Having trouble hearing low note fundamentals

[ThingsAbove]

HPF, eq for mids. Your low notes will have more presence, but you won't be hearing the fundamentals on those low notes as much as you hear their harmonics. With a big sound system or bass amp the fundamentals will be felt more than heard. Use those low notes tastefully and infrequently. IMO the B string is really more useful for an alternate fingering E and above than pummeling your audience.

 

[seamonkey]

If you're using software plugins, Waves MaxxBass can do the HPF thing to cut the actually fundamental, then it adds harmonics on top to fool your ear into hearing the fundamental as is it is there.
As with most software, there's a trial period where you can try it.

 

[Dbassmon]

Adam AX7's are excellent nearfield monitors. They do not lack quality low end, for sure.

The first thing I think when I hear your complaint is, are they somehow out-of-phase.
I think it's not possible to have them play out-of-phase because they connect with balanced XLRs (unless your cables are wired out-of-phase). So that is unlikely but possible. BTW X7s are linear to 42 Hz, that does not mean they don't reproduce lower frequencies but they start to fall off @42 Hz.

Your acoustic listening environment (your room) may have some issues. Does your DAW have a frequency generator plugin? Sweep down and see where the low end starts to disappear. Try that exercise panned left, then right, then together. Out-of-phase wiring will be very obvious. Try moving them to a different spot in the room. Do you have another set of speakers to compare? That would be helpful in diagnosing what is going on.

Finally, call Adam customer support. I believe they carry a 6-year warranty and the support is top notch.

Good luck, I would love to know the outcome. I am a very satisfied Adam AX7 owner.... I thought you should know.

 

[silky smoove]

BTW X7s are linear to 42 Hz, that does not mean they don't reproduce lower frequencies but they start to fall off @42 Hz.

Adam simply states 42hz-50khz as the frequency response of the A7X. They don’t indicate if that’s the the -1, -3, -10, etc. point. Having worked on a pair of A7Xs extensively I’m guessing that 42 is the -3 point, although I did find one reference to Adam almost saying it’s the -10 through some confusing product literature ad copy. That’s all just guesswork on my part but compared to other larger monitors that are clearly stated to have response that low I’ve always found the A7X to be a little lean in that department. That voicing makes it an excellent monitor for mixing but obviously not what’s required to hear the fundamental of a low Ab

 

[JW56789]

It would take seriously professional rig set up very properly to coax those fundamentals into an audible range, IF your ears could even hear them. It would be dreadfully expensive studio monitors set up very carefully, or on the other hand, a top flight sound reinforcement system (and I seriously doubt any good FOH engineer would want any part of that low a frequency running around the venue, even if the system could bring it forth). That's almost one whole octave below the fundamental of open E on a bass guitar.

The only rig I could think of that wouldn't be hideously expensive (though they don't give this stuff away either) would be some Bag End product utilizing their INFRA subwoofer system.

The only common use for that kind of low end is in the Dolby-based systems in big movie theatres where they use that to put the rumble in explosions, crashes, etc. IMAX is like that as well.

 

[Camarillo]

It’s not the monitors. I work with a pair of Adam A7x since 10 years with no issues. It’s not your ears, since the loss of hearing basically interests the high frequencies.
It must be your room.

 

[MackieBass]

Putting a HPF after the input made a good bit of difference!

How much low do people typically cut? I did 90hz

 

[JW56789]

Actually . . . . there are a few giant pipe organs in big cathedrals (I'm thinking of St John the Divine in NYC, others like it) where the organs have 64 or 128 foot stops with giant pipes that go down around those pitches. I heard one once, and it either sounds like whale song, or some slow rumble (at those cycles per second, it's the threshold where you can sort of sense the beats in notes that low). Technically interesting, musically curious.

 

[seamonkey]

About pipe organs
Some of the "low" sounds are created by shorter pipes that set up in harmonic sequences to produce a phantom or missing fundamental. Tympani drums do this also. They sound much lower than what they actually produce.

This is the same effect VSTs use to create phantom fundamentals even when the real fundamental can't be reproduced. Bass sounds bassier on smaller speakers when processed like this.

Groove3 subscription owners can get a free Waves Renaissance Bass plug in that does this. It's the same internal engine as MaxxBass but less user controls.