Yamaha Pro Audio Speakers & Monitors

An Introduction to Yamaha NS10 Speakers

Established in 1887, Yamaha began manufacturing pianos and reed organs but later developed an electronics division. The Yamaha NS10 speaker has become one of the Japanese firm’s bestselling products and is described as the “industry standard” by audio engineering professionals. New and pre-owned versions of these speakers are available on eBay. 

Yamaha NS10 speaker uses 

The company originally released the device as a domestic Hi-Fi speaker in 1978 and discontinued its manufacture in 2001. Recording engineers embraced the units to use in recording studios. Use the Yamaha NS10 as a piece of professional audio hardware in a recording studio or home recording bay as a nearfield studio monitor. Rock and pop recording engineers favor the device for its white-colored, mid–bass drive unit, which helps to reveal poor-quality recordings. 

Yamaha NS10 specs and sonic qualities 

This nearfield device is an 8-ohm two-way loudspeaker. Its sealed cabinet measures 15.0 inches by 8.5 inches by 7.8 inches. It weighs 13.2 pounds. The NS10 has an 0.98-inch particle-board cabinet. It features two drivers, a 180-millimeter paper woofer with a 35-millimeter soft-domed tweeter. The diaphragm of its woofer uses an unconventional design that forms its cone through curling and gluing the two ends of a flat sheet of pressed pulp paper together. See the manufacturer’s site for details. It has a second-order passive network crossing over at 2kHz. The frequency ranges from 60Hz to 20kHz. It runs at 25 watts to 50 watts of power. Earlier makes of the speaker feature press-down type input terminals, and later models had screw terminals. Rather than a flat frequency response, the NS10 features a midrange that’s slightly heavy with a limited bass extension. In its midrange at about 2kHz, it has a 5-decibel boost. At 200Hz, the bottom end begins rolling off. This wide-open midrange helps expose problem frequencies and poor recording quality, allowing the engineer to re-record problem sections using other methods. 

What tricks do pros use to enhance these speakers’ response? 

These speakers tend to exhibit an inherently bright treble response. Professional audio engineers dull this over-brightness by hanging tissue paper in front of the speakers. This is similar to comb filtering used with microphones, and it is referred to as the "tissue paper effect." 

Which releases of these devices are available? 

These vintage speakers generally sell in pairs. You can purchase replacement parts such as these on eBay:  

• NS10 JA0518A tweeter
• Yamaha NS10 woofer
• Yamaha NS10M crossovers

Content provided for informational purposes only. eBay is not affiliated with or endorsed by Yamaha.