Adam A7X studio monitors...whoa

Karl Houseknecht

Karl Houseknecht

Power User
I bought a set of KRK Rokit Powered 6's for my 40th birthday 10 years ago and those have been my reference for mixing and tone since that time. Fast forward, celebrated my 50th birthday and wanted to do an upgrade since 90% of my playing (really, anyone's) is done at my desk in my home studio. And then COVID hit and I spend even more time there. Did some research and went for a pair of Adam A7X's.

Before I made the switch, I used the Axe-III Synth block to run pink noise through my current setup and monitored via a RTA mic and the Axe-III RTA block. The results showed a sizable bump in the low end and a descending slope through 6K or so, and then a more steep cutoff in the highs.

Made the switch, ran the same test. The results, minus a tiny, but not unwelcome, bump in the 150 range, are damn near flat all the way up to 15K. Running reference tracks through them, I noted tight but defined low end and excellent high mid and high end detail without it being fatiguing. There is a clarity here that the KRK's were severely lacking with their, by way of comparison, bloated low and and smeared, blanketed highs. Don't get me wrong, the KRKs actually sound decent, but these Adams are on another level. The real test would be how do my tones that I dialed in through the KRK's sound through them?

I wasn't really prepared for this big of a difference. I have been compensating for the KRKs bloated lows and rolled off highs, and I probably need to do a bit of re-tweaking to bring things into balance. While my tones seemed to translate to live pretty well before, I know I felt like I'd overhyped the high end on them a bit and was lacking in the bottom. These monitors should give me something a lot closer to the truth. Looking forward to seeing how my patches translate for services next week.

Bottom line, yeah, I paid like $1500 for the pair. That's probably about 3 times what I paid for the KRKs. I wasn't expecting this big of a difference but clearly I was wrong about that. I recommend these if you're interested in truth in monitoring at home.
 
I use CLR's but have often thought of smaller monitors for reference work and have always eyed the Adams. I hear nothing but great things about them. Glad you're liking them.
 
i use these too. excellent speakers. your presets will translate really well to other systems once you get them dialled in.
 
Last year I switched out my Behringer reference studio monitors for a pair of Focal Shap Twins. The Behringer monitors were actually pretty good, and I had spent enough time with them to know how to dial them in for fairly flat response. I had experience with several high end monitors in other studios, and after debating ADAM / Focal, decided the Focals were the ones I wanted. They took a couple of weeks to break in properly, and now they are astonishing. Post-break-in, I spent several days listening to CDs that I really knew, and was amazed to hear details that just weren't there previously. I use these monitors for my recording DAW, and also when dialing in my AxeFX III tones. Without a doubt, these are the smoothest and most nuanced reference speakers I've ever heard. Granted, they cost $2K a pair, and there aren't many places to demo them. They make a big difference in my studio.
 
I love mine. Have not turned on my CLR in months. Presets dialed in with them record really really well with no tweaking.
 
i had the same experience the first time we ran my QSC K10 in an A-B configuration against the Atomic CLR. Just astoundingly night and day.
 
Any opinion about A8X? Still to purchase a pair of monitors and look into A7X or A8X. For AX8 my hope is to achieve more thump for home jamming comparing to A7X. I already have one XiTone, but want a stereo setup and something different from XiTone.
 
I can't imagine wanting more thump than what the A7X's provide, particularly for home practice and recording. Seems like frequencies you really want to avoid for guitar. I have a 412 for that kind of feel.
 
I have both the original A7's (with sub8) and CLR's. They both sound very very similar to each other and translate well with each other but of course the CLR's are just beefier with way more dispersion.

I have helped at least 10 people over the years here that were unhappy with their sound. Ie "why doesn't mine sound like everyone else's clips?" In all those cases it was an overbearing low end. The issue... KRK Rokit's.
 
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Godam said:
Any opinion about A8X? Still to purchase a pair of monitors and look into A7X or A8X. For AX8 my hope is to achieve more thump for home jamming comparing to A7X. I already have one XiTone, but want a stereo setup and something different from XiTone.
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Bought my A7X's 2 years ago and have never looked back. I also have the Adam Sub7 which is overkill for guitar playing (I have it for listening to music, pc games, movies etc) so if you want thump on steroids - go the A7X's with the Sub7.
 
I’m currently using my original A7 pair and they’re better than my KRK VXT8s, I can only imagine they destroy the rocket line.
 
Bruce Sokolovic said:
I’m currently using my original A7 pair and they’re better than my KRK VXT8s, I can only imagine they destroy the rocket line.
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I’m using KRK VXT8’s and have been for a while. Are the A7X’s that much of an improvement??
Didn’t really want to spend much more on monitors, yet I spend a BUNCH of time using these and playing through as well as building presets. I would upgrade if there’s a significant difference. Specifics would be super helpful.
Thanks for any Info...
 
I was happy with the VXTs. Only reason I put the ADAMs back up was because I killed a tweeter. I do think the ADAM is a bit smoother, dare I say softer and less harsh in the high end? The bass seems a little tighter too. If I owned the KRK already, I couldn’t justify buying the ADAMs though. I don’t feel the bump up in quality is significant enough for all that money. Unless there was really nowhere else I can make improvements. I’d get a good mic pre, a great mic, room treatment or maybe a better interface first. If I had all that and the 1500 was burning a hole in my pocket, then maybe.
 
Hi GtarLover,
Specifics? Seeing you spend a lot of time in front of those speakers - You will kick yourself for waiting. You'll hate spending the money, but you'll thank (insert some being you worship here) you did. In a month or two, you'll forget the money and still get the hairs on the back of your neck come up when you create a new tasty preset that sounds soooo good. In ten years you'll still be thankful you finally got so real professional monitors.

I don't have AX7s, but I have some good monitors and they make all the difference in the world. Like the difference between a neumann microphone and another 'just as good as a neumann mic' microphone - The difference is huge - sometimes subtle, but in music it's the subtleties that collect to make a huge difference.

Thanks
Pauly


GtarLover said:
I’m using KRK VXT8’s and have been for a while. Are the A7X’s that much of an improvement??
Didn’t really want to spend much more on monitors, yet I spend a BUNCH of time using these and playing through as well as building presets. I would upgrade if there’s a significant difference. Specifics would be super helpful.
Thanks for any Info...
Click to expand...
 
Hi again. I was already convinced to go with A7X which receive overwhelming support in fractal community. But the problem is... I could not find them in stock in my country. Some dealers suggest EVE audio SC207 instead. I understand that those could be quite good alternative to adams with similar topology, however I'm a bit concerned about one thing: in one of reviews a guy said that due to EVEs using DSP processing there is some latency added, comparing to adams. I'm wondering if the order of latency is really something crucial for AXE monitoring, or it is much less comparing to the AXE latency itself. For example, if AXE has 1-2 ms latency which is perfect to me, but EVEs add another 1-2 ms it would quite an issue for me.
What do you guys know about this? I could not find any particular latency numbers.
 
I wouldn't worry about latency within the A7X loudspeaker itself. It will be negligible. The AX series are all-analog devices; there is no DSP or A/D conversion anywhere in the system.

You'll get 1ms "latency" for every foot (0.34m) of air distance between the loudspeaker and your ear, anyway.
 
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