A5X Review by SonicScoop.com
Reviews
Berlin, January 7, 2012
ADAM’s second smallest nearfield monitor of the AX series, the A5X, has recently been reviewed by SonicScoop.com – NYC’s premiere online source for music production and music business. Below you can find some extracts from that review, which you can read at full length on the SonicScoop website.
Down Low
[…] I was particularly surprised to find out just how deep the compact A5X model can go. And it doesn’t just go low. It goes low and stays clean – Much cleaner than many ported studio monitors on the market.
To my ears, these speakers sound remarkably free of strange and misleading resonances down to 80hz or even lower. Down around 50hz or so, I finally start to feel the slightly sluggish response inherent in all ported designs, although it occurs at levels much less significant than in many monitors in the same price range.
Even after sitting with them for a couple of weeks, I’m still impressed these little speakers go that low at all, not to mention that well.
More Everything
The A5Xs have a small footprint, but they sound like giants. Or at least, much larger speakers.
In the studio, I tend to prefer working on speakers that are transient-accurate and mid-forward. Give me a good pair of Auratones, NS-10s, ADAM S3As, or maybe some Dynaudios, and I know I’ll be able to craft a mix that works.
When I’m away from work however, I often rock out to speakers that sound a little more “fun”. For casual listening in my home office, I have a pair of Event ASP-8s. They’re a pair of review speakers that I kept, not because they’re my ideal studio tool, but because they were affordable, and so much damn fun to listen to records on.
They’re also enormous.
As I write this review, the A5Xs are sitting in their place. They take up less than half the space of the giant Events, but they sound just as big, if not bigger.
Cranked up, the 5Xs scream like only an opera singer can scream. Compared to the ASP8s, their low end is tighter and more solid, the high end cleaner and less pointy, the midrange more complex and detailed, and the stereo imaging more concrete and precise. With two 50-watt amplifiers and the ability to cruise at about 102 dB, they also have plenty of power and headroom. (And if you ever mix that loud for long, please trust me when I say you’re doing it wrong.) This added headroom and stellar performance at high levels is a genuine improvement of the original ADAM A-series.
Although the ASP8s are fun listening in their own way (and may have a greater appeal to some listeners) if I had to mix on just one set of monitors, I’d trust the smaller A5Xs more. […]
I like the A5Xs. They’re slightly mid-forward and extremely detailed, just like a set of ADAM speakers should be. But they’re also more impressive and more fun-sounding than their prior incarnation. […]
Justin Coletti, SonicScoop.com, January 5, 2012
Please read the full review here on the SonicScoop webpage.