Bennett Prescott

Just This Guy, You Know?
Staff member
Jan 10, 2011
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Wallingford, CT
www.bennettprescott.com
Hey SFN,

Someone recommended the Harbor Freight Predator 3500 generator in another forum the other day, and that got me to thinking. This generator is clearly aimed at the Honda EU3000is, which is about $2200 no matter where you buy it. For 1/3 the price, more or less, what do you get? I wanted to find out for personal reasons, and also because I thought it could be a great way to talk about how very dissimilar loudspeakers can have similar specs too. Long story short, the Predator 3500 can absolutely deliver the power, but with way more inconsistent noise depending on location and load, and also it was quite unreliable. Turns out it's not so hard to find you get what you pay for!


Related videos and Information:
 
Great video Bennett!

The screen shot of the Predator being as much as 10 dB SPL louder in the 1-5kHz region where hearing is normally most sensitive, yet still reading within a dB or so "dBA slow" of the Honda EU3000is was a good "ear opener" for anyone concerned about sound looking for a generator.

+9@3kHz!.jpg

From the video's audio it sounded like the Predator 3500 was louder in the 1-5kHz range regardless of the load, but still would be interesting to see its spectrum compared to the Honda EU3000is at the six power levels you tested at.

Thanks!
Art