AV8/P7 no Bass ! help

RICK67

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I previously owned a stereo set up consisting of a Delta 290, bi-amped with a 290P. The sound from this was excellent. But I’ve Just connected up my recently arrived AV8 and P7, but I seem to have lost the bass. The sound is verging on shrill and doesn’t compare to my old system. I must have done something wrong somewhere in the setup as I can’t believe that the difference should be so dramatic. I have also read opinions that P7 leans more toward the warm/rich side of neutral.

I’ve connected the Front L/R outputs from the AV8 to Front L/R inputs on the P7 and connected the speaker’s high frequencies in to these amps and the low frequencies into the RS backs to bi-amp. I’ve connected the amp modules with interconnects – ‘out’ from the L/R amps to ‘in’ on the RS back amp modules.
I’m waiting for my additional speakers to arrive, so I’m just running this in stereo at the moment.. Have I missed something in the setup ? I’m using the Stereo Direct button so this by-passes most other processing etc……

Assuming that all my connections are correct ? ? ? ? , does anyone have any thoughts on this.

Cheers all,
 
From what you say, it seems connected up ok. Are the bass units in your speakers producing any sound?
 
That sounds right to me. What happens if you run it single wired (obviously refitting the biwire links to the speakers). The other test is to connect to bass and treble on the speakers seperately so you can judge the sound individually from each drive unit (be careful not to short the amp will playing around all though I'm sure you know this) ;)
 
It could be a speaker set-up issue in the menus of the AV8 (if you haven't set these up to match your actual setup.) I have a feeling the AV8 shipping default is for small speakers and a sub, probably set to 80Hz.

Are you in Analogue, Digital or Stereo Direct mode? I would try feeding in an analogue input to the AV8 from a source you know. Put the AV8 into Stereo Direct (press the direct button on the front). This bypasses all the bass management. Is the bass still way too light now?

Mark
 
Designer said:
It could be a speaker set-up issue in the menus of the AV8 (if you haven't set these up to match your actual setup.) I have a feeling the AV8 shipping default is for small speakers and a sub, probably set to 80Hz.

Are you in Analogue, Digital or Stereo Direct mode? I would try feeding in an analogue input to the AV8 from a source you know. Put the AV8 into Stereo Direct (press the direct button on the front). This bypasses all the bass management. Is the bass still way too light now?

Mark

Hi,

I've set the speakers to Large fronts and no sub and put the amp in Stereo Direct but still no luck. The source is a Meridian 506.2 CD player. This sounded excellent on my old Delta 290/290P set up. Do you think that the AV8/P7 should compare favourably to the 290/290P ? at the moment the difference is night and day, there is just no bass.
 
Rick

I had a similar strange problem when I changed to bi-amping with my P7 where I got no treble on one front channel. Having switched speaker cables around etc to make sure it wasn't the speaker(s), the 'solution' came when I unplugged the P7 from the wall and re-plugged it in again-miraculously everything worked perfectly!

BTW, I had the P7 switched off throughout, but it was the physical unplugging that did the trick.

Sounds strange I know, but I wonder if it has something to do with the P7 somehow 'memorising' previous connections and therefore not recognising the new configuration until it was completely unplugged.

Try it & good luck
 
Ambo said:
Rick

I had a similar strange problem when I changed to bi-amping with my P7 where I got no treble on one front channel. Having switched speaker cables around etc to make sure it wasn't the speaker(s), the 'solution' came when I unplugged the P7 from the wall and re-plugged it in again-miraculously everything worked perfectly!

BTW, I had the P7 switched off throughout, but it was the physical unplugging that did the trick.

Sounds strange I know, but I wonder if it has something to do with the P7 somehow 'memorising' previous connections and therefore not recognising the new configuration until it was completely unplugged.

Try it & good luck

Thanks Ambo - I'll give it a try this weekend when I can do some extended listening. The P7 is ex-dem and the AV8 is new - I'm wondering if things will settle down a bit when the processor has been run in ?

