KRK Rokit 5 G4 Review – #1 Best Selling Studio Monitors

Hello there, back again with another article for you! This time we will be looking at one of my recent purchases, the mighty KRK Rokit 5 G4!

As my regular readers may already know, I published an article on “Best Selling Studio Monitors and Buying Guide” a long time ago. It was one of the best-performing and most helpful articles on this website.

In that article, I mentioned that I was actually trying to figure out what to buy for myself and there we go! The pleasure of having researched countless hours and reflecting on my would-be buying decision to my readers is matchless! 🙂

---

Best Tools For Guitars at Stewmac.com

---

Recently, I got myself a pair of KRK Rokit RP5 G4 studio monitors and I am already in love with them!

KRK Rokit RP5 G4 Features

KRK Rokit RP5 G4 is a 5″, powered near-field studio monitor and belongs to the new G4 series. Generation 4 (G4) features a bi-amp that packs 55W of power for each speaker.

KRK G4 series monitors also feature a very unique DSP-driven graphic EQ with 25 built-in presets! Along with their KRK Audio Tools app, you can actually fine-tune your speakers

Both 1″ tweeters and 5″ drivers are made of Kevlar® material and guarantee an identical sonic experience across all frequencies.

Another unique feature of the KRK Rokit G4 series is that they feature front bass ports. The Classic series also had bass ports on the front, however with the G4 series they have actually been improved and come with a wider opening.

KRK Rokit RP5 G4 Tech Specs

Before I provide my experience with them, as I always do, I would like to provide you with a tech specs chart below.

Why did I go for KRK Rokit RP5 G4?

Let’s keep it honest here! As you may already know, I usually publish content here about guitars and related gear, accessories and many more products. So I must say I primarily wanted to buy a pair of studio monitors to be able to play and enjoy my electric and bass guitars rather than mixing music all day long.

I already have Creative Gigaworks T40 Series II multimedia speakers, but with my recent investments in guitars, preamps and IR loaders, this has become the weakest link in the signal chain.

Don’t get me wrong, as you can see in my article, I love my Gigaworks speakers. I think they are the best pair of speakers around for most of the audio-related stuff. Even though they are not even close to studio monitors and not built for the purpose, you can even record and mix with these.

---

Check out the best guitar pickup company, Seymour Duncan here!

---

I even recorded and mixed some basic stuff with those and listened to them with KRK Rokit RP5 G4. And surprisingly, I didn’t hear many anomalies going on with the frequencies which means I was able to hear most of the frequencies well enough with my Gigaworks T40 Series II speakers.

See my Creative Gigaworks T40 Series II speakers review here.

Despite their small-sized drivers, their bass response is excellent. However, when you want to have a bit more volume and headroom for your guitar tones and effects, they can’t easily handle it.

For this reason, I wanted to buy a pair of studio monitors and went back to my Best Selling Studio Monitors and Buying Guide to have a retrospective and to see if I had other opinions on this decision.

It seemed like KRKs were still the best choice, but I was also into Yamaha HS series monitors and had already started researching these. I even considered buying a pair of matched Yamaha HS-7. But since I live in a small place, I had to convince myself that I could never unlock their potential. The same goes for KRK RP7s, since there’s not much of a price difference, I wanted to go for 7″ drivers then gave up on this decision.

After having spent a lot of time thinking about my buying decision, I went for KRK Rokit RP5 G4 series studio monitors and I am already in love with them.

Going through this decision, I had to watch a lot of comparison videos (KRK vs Yamaha) and noticed KRKs were able to produce better low-end. However, when I watched another comparison video, I noticed it didn’t make much of a difference in sound.

Choosing studio monitors and headphones based on someone else’s opinion and way of testing is always risky. But we have to make that decision anyway. Unfortunately, not many people can buy all these monitors and try them out.

So as a friendly reminder, don’t take my words as the ultimate truth. Nonetheless, I will try to give you as many insights as possible from my perspective and hopefully help you with your decision.

How to place KRK Rokit 5 G4 monitors in a small room?

Before I will attempt to describe how these sound, I would like to mention some important points about placing your active near-field monitors.

First of all, you have to definitely place them at ear level, this is the most crucial foundation of a good starting point when placing your studio monitors. I was one of those people who just put their speakers on a desk, almost touching the back wall. But with experiments and research, I found out that this may be the worst thing you could ever do to yourself.

This rule of thumb shouldn’t be ignored. Even with your consumer-level speakers, you can see how much difference it will make.

Try this little experiment with your multimedia speakers (I assume you have 2 speakers). Hold and lift them with both hands, and place them as if you are creating a triangle. You will instantly see how the stereo image and bass response change!

