• WANTED: Happy members who like to discuss audio and other topics related to our interest. Desire to learn and share knowledge of science required. There are many reviews of audio hardware and expert members to help answer your questions. Click here to have your audio equipment measured for free!

Adam A4V Monitor Review

Rate this speaker:

  • 1. Poor (headless panther)

    Votes: 25 9.7%
  • 2. Not terrible (postman panther)

    Votes: 141 54.4%
  • 3. Fine (happy panther)

    Votes: 86 33.2%
  • 4. Great (golfing panther)

    Votes: 7 2.7%

  • Total voters
    259
OP
amirm

amirm

Founder/Admin
Staff Member
CFO (Chief Fun Officer)
Joined
Feb 13, 2016
Messages
44,368
Likes
234,386
Location
Seattle Area
Thanks to psycho-acoustics, dips are luckily not nearly as harmful as peaks.
As a rule of thumb we never EQ any dips exactly for this reason and it is also bad advice as well as practice to just level everything out.
Which as described can sometimes do (a lot more) harm than good.
I don't even understand why this was recommended, since boosting such issues quite literally doesn't help much at all
(since the resonance won't ever disappear, and in some cases even get worse.)
This is particularly true for destructive interference.
You are off the mark with your comments. The amount of musical energy at 1 kHz is quite a bit lower than bass. So you can boost it fair bit without the danger of pushing the amp too far. Since interference is far less than perfect, i.e. output did not go to zero, you can indeed boost such a dip. The trick is to listen and not get blinded by theoretical things.

There is proof point for this. Directivity dips are thought to be the same, i.e. not to try to correct. But research shows that they can be improved:
The Subjective and Objective Evaluation of Room Correction Products
Sean E. Olive, John Jackson, Allan Devantier, David Hunt and Sean M. Hess

1661489149564.png


Theory is one thing, practice is another. Manual EQ lets you experiment with fixing response errors and you can then judge individually whether some correction is valid or not.
 

thewas

Master Contributor
Forum Donor
Joined
Jan 15, 2020
Messages
6,741
Likes
16,175
You are off the mark with your comments. The amount of musical energy at 1 kHz is quite a bit lower than bass. So you can boost it fair bit without the danger of pushing the amp too far. Since interference is far less than perfect, i.e. output did not go to zero, you can indeed boost such a dip. The trick is to listen and not get blinded by theoretical things.

There is proof point for this. Directivity dips are thought to be the same, i.e. not to try to correct. But research shows that they can be improved:
The Subjective and Objective Evaluation of Room Correction Products
Sean E. Olive, John Jackson, Allan Devantier, David Hunt and Sean M. Hess

View attachment 226666

Theory is one thing, practice is another. Manual EQ lets you experiment with fixing response errors and you can then judge individually whether some correction is valid or not.
I haven't seen Toole, Olive or other EQ advisers recommending to fill narrow dips, here from Toole's book (2nd edition):

In general it is recommended to adjust the parametric equalizer to match the shape of and to reduce the amplitude of any upward thrusting peaks in the frequency response. Narrow dips should be left alone, but broad depressions may be boosted if the amount of boost is not more than about 6 dB.
Source: page 518

Also from Toole:

Peaks can be attenuated by EQ, but narrow dips should be left alone
Source: https://www.audiosciencereview.com/...ut-room-curve-targets-room-eq-and-more.10950/

Adjusting loudspeakers having different flaws to match full-bandwidth room curves of highly rated loudspeakers cannot yield the same high quality sound. This is especially true if narrow-band equalization is used above the transition frequency. This fact is not to be found in the advertising literature of "room EQ" products. Guess why?
Source: https://www.audiosciencereview.com/...e-targets-room-eq-and-more.10950/#post-307672

Narrow dips are usually the result of destructive acoustical interference and are usually audibly innocuous because they change with direction/position. Broader dips can be interpreted as anti-resonances if one chooses to, whether there is an associated frequency selective absorption process or not. Mostly not.
Source: https://www.avsforum.com/threads/ho...e-science-shows.3038828/page-161#post58530612

You cannot equalize the narrow dips because they are non-minimum-phase destructive-interference phenomena. So you don't want an automated equalizer that might try to fill them.
Source: https://www.audioholics.com/room-ac...b-sfm/applying-the-scientific-method-to-audio


I agree with you that in the end the direct listening comparison should decide but in my own experience positive narrow peak filters usually sound worse, which can be also understood as they are resonators, tonality might improve but the temporal behaviour often audibly worsens (it sounds artificial/muddy).
 
