You must have a PhD to understand the technical side to these speakers - so I'll limit the context of this post to their practical differences.
To begin with, I don't think the comparison Beoplay M5 vs Beolit 20 makes sense, but since I'm asked about it a lot lately I'll do my best to explain.
The reason I don't think it makes sense is because they have completely different intended uses:
- Beoplay M5 is a home/stationary speaker. For single room use, it's one of my top B&O home speakers as I also clarified in here.
- Beolit 20 is a portable speaker with nearly 8 hours of battery life (assuming full-on listening) and 2.5 - 3.5 hours of charging time.
This is what your decision should 100% be based on. Portable vs stationary. Because, as you see, they are NOT the alternatives of one another.
Unlike M5, Beolit 20 is battery operated (meaning that it's portable).
Keep this in mind as you read further.
Sound quality, strength and propagation
Have you ever noticed that there often tends to be quite the opposite opinions about a speaker?
I can understand this for more "personal taste" kinda products like clothing, for example.
But for engineering products like speakers? Personal tastes and preferences probably still play a role. But shouldn't it be less?
Why is it that we can't set a universal metric for sound quality?
First time I asked this question to myself has been a pivotal day.
Because it turns out that in the mid 90's, Electrical Engineer PhD Floyd Toole came up with a method called Spinorama. This is exactly what he accomplished with this. Turns out that his book Sound Reproduction is like the bible of audiophiles.
Put it simply, Spinorama is a set of measurements that gives a comprehensive overview of a speaker's performance from various angles.
It allows you to compare the performances of different speakers before even laying your ears hands on them.
Isn't that amazing?
This is why Spinorama was apparently groundbreaking news for audio industry. Hence in the mid-late 2010's, most brands and magazines began publishing Spinorama measurements, despite the challenges of making such measurements.
Fortunately, now we have the Spinorama data for a bunch of quite popular speakers. Pierre Aubert put all this untidy data together and put it into https://www.spinorama.org/. This is a stunning source. Pretty valuable stuff from him right there.
All good up to this point.
Now there comes a caveat.
Since the sound speakers propagate are in the form of omnidirectional waves, all measurements are obtained in anechoic or semi-anechoic chambers (a super-quiet room where soundwaves don't bounce back, here's how different that room sounds [a mind blowing time-adjusted video]).
This is a problem because it means that Spinorama alone, unfortunately, won't give us all we need. Placement and reflections play an equally important role there too.
This is why most A-class brands (like SVS, Bang & Olufsen, etc) often come up with room correction features, adjusted either manually or automatically. The EQ adapts itself to the placement (room, corner, center, etc) for a better (deeper and more accurate) sound. Which is great.
Additionally they often emphasize the importance of placement, here is an example: https://www.svsound.com/blogs/subwoofer-setup-and-tuning/75365187-the-art-of-subwoofer-placement
Anyways...
The source code under Pierre Aubert's work is licensed under GPL (General public license). He didn't perform any of the measurements himself, and instead he compiled all of them into one place, so that makes sense.
At this point, I thought that if there was a tool that combined both the Spinorama with the room acoustics data, it'd be extremely useful.
Unfortunately, it turns out that there wasn't any.
This is where I stepped in and partnered with an Acoustics and Audio Engineering PhD in order to achieve this.
We combined Spinorama data with room acoustics and came up with Soundton. A very simple, 2D online tool that allows you to:
- Reveal optimal speaker positions in a room,
- Test with real speakers from real brands,
- Compare different speakers and different positions in the room.
It can be very valuable for the vast majority.
The colormap provides you the locations with the best (green) and worst (red) listening experience.
It works the best with subwoofers since Soundton processes low frequency response waves only.
- Soundton is going to be, say, 80% accurate. Not 100%.
- Because, other parameters such as the age/materials of the building, furniture/windows in place also have an impact on room acoustics.
- If you want absolutely the most detailed room analysis, then what you need is an acoustics consultant. Mind you that's going to require deep pockets and patience though... assuming you find the right person and they get the job done.
Anyways...
Huge size (23 H x 18.9 W x 13.5 D cm - 9.1 H x 7.4 W x 5.3 D inches) of Beolit 20 allows placing more drivers & amplifiers of various sizes and hence enables high sound quality.
Beoplay M5, on the other hand, still offers 2 more amplifiers - which is enough to make a noticeable difference with the sound quality.
Amplifiers | 1 x 40W class D for the woofer (160W peak power) 1 x 30W class D for the mid range (120W peak power) 1 x 30W class D for the front tweeter (120W peak power) 1 x 30W class D for rear tweeters (60W peak power) | 2 x 35W class D for bass and treble (240W peak power) |
Frequency | 37 - 22.000 Hz | 37 - 20.000 Hz |
Driver units | 1 x 5” woofer 1 x 1.5” midrange 3 x 3⁄4” tweeters | 1 x 5.5” long-stroke Wideband Woofer 2 x 4” Passive Bass Radiators 3 x 1,5” Wideband Tweeters |
Maximum loudness | 96 dB SPL | 93 dB SPL |
Bass capability | 79 dB SPL | 77 dB SPL |
One of the things I and many others admire the most about the Beoplay M5 is that it offers the highest sound quality - particularly at aggressively high/low bass and aggressively high/low volumes.
Sound remains clean in every setting. You can hear each instrument clearly. It's quite a bit pleasant in your ears.
You'd expect the speakers like this to hold back on the loudness department but that's far from reality with the Beoplay M5.
It fills the bill for even relatively large sized (say, 50 square meters) rooms without a hitch.
Beolit 20 is weaker than the Beoplay M5 in this department, but not by a huge amount. The fact that its sound quality distorts and levels at aggressively high/low volumes is more noticeable and restrictive than its loudness.
Speaking of which, true 360 degree sound design of both products help a lot with their strengths.
Because they're able to propagate the sound equally in each direction when they're positioning in the room is closer to the center.
To be honest, Beolit 20 isn't really 360 degree, but more like 300-330 degree. If you're going to be listening to the audio in a full circle (which I'd doubt), this might be a problem. Beoplay M5, on the other hand, is truly 360 degree.
Lastly, it's possible to introduce their positioning into both speakers: corner, wall or center (freestanding). It'll then do its magic and adjust the audio accordingly.
Portability
You can't take Beoplay M5 out with you even just for once. It doesn't have an internal battery and hence requires consistent power all the time.
Beolit 20 is portable - but it's still huge. Meaning that you can simply just put it in your bag and forget about it. You're going to have to haul it.
Unlike M5, Beolit 20 is battery operated (meaning that it's portable).
If you're looking for something smaller, check out Beoplay P2 and Beoplay A1. Navigate to the introduction of this post and find their sizes compared to that of Beolit 20 in the image.
Ease of use
Beoplay M5 is slick. Tap it to let Beoplay M5 join other speakers playing in your home. Simply turn it to adjust the volume.
Beolit 20, on the other hand, uses a simpler but not less effective method: Buttons.
Unlike Beoplay M5, since Beolit 20 isn't a Wi-Fi speaker, it lacks the ability to connect other speakers in your home.