The Spec-Sheet Honesty Report
Our pipeline stores a first-class “unstated” wherever a spec sheet goes quiet — which means we can count the silence. This page does exactly that, per category and per brand, recomputed from the live catalog.
Of the 46 speakers in our catalog with a published sensitivity figure, 89% record no measurement conditions. Only 19 of 47 speakers disclose minimum impedance — the number an amplifier actually fights. 3 of 34 receiver power ratings omit channels-driven, and 40% of subwoofer depth claims come without a dB tolerance.
Why we can measure this at all
Most spec databases silently drop what a manufacturer doesn’t state. Ours can’t: every value is stored with its measurement context as an atomic pair, and a missing context is recorded as the literal value “unstated” — never guessed, never defaulted (our methodology). One honest caveat about what’s counted: “not stated” below means our normalized recordcarries no value for the field — either the sources we track don’t state it, or no source we track covers it. We count our records, not manufacturers’ intent; the pipeline’s refusal to guess is what makes the two line up.
Speakers: sensitivity numbers without conditions
46 of the 47 speakers we track publish a sensitivity figure, and 41 of those 46 record no measurement conditions. That matters because an in-room figure reads higher than an anechoic one for the same speaker — a “90 dB” with no conditions attached is a softer claim than an anechoic 87 (how to read sensitivity and impedance). Minimum impedance is quieter still: 19 of 47 disclose it, even though the dip — not the nominal rating — is what your receiver has to drive.
Receivers: the watts-per-channel game
34 of 40 receivers publish a power rating; 3 of those ratings omit how many channels were driven, and only 32 state distortion (THD). The conditions are the claim: a single channel driven into an easier load can read roughly double a two-channel 8Ω rating for a comparable amplifier — which is why we refuse to compare bare wattage numbers anywhere on this site (how much power you actually need).
Subwoofers: how low, at what tolerance
30 subwoofers we track claim a low-frequency extension, and 12 of those claims arrive without a dB tolerance. The tolerance is the whole claim: “20 Hz” at −10 dB and “20 Hz” at ±3 dB describe very different subwoofers (sealed vs ported, and how low is low enough).
Method, and using these numbers
Counts are recomputed from the live catalog (cached hourly), so they change as coverage grows — a brand’s row can improve the day it publishes better sheets, or the day we ingest a better source. Brand tables require at least 3tracked models. Per-product provenance is visible on every product page, spec by spec. If you cite this report, link this page rather than quoting a snapshot — the numbers here are alive. Wrong somewhere? Every value traces to a source; tell us and we’ll fix the record, not the story.