Speaker grills on or off?


Which sound do you prefer from your speakers - with grill on or off?
50jess
Grill's on or off? It boils down to how the designer miked the speaker in a anechoic chamber to achieve a perfectly flat response. Some designer's will mike and adjust the crossover with the grills on and some with the grills off.
Call the speaker company you plan on buying from and ask the engineer's if their speakers are adjusted in a chamber with the grills off or on. This is why some speakers sound better with the grills off and others with the grills on.
Well if you own Wilsons its no problem, they just fall off.......Why a speaker that expensive has no real good system to hold the grills on is crazy......So be it !!     autospec
I'm lucky. My speakers use Accuton drivers which have a permanently affixed metal grill. I get the best of both worlds: They don't interfere with the music and I can clearly see the drivers.

All the best,
Nonoise
I like designers who make speakers that look good with grills off (covers over the driver screws maybe, hidden grill holding magnets, etc.), and I particularly like tweeters designed to have little mesh screens on them to ward off poking, accidental or curiosity driven. I was talking to a guy at a local Extreme HiFi shop about that…specifically the exposed tweeters on a Magico…he said hey, it happens…damn…Shirley’s been drinking again and wondered about that tweeter...
i saw a report in the net years ago. it's an independent test using a microphone placed at a normal listening position, using scientific software and recording equipment to access the difference with speakers grills on and off. The results clearly reflects there are roll off in certain parts of the frequencies spectrum, not just in the treble or bass. 
So it does depends on the listener preference whether he like grills on or off. 
-phil