In order to achieve this while you can set your hands free, you should consider buying monitor stands and isolation pads. Since I live in a small place and I have a few possible placements for my desk and speakers, I have also purchased an amazing product called IsoAcoustics ISO-155.

IsoAcoustics ISO-155 is a pair of table stands and isolation pads for reference monitors and speakers. Although they seem to be a bit pricey, it’s totally worth the damage in your wallet! 🙂

See my full review of IsoAcoustics ISO-55 isolation stands and listen how it changes and fine tunes your low-end!

IsoAcoustics ISO-155 has really helped me to place them at ear level and already refined low-end for me. In order to prove they really work, I spent a lot of time and recorded a set of videos for you.

In this video, you can actually hear KRK Rokit 5 G4 and Creative Gigaworks T40 Series II on a standard desk, then on IsoAcoustics ISO-55 at around a 27-degree angle listening position. You may ask “But why are you comparing a multimedia speaker with a studio monitor?“.

I just want to keep things here very honest and open, as an amateur musician and hobbyist, I’m documenting the changes and how I perceived them. So I also want my readers to benefit from these moments for their own purchasing decisions.

The second important point I would like to make is that experiment with possible placement options in your room. You will find an enormous amount of information about how you can acoustically treat a room. But most of us will have to work it out without investing a lot of money and time in acoustic treatment.

As you can see from the images, I have come up with this placement. But in the meantime, I tried other possibilities and moved everything a few times. Unfortunately, this moving process took a lot of time and I found myself having worse results than this.

In one placement, there were so many low-end resonance frequencies being generated that I had to immediately move back to this placement. For testing a new placement and set up in my small living room, I’d also stand up and walk around my place and try to hear it in different positions. The worst one really surprised me when I attempted to listen to my speakers from a distance but almost faced the right monitor directly. I heard extremely energized bass frequencies.

At my current setup, it is not the case. Note that, these are near-field active monitors so you should have these set up as they form an equilateral triangle (a=b=c=1 to 1.5 meters).

I also want to suggest you give KRK Audio Tools app a try. There are so many cool features that you can benefit from. I actually really like its EQ Recommendation feature.

In this placement, it is recommended to use preset #3 (Flat) and preset #5 (high Shelf +2dB). I also really like the monitor aligning feature. It actually helps you set up your monitors at an identical angle to the listening position. Very cool!

How do they sound?

My first impression was I just couldn’t believe my ears. Upgrading from a solid pair of multimedia speakers to the number 1, the best-selling active near-field monitor was almost a day and night difference in a matter of seconds!

I really like the stereo image and almost feel like my favourite bands play before me. 🙂 Also want to mention that these can go very loud which is a perfect fit for my use case. I sometimes want to enjoy lush guitar tones at high volumes and just want to hear all the effects and feedback.

As you may guess, buying yourself a pair of monitors won’t make a better mixer or sound engineer overnight. But we still can benefit from these wonderful and affordable reference monitors.

KRK Rokit 5 G4 Canon EOS M200 Room Audio Test (no talking)

As I have mentioned at the beginning of this article, I would like to give you as much insight as possible from a bedroom guitarist’s perspective. For this reason, here I am providing you with a KRK Rokit RP5 G4 review video in which I have played my Fender American Standard Stratocaster and recorded room audio with a Canon EOS M200 camera (built-in microphone) so you have a better grasp of how Rokit 5 would sound in a similar scenario.

I have only added a touch of hall reverb by TC Electronic M30. I also used various channels on my ENGL E570 tube preamp and also used ENGL Cabloader (6L6 power amp, ENGL 4×12 V30, 441 microphones).

I must say Canon EOS M200 built-in microphones are not so good at capturing audio. It adds a lot of rumbling that normally doesn’t exist. But still, you will hear the live room feel of playing the guitar through KRK Rokit 5 G4s.

Overall, I have been enjoying every moment with my KRK Rokit 5 G4s. Wish I had lived in a place where I could really crank these up and fill the room without annoying my neighbours. But still, I can usually play very loud in my particularly small living room without an issue. It is very satisfying to fill the room with your guitar sounds, especially with some reverb, delays and chorus effects added, I feel like I’m playing before a real amp!

I can totally recommend KRK Rokit RP5 G4 studio monitors to anyone who is looking for a very affordable, sweet-sounding pair of speakers! I hope you have enjoyed this article and found my content helpful.

Thanks for visiting my blog and supporting me so far! I will hopefully see you in the next review here!

Osman Cenan Çiğil – cigilovic.com

Check out the best used gear website!