Last edited:

program2000

Member
Joined
May 8, 2022
Messages
23
Likes
14
I don’t understand this laguage By same observation you mean he recommend the speaker like Amir does?
Yes, he recommend a4v but it is only good, not very good speaker.
It is sad that Adam did not improve his speakers after so many years.
 

OWC

Active Member
Joined
Apr 14, 2019
Messages
204
Likes
154
You are off the mark with your comments. The amount of musical energy at 1 kHz is quite a bit lower than bass. So you can boost it fair bit without the danger of pushing the amp too far. Since interference is far less than perfect, i.e. output did not go to zero, you can indeed boost such a dip. The trick is to listen and not get blinded by theoretical things.

There is proof point for this. Directivity dips are thought to be the same, i.e. not to try to correct. But research shows that they can be improved:
The Subjective and Objective Evaluation of Room Correction Products
Sean E. Olive, John Jackson, Allan Devantier, David Hunt and Sean M. Hess

View attachment 226666

Theory is one thing, practice is another. Manual EQ lets you experiment with fixing response errors and you can then judge individually whether some correction is valid or not.
My comments were never off.

I said that dips are not as harmful, compared to peaks.
Your response does not even go to that statement, just only says that dips are harmful as well.
Guess what, I never said that they weren't harmless, I said that weren't as harmful as peaks.

Any how, it doesn't matter in case of boosting destructive interference.
You can boost that kind of resonance forever, the interference will always be there since that's by definition what destructive interference does.
The only thing that it does is making a dip with an even higher Q-factor and at some point will be swallowed up by the smoothing of the graph/measuring system.
So it looks good, but in practice it's still there.
I guess the only acoustic element that will limit this, is the acoustic resistance or boundary layer that eventually will put an halt on such resonance going any higher.
Turbulence could also work.
Quantifying that is not easy, but it won't be at low SPL's

@thewas rightfully states that EQ narrow dips is just not wise to do by default, unless you know what it's causing it.
In case of destructive interference like a port resonance it quite literally doesn't do anything except overloading the system.

Which could lead to even potential damage for users who are less knowledgeable and unaware.
VERY bad general advice to give also very ironic advice, because it has been known for at least 15-20 years that it's a bad idea to EQ dips in general.

Can even by found in books like Loudspeaker Handbook by Eargle as well as Loudspeaker and Headphone Handbook by Borwick.
Although anyone with knowledge in basic acoustics knows and understands what destructive interference means and why EQ them won't do anything at all.

It totally beats me why all of a sudden this is coming back all over again.
Including those silly "calibration" companies with magic microphones and systems.
Because "flat" is "good" ?
 
Last edited:

OWC

Active Member
Joined
Apr 14, 2019
Messages
204
Likes
154
I haven't seen Toole, Olive or other EQ advisers recommending to fill narrow dips, here from Toole's book (2nd edition):

In general it is recommended to adjust the parametric equalizer to match the shape of and to reduce the amplitude of any upward thrusting peaks in the frequency response. Narrow dips should be left alone, but broad depressions may be boosted if the amount of boost is not more than about 6 dB.
Source: page 518

Also from Toole:

Peaks can be attenuated by EQ, but narrow dips should be left alone
Source: https://www.audiosciencereview.com/...ut-room-curve-targets-room-eq-and-more.10950/

Adjusting loudspeakers having different flaws to match full-bandwidth room curves of highly rated loudspeakers cannot yield the same high quality sound. This is especially true if narrow-band equalization is used above the transition frequency. This fact is not to be found in the advertising literature of "room EQ" products. Guess why?
Source: https://www.audiosciencereview.com/...e-targets-room-eq-and-more.10950/#post-307672

Narrow dips are usually the result of destructive acoustical interference and are usually audibly innocuous because they change with direction/position. Broader dips can be interpreted as anti-resonances if one chooses to, whether there is an associated frequency selective absorption process or not. Mostly not.
Source: https://www.avsforum.com/threads/ho...e-science-shows.3038828/page-161#post58530612

You cannot equalize the narrow dips because they are non-minimum-phase destructive-interference phenomena. So you don't want an automated equalizer that might try to fill them.
Source: https://www.audioholics.com/room-ac...b-sfm/applying-the-scientific-method-to-audio


I agree with you that in the end the direct listening comparison should decide but in my own experience positive narrow peak filters usually sound worse, which can be also understood as they are resonators, tonality might improve but the temporal behaviour often audibly worsens (it sounds artificial/muddy).
Thanks, nothing to add, there is plenty of scientific literature and just basic acoustics describing why and how.
I know some people here just like to yell "can you prove it? / "reference please", but there is no replacement for basic knowledge and understanding of the underlying physics.
I am not gonna quote entire books, in fact I am not even allowed to do so.

