2. speakers
  3. 1208380202

No bass in the Proac Response 3

I've just had the opportunity to buy a Proac Response 3 from a fellow agon just recently. One of the foam the 6.5" woofer was
torn ( with holes) so I already had it replaced with brand new foam. The treble improved quite a bit once I had the foam replace. The midrand is still the same and I have to say the Proac midrange is beautifull. I can sit and listen to female vocal (Krall, Elle, Cassandra) music all day. There is no sign of harsh or etch at all.

However, my problem now is that the bass is nowhere to be found when I play rock/pop. I do the regular Proac reccommended speaker placement of 2 feet away from the wall and the deep bass , mid bass are all but lost. If I moved the Proac very close to the wall then I get stronger bass, but now my image and everything else got all messed up. A simple analogy would be like I don't feel the singer is standing in the rooming sing anymore once I move the speakers toward the wall. Everything is just so flat ( 2-d), but the bass is good.

The most simple weak link that I can see in my system is that maybe the Krell integrated is just not big enough to produce the kinda big bass that I used to. But another interesting thing to know is that before I got the R3, I also got a much smaller Proac supertower that produced bass twice as much as the R3; and the R3 is twice the size, but lacking in the lower freq department.

My system is following:
Krell KAV-300i (integrated amp)
Arcam DV-27 (CD player)
Sony DVD player + PS Audio UltraLink DAC
Proac R3 (Full range speaker)
ducchau
ducchau OP
12 posts
 
Thanks a lot for all the quick response. I've had the Response 3 for about more than a month and the surprising thing that I found is that when the 6.5" midwoofer was tearing up, the treble was the first to go ( very surprising). SO I've had all the foams professionally refoam. And the treble came back ( I always thought that the high frequency came from only the tweeter. But it's not true with the Proac).

Anyway, back to the R3 bass, I've tried a few speaker placements experiments before. However, have not had good success. However, based on the urge of you more experienced gentlemen, I will go home tonite and try a few more locations, even I will change my sitting location. Also, another thing I forgot to mention is that I've filled up the sand pretty full. Could someone please enlighten me more on this sand filling thing in the R3. Please understand I am a pretty newbee in audiophile. And another school of thought. I've heard that class A amp will do wonders with bass and even less harshness in female vocal. Is it true that getting a new amp will help or it's still more a speaker placement problem..Thanks, ducchau.
racamuti's avatar
racamuti
362 posts
 
I don't know how many hours you've played the speakers after replacing the foam surround, but maybe they need to be broken in some. If you want to break them in fast just reverse the speaker wire polarity on ONE speaker only and place the speakers facing each other very close and let "em" rip. You can also put a blanket over them if it is still to loud. I have heard speakers with very little bass when new have great bass after loosening up some by about 50 hours.
ducchau OP
12 posts
 
Racamuti...Nope. Have not had burn-in time for the new woofer foams. Just picked up the drivers last weekend so probably not than 20 hours of playing. But really burn-in time for foam also. This is the first I've heard. Thanks, Ducchau.
prefab
55 posts
 
Could you have reconnected the drivers out of phase? Try switching the polarity on one of the drivers.
xiekitchen
821 posts
 
If ALL the 6.5" drivers had their foam suspensions changed out then you will need break in time to get the bass back. If only one driver was changed and suddenly bass has disappeared, the last post may have merit... did you somehow reverse polarity when re-installing said woofer back into cabnet?
Otherwise break-in time should bring it back.
I don't know about Krell's integrated, but the old Krells had great bass. About class A: Some Class A's are better than Class AB but Class AB done right (like an Eagle 4) are no issue. My old Forte 1a (50 watts class A) was pretty good in the bass, outperforming some 250 watt amps I compared it too.
More to discover