Help with Adam A7X studio monitors for AxeFx III

[Dickie Fredericks]

Those are excellent monitors. So many variables on why the sound isn't optimal.
I'd start w the room before I blamed the monitors.

 

[Hatata]

I had the A7X’s and I loved them so much I upgraded to the A7V’s. As long as they are working correctly they should provide a neutral sound. If you have a store with a good return policy go pick up some Yamaha HS7s just to rule the monitors out.

 

[mesabassman]

I have those speakers with the Sub8. I have my FM3 hooked up and they sound incredible. I also have a treated room and Sonarworks room correction.

 

[paulmapp8306]

Some of this is in descriptions.... one persons "boomy" is another's "lovely low end"... One persons "harsh" is another's "cuts nicely".

Direct sounds are most often down to the cab blocks - heck I still prefer no cab block and into my real cab lol - but Im working on direct for a change. Im using the same sounds I ruin to my can then playing whit the cab blocks to see what happens.

Ultimately, I ran A5xs with a Yam sub for a long time - though Im now on KH120s and Neumans matching KH750 sub - and it never sounded bad - different to what I was used to using a real amp, but not bad.

 

[Nik73]

My small room is an acoustic nightmare with an open door behind me, furniture for the sound to bounce off, as well as an 80’s arcade cabinet. BUT, I have a pair of A7X’s and they sound incredible with the AF3 with zero tweaking. Definitely not boomy, but plenty of low end even without a sub woofer.
i know that’s not much help, but they should sound great right out of the box.

 

[MirrorProfiles]

I had A7X’s and they are probably my least favourite monitors I’ve ever owned. The port is doing way too much work and they have an odd slow resonance around 60hz that skews things in a weird way. I also found them kind of scooped (I guess from the exaggerated port, and ribbon tweeter) so I never felt like I trusted the midrange and was second guessing myself on guitars. When I switched monitors, I could INSTANTLY trust what I was doing.

Using amphions and ATC’s and way happier now. Generally I don’t like ported monitors but it really depends on how they’ve been designed. The ATC ports are less noticeable, and IIRC aren’t even there to extend the low end (they’re there to control the load on the bass driven and are working more gently).

But regarding the OP, the issue is most certainly not the monitors. It’ll be the room, and positioning of the monitors in the room. Try and adjust the height, distance apart from each other, distance away from the wall, listening position etc. Measure with a reference mic, see what your room is doing.

Monitors are maybe 5% of the battle, the influence the room has on them is everything. If your room isn’t treated then you’ll just be hearing the effect of what the room is doing to the monitors rather than what the monitors are putting out.

Measuring is the best way to see what’s going on, and also the best way to see if any adjustments you make are helping, making things worse, or making things better in some ways and worse in others. A Behringer measurement mic is $50 or so and Room EQ Wizard is free.

You can’t expect the monitors to be perfect out the box without considering the room, the room has WAY too big of an impact to ignore. I’m sure by moving them around you can get a decent enough response out of them, but obviously some acoustic panels will help a lot.

 

[FrancescoDiMauro]

Wow guys, thank you very much, I'm overwhelmed by the response!

I went through all your comments, and I'll try to answer them all here, let's just start with the fact that and my overall feeling is... that I bit off more than I could chew!

I realize I was pretty naive when I got myself into this, actually ignoring some of the warnings, especially regarding the impact of an untreated room... I thought it would be a matter of nuance, but judging by your comments it seems it's basically fundamental! For those who asked I'm attacching a picture of my initial setup (on the left), and the current one (on the right), which, if anything, made things even worse: the room is smaller and has a rounded ceiling (barrel vault? I'm not sure if this is how you say it in english), thus it's more echoey, the overall feeling I described didn't change that much though, that's why I initially brushed off the room treatment issue.

I'm doing some renovations, so at some point in the future I will go back to the other room (which is about 5 by 6 meters, flat and lower ceiling), while keeping the bigger desk, that might be a good moment to "do the treatment", I guess. I've no clue on how to go on with that though, maybe I'll start with the link Strabes posted, or maybe I see if I can find somebody in my city that does these things for a job... But if I have to spend money (more than I already did, I'm starting to feel I'm knee-deep into a sunk-cost fallacy at this point), I'm frankly starting to wonder if going back to a good-old amp would be a better choice for me... I never was a valves-no-matter-what kind of guy, I used to do gigs with a crappy solid state Peavy, so I'm not looking for the "perfect sound", just something reasonably nice to dial once and forget about it. Clean, cruch, lead, a few effects here and there, nothing to fancy. Maybe AF3 to power amp to regular cab? Would that be easier?

Anyway, regarding the equipment: I bought all new, Axe Fx III Mark II, Furman PS-8RE III and good (and short) xlr cables, I went all in, so I don't think that's the problem, and both monitors sound the same. Oh, I realize now that maybe another good way to describe the sound I'm hearing is "muffled", like it's going through a cushion or something... I mean, not that bad, but it's just something I can't seem to avoid by fiddling with the classic low/mid/high parameters of the simulated amps.