As for the last sentence. It all depends where the dips are coming from.
So a statement if EQ'ing dips in general should sound better/worse (whatever that means), can never be made.

This is also the reason why it's so extremely important to do near-field burs decay (waterfall in periods) measurements as well as electrical impedance measurements.
But apparently to some that seems not be important and they magically know were those dips and issues are coming from.
Just only saying "it's resonances" doesn't say much at all.
 

OWC

Active Member
Joined
Apr 14, 2019
Messages
204
Likes
154
Since you said high-end.

Right, that's a 3-way system.
In that case it's possible to filter the woofer before the port resonance.

So, okay, I should have said in any high-end 2-way system I guess.
You're correct on that.
 

Koeitje

Major Contributor
Joined
Oct 10, 2019
Messages
2,292
Likes
3,880
Well it is pretty funny how I made it to this thread. I have been looking for some desktop computer speakers for the past 6 months. First I was checking out BestBuy and thinking $150 Edifier pair looks good, but I wonder if there is something better - then found Vanatoo T0 - which led me to this forum - which got me wondering about studio monitors - which let me to iLoud MTM and was about to buy - but then iLoud raised their price $50 to $399. Well I'm already looking at $399 for MTM - hey what are these new Adam Audio A4V for "only" $100 more but no detailed reviews - and then here is a detailed review! I still haven't purchased anything! HAHA.
The T5V's are very good if they can be a bit bigger and you don't need the built-in DSP options from the A-series. Just use a shelf equalizer and they are great.
 

MadMaxx

Active Member
Joined
Mar 27, 2022
Messages
135
Likes
240
Location
Islamorada, FL Keys
I recently sold my LS50 Metas, SVS 3000 Micro, and Outlaw monoblocks after listening to an audition of the Adam Audio A7V. Bought a pair + the Adam Sub8 for my desktop PC audio setup. As much as I liked my Metas, these A7V monitors blow them away. I'm hearing details in my music and games that I never knew were there.

758417_adam.png
 

YSC

Major Contributor
Joined
Dec 31, 2019
Messages
3,194
Likes
2,570
I recently sold my LS50 Metas, SVS 3000 Micro, and Outlaw monoblocks after listening to an audition of the Adam Audio A7V. Bought a pair + the Adam Sub8 for my desktop PC audio setup. As much as I liked my Metas, these A7V monitors blow them away. I'm hearing details in my music and games that I never knew were there.

View attachment 241705
For a pc setup I am a bit surprised for the adams blocking a bit of your screen.

Wonders if it’s possible to have some in room measurements sometime, am really curious will the dip in FR of the A4V be there in the A7V also
 

MadMaxx

Active Member
Joined
Mar 27, 2022
Messages
135
Likes
240
Location
Islamorada, FL Keys
For a pc setup I am a bit surprised for the adams blocking a bit of your screen.

Wonders if it’s possible to have some in room measurements sometime, am really curious will the dip in FR of the A4V be there in the A7V also
That's just the angle from where I took the pic. When I'm at my desk, there's a good 2 inches of space between the monitor and each speaker. The monitor view isn't obstructed at all. ;)
 
  • Like
Reactions: YSC

Scielienta

Member
Joined
Nov 20, 2019
Messages
33
Likes
20
I recently sold my LS50 Metas, SVS 3000 Micro, and Outlaw monoblocks after listening to an audition of the Adam Audio A7V. Bought a pair + the Adam Sub8 for my desktop PC audio setup. As much as I liked my Metas, these A7V monitors blow them away. I'm hearing details in my music and games that I never knew were there.

View attachment 241705

A7V looks lovely, can you compare with LS50 Meta shortly?

That iLoud Micro sound is fantastic for its size, also have it on my desk.
 