How do you find the quality of the AV8/P7 in stereo compared to previous systems you've owned ?
 
Rick67,

Weird but I also had a similar problem with my AVR300 when, with some spare hi quality speaker wire hanging around, I thought I'd try bi-wiring my front speakers. See if I could detect any difference.

Everything turned off, added in the wires, removed the links etc with great care. Double checked everything and switched it on. Nearly had a heart attack, there was a difference all right. My previous wonderful sound had become totally flat and lifeless. No base or highs, sounded like it was coming through a megaphone. Totally awful.

I don't honestly remember whether I removed the power cable like Ambo but may have. Certainly switched it off at the wall plug and spent ages rechecking all connections thoroughly. Nothing evident. Turned it on again and all was well. Huge sigh of relief. This is the only weird thing that has ever happened with the 300. Darned if I can tell much difference with the bi-wiring but its staying on the 'leave well enough' alone basis.
 
RICK67 said:
Thanks Ambo - I'll give it a try this weekend when I can do some extended listening. The P7 is ex-dem and the AV8 is new - I'm wondering if things will settle down a bit when the processor has been run in ?

How do you find the quality of the AV8/P7 in stereo compared to previous systems you've owned ?

Sorry for the delay-bad week!

For a start I always use the AV8 in stereo direct mode for music as it sounds far superior to leaving the digital processing switched on, so recommend you do that. I moved up from an A85, which I'd had for several years, so it was quite a step up. Initially I was just bi-wired with the AV8/P7 and the sound was certainly much more open ("bigger"?) and mightily impressive compared to the A85 (which, by the way, was a great amp).

When I moved to bi-amping, the detail and separation just got better immediately. In summary, it's a major imporvment over the A85, very musical and effortless overall sound, but I have the feeling that the amp is now too good for my £500 Cyrus speakers. I'm sure I can get even more out of it and I'm now in the market for some high-end speakers-currently a showdown between PMC's (FB1's or OB1's) and B&W's (prob 805S')

Hope that helps. BTW, how did the mains unplug/re-plug go?
 
Ambo said:
Sorry for the delay-bad week!

For a start I always use the AV8 in stereo direct mode for music as it sounds far superior to leaving the digital processing switched on, so recommend you do that. I moved up from an A85, which I'd had for several years, so it was quite a step up. Initially I was just bi-wired with the AV8/P7 and the sound was certainly much more open ("bigger"?) and mightily impressive compared to the A85 (which, by the way, was a great amp).

When I moved to bi-amping, the detail and separation just got better immediately. In summary, it's a major imporvment over the A85, very musical and effortless overall sound, but I have the feeling that the amp is now too good for my £500 Cyrus speakers. I'm sure I can get even more out of it and I'm now in the market for some high-end speakers-currently a showdown between PMC's (FB1's or OB1's) and B&W's (prob 805S')

Hope that helps. BTW, how did the mains unplug/re-plug go?


Hi Ambo.

No instant differences from the unplug/re-plug but I've done some extended listening and running in and things have definatley improved. I think the main reason for my initial concerns may be that the new set up just sounds 'different' to my old one. I had my Delta 290/290P for several years and perhaps I had become too accustomed to that sound.
My dealer also said that the combo will improve with some running in which appears to be ringing true.......anyway more listening....

Interesting comment on the speakers. I was thinking of PMC's myself as that will be my next upgrade. Arcam and PMC's do seem to be be paired up quite often...was looking at the GB1's

Cheers
 
Additional suggestions that you have probably checked already:
- Are you absolutely sure you got all phasing right. With 4 wires going to every speaker it is easy to switch a +/- on one of the connections.
- This may sound silly and you probably double checked it, but I have come across it: check on your source component that you didn't connect two right channels (or left channels) from output 1 and 2, instead of a R+L from one output.
 

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