6 1 Meter Frequency Response (1/12th Octave) On Axis
Note - this is NOT a 1 watt measurement

As you can see, the Rokit 6s measures incredibly flat on axis except for a bump around 12-15kHz with a fairly dramatic dropoff below 70Hz which is expected and likely deliberate to preserve system dynamics since these monitors are designed to work in concert with the 10s subwoofer.

KRK Rokit Powered 6 1/2 Meter Frequency Response (1/12th Octave)
Pink - On axis, Orange - 15 degrees off axis, Yellow - 30 degrees off axis

KRK specs these speakers to 49Hz which doesn't look very likely from the 1 meter graph but it much more plausible in the above. Since the speakers are probably mostly going to be used nearfield, this seems to be the most representative of actual use.