So, here's what I guess I'll try to do in the meantime, before resorting to acoustic treatment of the room:

• Try output 2 instead of output 1.
• I don't have a good pair of headphones, would it be reasonable to route the output headphones jack to the stereo unit you see in the picture? It's a pioneer A-105, nothing too fancy, while the speakers are Beovox S 75, my dad bought them in the 80s I guess. Again, nothing to fancy, but I like how they sound, do I risk damaging them?
• Try to play some music through the monitors. I don't have a sound card to directly connect the monitors to the PC, can I use the AF3 itself for that? Are there some settings I should know about? What if I don't like what I hear, what parameters should I tweak then?
• Rise the volume up? I'm not getting any younger, and I don't fancy hear-bleeding volumes anymore, I thought monitors would help getting a good sound without smashing my eardrums (it's one of the reasons I opted for this setup), am I wrong? No pain, no gain? Is it better to rise the volume for the monitors or from the OUT1 knob of the AF3?

I'm still not shure on what the first steps should be in sculpting the sound though, I'm overwhelmed by the sheer amount of parameters along the chain, should I start with everything flat? Out 1 EQ, monitor controls, amp, cab, mic...? What should I tweak first then? Thanks!

 

[simeon]

moving away from the back wall, was a good idea
i would say don't go down the rabbit hole of tweaking every parameter available, you'll go mad and it's really not necessary. i never tweak anything beyond the basic controls and selecting which speaker impedance to use based on the cab i have selected. i use a7x's and they sound great to me and i'm in a tiny untreated room. there's no way they should sound "muffled", especially if they're new. mine were quite bright to begin with and only settled down after i had played a considerable amount of music through them.
what you need to do is listen to some music through them. plug your phone or ipad into the back of the axe, or pipe some music from your laptop down the usb and set up a preset that's just an input and output. then listen and move around the room. put your head in and out of the listening position and see if you hear changes in the frequency response. also sit in your chair while playing your guitar, so your head is aligned with the speakers. don't stand up and play. you might also find some isolated guitar tracks, or amp demos on youtube helpful. a lot of people will tell you do this or do that...tweak this parameter or that....and it's really not necessary. watch some of leon todd's vids as well.

 

[strabes]

I'm not looking for the "perfect sound", just something reasonably nice to dial once and forget about it. Clean, cruch, lead, a few effects here and there, nothing to fancy. Maybe AF3 to power amp to regular cab? Would that be easier?

All of this gear might be a little overkill if those are your goals. Fractal is definitely the best there is, and listening to music through good speakers in an acoustically-treated room is a real joy, but is expensive to do at home. So maybe something like a Spark 40 might be a better choice for just plugging and playing (and messing with tones with your phone).

With that said, I would definitely do a factory reset on the AxeFX unit to make sure everything is set up the way it's supposed to be for monitors.

the room is smaller and has a rounded ceiling (barrel vault?

There is actually a tradeoff here, a smaller room will make the horizontal room modes worse, but the higher vaulted ceiling will reduce the strength of the mode between the ceiling and floor, which is usually the bigger problem. It's a big null around 70-80hz for your typical 8-10ft residential ceiling, is more difficult to treat since you can't really put bass trapping on the floor, and since it's a null it can't be fixed with EQ or room correction software.

Try output 2 instead of output 1.

Won't make a difference unless there's a global EQ on one of the outputs.

would it be reasonable to route the output headphones jack to the stereo unit you see in the picture? It's a pioneer A-105, nothing too fancy, while the speakers are Beovox S 75, my dad bought them in the 80s I guess. Again, nothing to fancy, but I like how they sound, do I risk damaging them?

You could also use output 2, output 3, or output 4 for this. That will give you a dedicated volume knob which is useful. Having a second set of speakers is a great idea for diagnosing issues.

Try to play some music through the monitors. I don't have a sound card to directly connect the monitors to the PC, can I use the AF3 itself for that? Are there some settings I should know about?

Yes, the AF3 is a class-compliant usb audio interface. Works out of the box on MacOS, and on windows you just need to install the drivers. Curious if music sounds good through the speakers.

What if I don't like what I hear, what parameters should I tweak then?

If music played through both sets of speakers doesn't sound right, then you can definitely say it's the lack of acoustic treatment in the room and/or your speaker placement. Having the speakers so close to the corners is not ideal but altogether the placement doesn't look horrible, I've seen worse. Beautiful view through the window btw.

Is it better to rise the volume for the monitors or from the OUT1 knob of the AF3?

Doesn't really matter. Set the monitor volume to where you can use the OUT1 knob for all your adjustments.

Rise the volume up? I'm not getting any younger, and I don't fancy hear-bleeding volumes anymore, I thought monitors would help getting a good sound without smashing my eardrums (it's one of the reasons I opted for this setup), am I wrong?

Should be able to accurately judge music and tones without ear-splitting volume, especially if you're not dialing in things for a live environment. There are plenty of decibel meter phone apps, 85dB should be plenty of volume and is safe for extended periods.

 

[FrancescoDiMauro]

Thanks guys for all the advice, and Merry Christmas! In the next few days I'll have a bit of spare time, perfect time to dig deeper into this!