Help - Atomic Reactor 50 Sounds Bassy and Not Clear

Now I notice even on my own patches its doing it. Could it be the cables ? Maybe I should use the humbuster cables intead of an XLR from the unit to the powered Atomic cabnet ?
no, a humbuster should not sound any different than an XLR.

do you have any other speaker to try this with? we need to rule out the speaker as the problem.
 
no, a humbuster should not sound any different than an XLR.

do you have any other speaker to try this with? we need to rule out the speaker as the problem.
I have all my PA speakers. I guess I could try running them through a power amd from the AX8.
 
I have all my PA speakers. I guess I could try running them through a power amd from the AX8.
i would stay away from the tube amps, and run it through some PA speakers if you have them. do you have a PA system with a mixer and all that? just plug the AX8 into a mixer channel, gain stage it properly and take a listen.
 
i would stay away from the tube amps, and run it through some PA speakers if you have them. do you have a PA system with a mixer and all that? just plug the AX8 into a mixer channel, gain stage it properly and take a listen.
Yes I do. Thank you !
 
So thats why my presets always sound not the same if I build them at bedroom volume and then gig them!!

Mine do, what I do at home volume on my CLR and desktop monitors sounds just as well balanced when I crank the CLR’s and through house PA systems.

When I was getting a doctorate in Audiology I did a lot of research with human test subjects and equal loudness perception across the frequency range. Essentially the same work the Fletcher and Munson did decades ago.

I certainly was not the first or the most well known researcher into the field of psycho-acoustics and human auditory perception, but I’m probably one of the few who came into the field as a musician and guitar player, and looked at these issues from the standpoint of how it equates to guitar tone.

Then again, no one has to take my word and experience for it.

Your welcome to simply crank the bass and treble some arbitrary amounts, when listening at some random levels, “because FM”.

That is all I see parroted over and over on forums.... “my tone sounds bad”. Blame “FM” someone on the Internet forum says, then another person repeats it, etc etc

All our tone problems at gigs are because FM, yet how many of those blaming it ever took the time to read the research, conduct their own controlled tests etc ?

I’ve tried to explain when and how “FM” is and isn’t a concern, to educate people so they can understand if they are doing soemthing where it’s a concern and when it isn’t

If what your doing work, then by all means keep at it, but simply telling people “create your patches at 90” or whatever isn’t 100% applicable advise
 
When you say gain stage it. Does that mean no gain on the board ? Because thats how I run my sound. As little gain on the PA board as possible.
Gain Stage means to use the appropriate amount of gain needed on the channel. so adjust things as you normally would to prevent clipping on the mixer.
 
Mine do, what I do at home volume on my CLR and desktop monitors sounds just as well balanced when I crank the CLR’s and through house PA systems.

When I was getting a doctorate in Audiology I did a lot of research with human test subjects and equal loudness perception across the frequency range. Essentially the same work the Fletcher and Munson did decades ago.

I certainly was not the first or the most well known researcher into the field of psycho-acoustics and human auditory perception, but I’m probably one of the few who came into the field as a musician and guitar player, and looked at these issues from the standpoint of how it equates to guitar tone.

Then again, no one has to take my word and experience for it.

Your welcome to simply crank the bass and treble some arbitrary amounts, when listening at some random levels, “because FM”.

That is all I see parroted over and over on forums.... “my tone sounds bad”. Blame “FM” someone on the Internet forum says, then another person repeats it, etc etc

All our tone problems at gigs are because FM, yet how many of those blaming it ever took the time to read the research, conduct their own controlled tests etc ?

I’ve tried to explain when and how “FM” is and isn’t a concern, to educate people so they can understand if they are doing soemthing where it’s a concern and when it isn’t

If what your doing work, then by all means keep at it, but simply telling people “create your patches at 90” or whatever isn’t 100% applicable advise
Ok,

I may not have a doctorate in Audiology but my ears work just fine in fact my last hearing test showed at my age (52) my hearing was above average! Considering how I have abused my ears over the last 4 decades I found this rather surprising.