MadMaxx

Active Member
Joined
Mar 27, 2022
Messages
135
Likes
240
Location
Islamorada, FL Keys
A7V looks lovely, can you compare with LS50 Meta shortly?

That iLoud Micro sound is fantastic for its size, also have it on my desk.
What I've noticed most is the level of detail I hear in music and video games. The Metas sounded almost muffled in contrast. To be fair, the A7V have a 7" driver vs. 5.25" on the Metas. I think the ribbon tweeter makes a big difference, too. The new Adam A line also have built-in amps and DSP functions that help fine tune the sound.

Agreed on the iLouds! They're perfect for small/mobile setups.
 

YSC

Major Contributor
Joined
Dec 31, 2019
Messages
3,194
Likes
2,570
What I've noticed most is the level of detail I hear in music and video games. The Metas sounded almost muffled in contrast. To be fair, the A7V have a 7" driver vs. 5.25" on the Metas. I think the ribbon tweeter makes a big difference, too. The new Adam A line also have built-in amps and DSP functions that help fine tune the sound.

Agreed on the iLouds! They're perfect for small/mobile setups.
The ribbon tweeter maybe just have that elevated treble as in the T5V, would like to see if that’s where the perceived detail comes from
 

premasai275

New Member
Joined
Dec 15, 2022
Messages
1
Likes
0
This is a review and detailed measurements of the Adam A4V studio monitor (active DSP speaker). I purchased it new for US $500.
View attachment 225907
The look is standard ADAM Audio which is not bad. The build seems rather solid but with very sharp corners past the front face. Back panel shows clearly UI for changing things:

View attachment 225909

The momentary switches are easier to manipulate than competing dip switches. There are three "voicing" options. Pure which is anechoic/flat response. UHR which is Adam's own target and "Ext" which is custom. You program that using Ethernet port. I tried to do that only to find out the software won't be ready until next month. :(

Level of tweeter hiss is very low and not a concern for me anyway.

Here are the specifications:
View attachment 225910

Measurements that you are about to see were performed using the Klippel Near-field Scanner (NFS). This is a robotic measurement system that analyzes the speaker all around and is able (using advanced mathematics and dual scan) to subtract room reflections (so where I measure it doesn't matter). It also measures the speaker at close distance ("near-field") which sharply reduces the impact of room noise. Both of these factors enable testing in ordinary rooms yet results that can be more accurate than an anechoic chamber. In a nutshell, the measurements show the actual sound coming out of the speaker independent of the room.

Likewise listening tests comply with the latest research into proper evaluation of speakers calling for mono, instead of stereo listening:


Documentation is not clear about reference axis. By experimentation, I arrived at a point between the borders of midwoofer and tweeter.

Adam A4V Measurements
It is not often that we start with a clear aberration in frequency response:
View attachment 225911

That disturbs an otherwise good response with a bit of treble boost. The cause of the dip appears to be interference coming out of the front port:
View attachment 225912

We can visualize this using our 3-D speaker dispersion at the offending 1 kHz and points before and after:
View attachment 225913

You can see how at 1 kHz the bottom is extended indicating energy coming from the port, causing a cancellation at our reference axis (red arrow).

This naturally translates into both early reflections and predicted in-room response:
View attachment 225914


View attachment 225915

Power handling was excellent at 86 dBSPL. But I could hear and we can see distortions at 96 dBSPL:
View attachment 225916

View attachment 225917

The larger tweeter (than typical cone ones) starts to "beam" (narrow its response) above 8 kHz or so:
View attachment 225918
View attachment 225919

Vertically we have our usual mess with 2-way speakers with a bit more thrown in for good measure:
View attachment 225920

Our CSD/waterfall measurement tells us what we already know as far as resonances:

View attachment 225921

Finally here is the step response for fans of this measurement:
View attachment 225922

ADAM A4V Listening Tests and Equalization
First impression was positive and it was not until I listened more/applied EQ that I appreciated the extra brightness. So I applied three filters:
View attachment 225923

The first two are quite narrow so audibility impact is very small (or imagined). I thought that filling that 1 kHz trough made the sound a bit less bright. The biggest difference naturally came from the broad filter #2. That needs to be adjusted to taste. Without it, the sound appears to be "higher resolution/detailed" but with female vocals it, I did not care about the way it exaggerated some sounds.

