HEDD Type 20: A midfield monitor to bridge home and pro applications?
At Musikmesse 2017, Berlin-based Heinz Electrodynamic Designs (HEDD) introduced the Type 20, a compact 3-way midfield monitor for owners of smaller studios. To those coming from a home recording background, midfield monitors are designed to be positioned from farther away than your 5 or 8-inch nearfields, and present a wider stereo image as they are positioned further apart.
Due to their three-speaker design and intended distance of use, midfields are also considerably bigger and louder than nearfields. What HEDD aims to accomplish is to let, say, home studio owners fit two of these beasts into their setups so they can enjoy their advantages (such as extra detail and separation) without venturing into overkill territory. There are other compact midfields already on the market, by the likes of KRK and Neumann. But HEDD is also catering to the pro sound niche with extensive digital connectivity.
The Type 20 has a strong, rubber-coated cabinet housing the proprietary Honeycomb-sandwich woofers (7″ bass/4″ mid- range) and the HEDD Air Motion Transformer tweeter for accurate high frequency reproduction. Since the monitor is active, three 300W Class-D ICEpower modules work the amplifier section. The Type 20’s frequency response goes from 50kHz at the top all the way down to 32Hz. It will be fun to hear how much low end can be squeezed out of that 7-inch woofer!
Its acoustic properties aside, the Type 20 benefits from the HEDD Bridge system. The speaker can be optionally equipped with AES3, AES EBU, Dante, or Ravenna connections for Audio-over-IP functionality. This lets the monitor integrate within IP-based recording configurations and multi-channel environments. Audio networking and multi-channel setups are typical for multi-room studios, houses of worship, theatres, and concert venues. So there are plenty of applications for a digital-minded midfield monitor like this one.
More information about the HEDD Type 20 can be found here. The price and release date are still unknown.
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