Xls200

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GFS AV

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Afternoon all,

Just been putting my week old XLS200 through it's paces.

I put a dance CD on to test it's speed. I noticed something unusual though -

One track I tested it with starts off with no bass, then it suddenly kicks is all at once. Quite a fast beat, asking a lot of work from the sub. I had it setup about 80Hz with speakers set to small, and the volume on almost a half (too much methinks).

The unusual thing was, For the first couple of seconds of this powerful bass sequence, the sub's volume seemed to decrease then increase back to normal. Then it would stay the same and was fine :confused: . It's as if there wasnt enough power/current being sent to the driver for some reason.

I replayed the track 2-3 times and the same thing happened. It's as though once the sub recognises theres a lot of power required, it levels out and keeps up the power.

Has anybody else experienced this with their XLS200, or any other sub for that matter?

As you will know, the XLS200 is not short on power, so I cant quite understand whats happening.

Any ideas folks?? :rolleyes:
 
Is it a problem with the mastering of the CD perhaps ?
 
It does sound quite odd. Solid state electronics like this don't really have a "brain" to decide how much juice is needed. Volume on almost half does sound like too much gain to me but that's a different matter.

Do you have this problem with any other CD/DVDs? Could you try the CD on someone elses system or tell us which track it is so someone else might be able to give it a try?
 
Just an idea..... could this be the protection circuit kicking in?
 
It's definately not the CD as the first time I played the track it happened about 2 seconds into the bass line, then the second time I tried it, it happened as soon as the bassline kicked in, then re-gained power.

Also, nothing to do with night mode.

Seems strange dunnit!
 
Protection circuit? hmm, perhaps. When I have time i'm gonna try the same thing but with the volume eased down a tad.

Cheers for your thoughts folks, any other ideas anyone??
 
I'm using a Yamaha 640SE amp (think its about 85W), and MS Avant 906 fronts, 905centre, and 902 rears.

I thought it may be a problem with the amp, but then I thought, well it's the subs amp that powers it :confused:
 
Hia GFS,

What song was you playing. I have quite a few dance cd's and also an XLS200.

I can offer a second opinon for you if you fancy ;)

Adam.
 
Thabks Adam that would be good. :)

'Crush' is the track. Is the first track from Paul Van Dyk's album 'Reflections'.
I think it's about 1 min 30 secs into it.

While we're on the subject of dance music, are there any artists you'd recommend for well produced, clean sound? Preferably with good bass. Rather than the usual crackly cack. PVD is one of the better ones I think.

Cheers
 
Brand New Heavies 'Heavy Rhyme Experience' was the first thing on my stereo when I got my XLS200. There is some excellent bass guitar on that. :D

I guess Red Hot Chili Peppers might do the same, although Flea goes for more of a high end snap on his slap-bass than the thumping deep stuff (the sound of farting in the bath is the way I always think of it :rotfl: )

I've also thoroughly enjoyed Two Pages by 4Hero - both disks. I will get round to playing Post by Bjork at some point. From memory Hyperballad had some real deep stuff at the start which could now frighten small children.

I have to say that I'm already getting over the phase of putting on bassy albums just to hear some deep bass and am now just enjoying rediscovering my CD collection again!

It's more movies that I'm watching for the wow factor! :blush:
 
It's funny you mention Brand New Heavies 'Heavy Rhyme Experience'. I just bought it last week :laugh: . I agree it does have some nice bass lines.
 
C'mon chaps!

Any other ideas?? :confused:
 
The output on your amplifier is as likely to clip as the sub is. Probably more so with the XLS200 connected to it which is cetainly robust.

How do you have your equipment setup? You mentioned at the start that you had the sub volume set at half which is much too high IMO. How loud were you listening, and are all of the speaker channel calibrations set to within a few dB of zero on the amplifier?

Have you noticed this problem with any other material? Were you using the DACs in your CD/DVD player or using a digital connection to your amp? Have you tried playing the same track using the other DACs (ie. if you were decoding in the amp, try decoding in the player and vice versa)?

I'm not too familiar with your MS Avant speakers, does anyone know (Tons?) if the Yamaha is going to be struggling to drive them? Were you using all of your speakers or just your front pair?

A lot of questions I know but there's a lot of potential causes. I'm particularly interested to know if you've had the problem with any other material as that would indicate an abnormality with the disc or the way it gets decoded. :)
 
Thanks John,

As I said, it's definately not the CD. I dont have my speakers set within a few db of zero. Do you think I should? I cant see this making a difference. I will try it though.

My CD/DVD player is connected via a single phono lead (Profigold).

I have not noticed it with any other material. It seems fine through explosive action films. But i havent really had chance to play 'much' loud music yet.

When I first noticed the problem, I think my amp was at about -25db.

Just using front pair with music.
 
When I say within a few dB of zero, I mean in the individual calibration section (where you trim each speaker to be the same volume). Particularly with all MS series, you shouldn't need to adjust each speaker by more than 5dB at the absolute most. Similarly with the sub, you really want the sub output set to zero on the amplifier and adjust the volume on the sub panel itself until it's right.

If you've got your front speakers set to about +10dB in the calibration setting, and then listening at about -25dB then I wouldn't be too surprised if the amplifier outputs were clipping so it cut some of the bass.

I think it would help a lot if you could reproduce the problem with some other CD material, plus you get the chance to listen to lots of music. :D
 
Sorry for the long delay...

I havn't got that CD unfortuanetly.

There could be a number of answers to the problem.

The room could be sucking out bass at certain frequencies.

What I tried when I thought some recordings were slightly dodgy was to play them in the PC using Winamp or similar.

Doing this meant I could use one of the winamp plugins and get a 7 million band spectrum analyser accross my monitor.

Might not be able to hear the bass concerened through PC speakers, but the analyser is generally good enough to give you an idea if are any holes in the frequency spectrum.

As for reccomendations, I think nearly all of the React Test CD's are well recorded and cover a broad spectrum of music. They only cost a fiver or so too, which is nice :thumbsup:

Hope this helps a little.

Adam.


Edit... I've also just re read the thread and picked up on the settings on the sub.

I use a PM7200 with E800 processor, and the gain on the XLS200 is only on about 25 to 30%.

This is with the 7200 driving Tannoy R3's.

Anything more than this amount of gain resulted in a mish mash of overblown bass and uncomfortable music.

Maybe it is down to positioning.

Have you tried turning the gains down and either moving the sub or walking around the room to get a feel for room gain / cancellation etc.
 
Cheers SS,

As I said, I dont think the CD is the problem, as the quite spot differed slightly on each playback.

When I get chance, I will try changing the settings on my amp and sub, and see if I can sort this problem.

It may just be a case of "TURN IT DOWN".
 
Problems solved folks.

Just spoke to a nice chap at BK, who informed me that it's the "ASP automatic speaker protection" (audibly transparent driver protection).

So, nothing to worry about. Best turn it down a touch then :(

Not a problem though, as I explained to the chap, I'll never be listening at that kind of level anyway. -25db is very loud on my amp. When listening at this volume, I will rarely have the sub volume over a quarter.

Cheers folks
 
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