My Marantz doesn't like Baby Advents?

[suprpntr]

Very odd..

I picked up these Baby Advents for the sole reason to learn to do a refoam. Used a bit too much glue, but that is another story. But they turned out OK. I put them on my unit and all seemed to work. However they seemed to lack some base and richness. I figured they were just not very good speakers to begin with.

My Bose 2.2's on the other hand have lots of base on the same unit. Tried switching them around from main to remote, same result...Bose booming, Advent not. No, I did not run them at the same time.

Now I did not expect a whole lot from these speakers to begin with but....

Ended up hooking them up to an old, cheap receiver and guess what? They sounded much better, richer sound.

Anyone here have a theory on why?

[vinyldavid]

Stupid question, but was your polarity wrong?

Also, at low levels, baby Advents do NOT have much bass, IMHO, from having owning a pair.

I have only used mine with a Sony STR-AV1070 Pioneer SX-780 and OnkyoTX-4500. I prefer the Pioneer out of all of them to drive the Advents. It just worked well.

[suprpntr]

I think polarity was a good question to ask.

I double checked. Marked the woofer when I did the reinstall. Switched speakers several times, figure if even I wasn't paying attention I would have got it right by error...hehehee.

True, at low volume not much base on the Babies. But going from good receiver to cheapie the sound was really noticable for the better. It is really strange and I even switched back and same result.

And luckily for my wallet my ear is not super fine tuned...LOL

[vinyldavid]

I think polarity was a good question to ask.

I double checked. Marked the woofer when I did the reinstall. Switched speakers several times, figure if even I wasn't paying attention I would have got it right by error...hehehee.

True, at low volume not much base on the Babies. But going from good receiver to cheapie the sound was really noticable for the better. It is really strange and I even switched back and same result.

And luckily for my wallet my ear is not super fine tuned...LOL

Hmmm....well, my SX-780 was low on the line, I think, and it did better than a higher on the line Sony AV receiver that actually sounds decent.

It could also be that when you to a refoam, you have to let the drivers break in. My foam is fine, and I KNOW that these are broken in (:D), so just give 'em little time...then you might fine the BOTL stuff too bassy....

[kretinus]

I just refoamed one of my Infinity SL10s, the other one will need it but is intact for now, the new surround is a lot stiffer than the old one and there is a detectable difference in bass, not much, just not as deep. I figure the new foam will breakdown and soften up a bit with use so I'm not worried, and if nothing else I'll just refoam the other one.

[FoolForARadio]

I had a set of Advent/3 speakers I got right after college. They sounded great for years on budget amplification, and they were darn sure broken in. I stuck with a Marantz 2230, and I didn't like the sound at all. I ended up giving them to my grad school neighbor just to make room for more stuff. In my case, I think the Advents wanted more power than the Marantz had to give.

[kermit z]

I just refoamed one of my Infinity SL10s, the other one will need it but is intact for now, the new surround is a lot stiffer than the old one and there is a detectable difference in bass, not much, just not as deep. I figure the new foam will breakdown and soften up a bit with use so I'm not worried, and if nothing else I'll just refoam the other one.


Same thing with my Boston A60s. I refoamed one, the other is ok for now. It was my first refoam so lot of glue used:D The refoamed speaker currently less bass than the other. I am counting on it breaking in:thmbsp:

[jim w.]

Very odd..

I picked up these Baby Advents for the sole reason to learn to do a refoam. Used a bit too much glue, but that is another story. But they turned out OK. I put them on my unit and all seemed to work. However they seemed to lack some base and richness. I figured they were just not very good speakers to begin with.

My Bose 2.2's on the other hand have lots of base on the same unit. Tried switching them around from main to remote, same result...Bose booming, Advent not. No, I did not run them at the same time.

Now I did not expect a whole lot from these speakers to begin with but....

Ended up hooking them up to an old, cheap receiver and guess what? They sounded much better, richer sound.