Dynamics/power capability was excellent. I could listen quite loud and most of the time not hear any distortion. When there was some, it was grittiness that set in quite gently. Considering that I listen to only one speaker, you should be in very good situation using them in desktop application (how I tested it).

Conclusions
Adam manages to make a 4 inch speaker sound good. Not always an easy task as far as power handling. There is an unfortunate cancellation due to front facing ports. Wish they were in the back. Or some fill material to dampen it. Fortunately audibility impact is almost non-existent due to its narrowness. Default voicing is a bit bright both in measurements and my listening tests. Possible that if you placed it higher up, it would not be so.

Power is optimized quite well to produce what it can well, and filter out what it cannot (deep bass). Nicely done.

Overall, I am going to recommend the Adam A4V monitor speaker.

----------
As always, questions, comments, recommendations, etc. are welcome.

Any donations are much appreciated using: https://www.audiosciencereview.com/forum/index.php?threads/how-to-support-audio-science-review.8150/
Hi, there I am new to this Forum and I saw your Frequency Chart for the Adam A4V. I just got a set of them and I wanted to ask you if the settings you listed up above on Band 1-3 if I can make regular this as a setting to my speaker to improve clarity or did you measure them in your room/Environment or is it a general improvement of the speaker which everyone can apply? Thank you, Klaus. And one more question, is this setting then enough improvement or do you suggest a calibrating with sonosworks mic and software? Thank you.
 

Attachments

  • Bildschirm­foto 2022-12-15 um 18.45.57.png
    Bildschirm­foto 2022-12-15 um 18.45.57.png
    345.2 KB · Views: 51

dimedrol

Member
Joined
Dec 7, 2022
Messages
29
Likes
60
I've had Adam A5x's for 11 years now - for the last 3 years the capacitors in them have been dying out causing audible effects from channel imbalance to audible hiss coming from the tweeters or hum from the woofers. I am not a sound engineer, I use them as my computer multimedia speakers. The best thing about them is their ribbon tweeter that can easily become annoying at an average/high volume but I usually listen to them late at night at a very low volume and that is where they shine. They kinda work like the good old tone compensation giving me a very pleasing amount of detail in the high end and thus I don't perceive any loss of resolution as in my experience is typical at very low listening volumes with dome tweeters. Because of their constant need of servicing I am going to replace them with Genelecs, but I know for a fact that in my night listening sessions I will be missing those x-art tweeters.
 

Nuclear

New Member
Joined
Dec 30, 2022
Messages
2
Likes
1
I've had Adam A5x's for 11 years now - for the last 3 years the capacitors in them have been dying out causing audible effects from channel imbalance to audible hiss coming from the tweeters or hum from the woofers. I am not a sound engineer, I use them as my computer multimedia speakers. The best thing about them is their ribbon tweeter that can easily become annoying at an average/high volume but I usually listen to them late at night at a very low volume and that is where they shine. They kinda work like the good old tone compensation giving me a very pleasing amount of detail in the high end and thus I don't perceive any loss of resolution as in my experience is typical at very low listening volumes with dome tweeters. Because of their constant need of servicing I am going to replace them with Genelecs, but I know for a fact that in my night listening sessions I will be missing those x-art tweeters.
I have the EXACT same issue (audible effects from channel imbalance to audible hiss coming from the tweeters or hum from the woofers) with my A5X's that happen randomly and turning them off for a day fixes the issue until it pops up again at the worst times. Did replacing the capacitors work to fix the issue? I'm no engineer either I was wondering what was wrong with my speaker (it only happens with one of the two).
 

dimedrol

Member
Joined
Dec 7, 2022
Messages
29
Likes
60
I have the EXACT same issue (audible effects from channel imbalance to audible hiss coming from the tweeters or hum from the woofers) with my A5X's that happen randomly and turning them off for a day fixes the issue until it pops up again at the worst times. Did replacing the capacitors work to fix the issue? I'm no engineer either I was wondering what was wrong with my speaker (it only happens with one of the two).
In my humble experience if it gets better in 5-10-20 minutes after powering the monitors on - it very likely can be fixed by replacing capacitors. I fixed hiss on two occasions like that - it was much more apparent upon having just turned the monitors on and then it gradually disappeared. But right now I have hum and channel imbalance and those don't seem to self-improve over time, so I still need to find someone to look into them.
 
Top Bottom