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SM-5 is a 3-way coincident studio monitor with onboard DSP and network control, from Kali's flagship Santa Monica series. Each speaker holds 8 parametric EQs, up to 10ms of delay and 18dB of trim, so the monitor is tuned to the room rather than the room being blamed for the monitor.
Per-speaker room correction, stored in the speaker, not in your DAW.
Every room does something wrong to what a speaker produces. The usual answers are to treat the room, which is expensive, or to correct in software, which only fixes what passes through the DAW. Putting the correction inside the speaker fixes everything the speaker plays, from any source.
The SM-5 carries 8 bands of parametric EQ, 10 milliseconds of delay and 18dB of trim per speaker, set over network control. Delay per speaker is what makes immersive setups practical, because speakers at different distances can be time-aligned to the listening position without moving anything.
Underneath the DSP it is the same coincident 3-way architecture as the Independence series, refined. The midrange and tweeter share an acoustic centre and the woofer stays in summation with the midrange through the crossover.
At a Glance
| Brand | Kali Audio |
|---|---|
| Series | Santa Monica |
| Model | SM-5 |
| Configuration | 3-way coincident |
| Woofer | 5 in |
| DSP | 8 parametric EQs, 10ms delay, 18dB trim per speaker |
| Control | Network |
| Sold as | Single speaker |
What Does Network Control Give Me?
Each speaker is addressed individually over the network, so EQ, delay and trim are set per unit and stored in the speaker. In a multichannel room that means every position can be calibrated independently without a rack of outboard processing.
Why Does Per-Speaker Delay Matter?
In an immersive setup the speakers are not all the same distance from the listener. Up to 10ms of delay per speaker time-aligns them to the listening position, which is what makes the imaging work in Atmos and other multichannel formats.
SM-5 or IN-5?
The IN-5 is the coaxial 3-way without DSP. The SM-5 is the flagship version with onboard room calibration and network control. If the room is untreated or the setup is multichannel, the DSP is the reason to move up.
Why Kali Audio
Kali Audio was started in Burbank in 2018 by engineers out of the professional audio industry, and the whole company is built on one idea: measure everything, publish the measurements, and let the numbers do the arguing. Every product line is named after a California town. Lone Pine is the entry range, Independence is the 3-way coaxial line, Santa Monica is the flagship, and Watts is the subwoofer series. Kali became the reference for value in studio monitoring by beating far more expensive speakers on measured response rather than on marketing.