Now getting to the FM mention, I'm not blaming FM as the main cause but more or less pointing to an effect that might be a symptom of presets being built at a bedroom volume verses a giging volume on the same monitoring system.

Case and point, most every one I know has at one time or another used the loudness control on there stereo to get things to sound better at a lower volume, you know to fill things up without having to ratel the windows... inter the smily EQ curve right! Leave the loudness button on turn that volume up and the highs and lows are now hyped!

I have done this so many times that I'm quite confident of this scenario so I feel it is worth mentioning to a new FAS user which was my intent, not to debate FM but rather assist the OP in getting the most out of his AX8 experience.

So from now on as to not to deliver miss information I will just let people know to build there presets at gig volumes with no explanation as to why other than it just sounds better and leave it at that.
 
i'm not going to withhold my layman's terms that communicate things in a simple manner just because i don't have a degree or training in something. *shrug* especially if i'm explaining it to someone who also doesn't have a degree or understand that lingo anyway.

if the answer is to arbitrarily make a frowny face and it works, then problem solved in my opinion. figuring something out without knowing why it works is pretty typical, as frustrating as it may be to those who know much more.
 
This may not be the answer to your issue but it helped get me up and running quickly, check out Austinbuddy's 700 naked amps pack. There's a bit of a learning curve for importing them that you will need to get over but the patches provide a much better starting point than anything I had tried previously. Many of the presets that came with the unit weren't really good to my ears. I feel like that amp pack was a much better starting point.

I also suggest using a more medium to low output guitars to start with and move on to higher output once you have a better grasp of the nuances. I found it difficult to create patches that meshed well with my active guitars at first. What helped for me was to moving to my strat and ebmm custlass for a bit in order to figure out the best way to approach things for me. YMMV.

Edit: I didn't see it mentioned but it may be worth exploring doing a factory reset since you bought it used. Would at least provide a starting point that most of us have experience with.
 
This may not be the answer to your issue but it helped get me up and running quickly, check out Austinbuddy's 700 naked amps pack. There's a bit of a learning curve for importing them that you will need to get over but the patches provide a much better starting point than anything I had tried previously. Many of the presets that came with the unit weren't really good to my ears. I feel like that amp pack was a much better starting point.

I also suggest using a more medium to low output guitars to start with and move on to higher output once you have a better grasp of the nuances. I found it difficult to create patches that meshed well with my active guitars at first. What helped for me was to moving to my strat and ebmm custlass for a bit in order to figure out the best way to approach things for me. YMMV.

Edit: I didn't see it mentioned but it may be worth exploring doing a factory reset since you bought it used. Would at least provide a starting point that most of us have experience with.
I bought the AX8 New. The Atomic Reactor Powered Amp was used.
 
Turning down the bass knob and increasing the middle and treble frequencies will help.

I recommend using the hi-pass filter. It works wonders. I generally cut off anything below 80 hz.

Have you downloaded the most recent software? Do it if you have not done that yet.
 
Turning down the bass knob and increasing the middle and treble frequencies will help.

I recommend using the hi-pass filter. It works wonders. I generally cut off anything below 80 hz.

Have you downloaded the most recent software? Do it if you have not done that yet.
Should I run a XLR from the cabnet to the PA or from the AX8 to the PA ?
 
Should I run a XLR from the cabnet to the PA or from the AX8 to the PA ?
if you are trying to test the AX8 through your PA system to judge against the CLR, then go from the AX8 directly to the PA to take the CLR out of the equation so you can compare.
 
if you are trying to test the AX8 through your PA system to judge against the CLR, then go from the AX8 directly to the PA to take the CLR out of the equation so you can compare.
If I am giging. I use the powered cab behind me. So is it better to run front of house from the cab or from the AX8 ?
 
If I am giging. I use the powered cab behind me. So is it better to run front of house from the cab or from the AX8 ?
it's probably no difference. the XLR output on the CLR was designed exactly for that. but personally, i always prefer to send anything the Source signal, and not a pass-through like on the CLR.

you should try both and see what you prefer. if it's easier to plug into the CLR for the house feed, then use that. but make sure you know if the knobs on the CLR affect that signal.
 
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