Anyone here have a theory on why?

they need to be played an broken in. thats the big thing. just like a motor in a brand new car. i have a bigger set of advents an let me tell you im on the hunt for a another set of these. theres plenty of bass trust the advent owners. athough i dont crank mine but at 2 - 3 wpc. these will shake the floor. listening to some grateful dead rite now " shake down street" i feel as though they are playing in my room now live.

so heres my theroy play em an let em break in :thmbsp:

[dc270]

After a respectable break in time you might increase/ or pull out some of the internal batting material to find the tuning you like. I had a pair that were broke in and the bass was not what I expected- after I player with the batting some it improved, not dramatic but noticable!
DC

[kcollins4]

Were the advents sitting in the exact same spot as the other speakers were? You can't sit them on top of the other ones and expect the base to be at all the same. Agree with others about break in on new foam too.

[no1maestro]

Don't forget that speaker damping in the amp has a lot to do with matching up speakers; matching has a lot to do with it!!

[suprpntr]

Don't forget that speaker damping in the amp has a lot to do with matching up speakers; matching has a lot to do with it!!

I don't totally understand this, being a newbe and all....

Would this explain why a cheaper receiver might perform better than a good one?

Thanks

[RadShak1251]

I owned a pair of the original Babys for 14 years. I finally gave them to a buddy in need of music in his new apartment.

That being said........

* as long as the Advents were kept in the same place when changing the receivers, the issue of surround stiffness (break-in issues) ought to be left out of the equation.

* different receivers usually do sound different. This is not some flaky audiophool myth either. It is very easy to design an amplifier circuit to subtly accentuate a specific set of frequencies of the signal it handles. There are also other methods to change the signal that do not show up on basic frequency response charts, but most definitely change the signal in audible ways.

* as no1maestro alluded to already, an amp's damping ability (its electrical ability to control the movement of the woofer cone) can affect the sound the woofer reproduces. Usually if its damping ability is on the lower end of the scale, a woofer will continue to vibrate after the initial signal is over with, adding X amount of bass to the original recorded sound.

Amps with better damping abilities cost more because among other things, they usually use larger power supplies and more heavily-built output transistors.

A similar concept is used when designing a woofer: if the magnet is made smaller (not too small though), apparent bass can actually increase, though it's not as accurate as the bass from a woofer with a larger magnet.

* at least on my Babys, the surround was very mushy, much softer than the average bass-reflex speaker's surround, so if the replacement surround wasn't also mushy (technical term: "compliant"), then that can audibly affect bass output.

* as far as the Bose comparison, Advents are (well, were :() designed for deep/rich bass but bass that is not neccesarily "punchy".......which is what most bass reflex speakers ARE known for, and though I've never heard of the 2.2s, every Bose I've seen has used a bass-reflex design. So you're hearing the effects of two different design philosophies, and not bad design. I would say its the classic West Coast vs. East Coast sound thing, but Bose is located in Massachussetts too, so never mind! :D

[MisterFishey]

I have a Marantz 2250 connected to some Baby Advents, and I think they have great bass, especially for bookshelf speakers. It is true that they do not have much bass at low volumes - hence the reason for the loudness switch. I don't know what kind of Marantz you have, but the loudness switch is designed to compensate for human hearing deficiencies at low levels by boosting the bass and treble. The boost is in decibels, not a percentage, so the effect more or less cancels out at higher volumes, so I keep my loudness switch on all the time. My Baby Advents are refoamed too, so I think I may have a similar thing going on.

[suprpntr]

My thanks to the last two posters for such detail replies.

I am running them off of a 2235B. I'll give them some time.

Maybe I will just have to buy another receiver to support my Baby Advents...heheee.

[vinyldavid]

My thanks to the last two posters for such detail replies.

I am running them off of a 2235B. I'll give them some time.

Maybe I will just have to buy another receiver to support my Baby Advents...heheee.

I would push for a Pioneer, but i have not ever heard them with Marantz. I am pulling out my barely functioning SX-780 for a basement stereo, I think and the Advents will be part of it.

[suprpntr]

Update;

Advents are sounding much better. After several days of running them, the bass finally picked up. I guess there is a break in period. More extreme than I would have guessed.

They were about to be banished to the closet forever!

My uneducated guess would be that that because this was my first refoam job, I used waaay too much glue on the repair. I am hoping this is not harmful in the long term.

They now sound better than the bose 2.2 that I thought were just fine on the unit. The Bose still have more bass, but the Babies have more detail.

Now to find another set of vintage speakers to refoam! Of course that means finding a new unit to power them.

Does it ever end?

[legalalien]

I run a Marantz 2275 with large Advents and they are a match made in heaven, I suspect the woofs just needed to loosen up.