685's, Alittle Bright?

[-=PLuKE=-]

As some of you know i bought my 685s over the weekend after having them on order. Now i like everything about them, The base sounds really deep and clean and you can here the highs all well and good. Now i have had them on for a few days now, But they might not be full run in yet, But on some songs they sound very bright sounding, The highs seem abit to much and vocals come out alittle much on higher volumes, Now i am using the QED Silver Anni cable which i hear takes a long while to burn in and that can sound bright to!.

So, What can i do? Its not on all songs either, In the B&W book they say curtains help take some brightness away or can add brightness if you take curtains now.

Setup

Teac AH-300
QED Silver Anni
XOS XHA215 (Phono)
Audiophile 2496 (soundcard, running music from PC)


THANKS!.

Luke

[miner]

Silver cabling will always bring out the highs plus B&Ws tend to be on the bright side, too. After some run in all should settle down a bit.

[-=PLuKE=-]

Thanks. I will give them another week and see, I have tryed some cheap cable and that did bring down the brightness abit. Am not saw if my room setup will have an affect, Will post a pic later when am home.

Luke

[jack667]

Thats strange - I don't have the 685s any more but I found they were actually very warm, without sacrifice of detail.

I used mine with a pretty decent amp (bladelius thor) and chord odyssey biwire, and found them indeed excellent in the bass, but never harsh or bright.

Have you tried some simple room treatments? Try clapping your hands in your room and see what sort of echo you get! Works for me!

[-=PLuKE=-]

I have done that and no echo, I dont have curtains in my room either. I know my amp (Teac AH-300) isnt the best but has more than enought bass they guys said it will be plenty enough for now as the Teac amp is like NAD amps as they are pretty bassy, But to get the whole 100% out of them i would need to upgrade to something better. Cant really afford anything new yet, as am living at home (20yrs old) and i race motorbikes so cant upgrade amp yet, Maybe near Christmas time.

Here are a few pictures, Setup ok?.





BOTH SPEAKERS ARE THE SAME DISTANCE FROM THE WALL



TWO PICS OF THE WALL, SOUND BOUNCING?.

[beden1]

I would try to move the speakers away from the back wall a bit. It looks like you have some room to the front edge of your shelving. I would also consider adding drapes to your opposite wall. Your room does not appear to have much in the way of sound dampening which the drapes will help.

You may want to just try hanging a sheet over the window to see what effect it has on your overall sound, before going out and buying drapes.

If the sound becomes too dead by hanging the sheet over the windows, try hanging the sheet in the middle of the side wall -- the wall next to your speakers.

Additionally, you may want to try and listen to the speakers with the grills on, as this may turn out to be of benefit in toning down the speakers a bit in your smaller room.

[-=PLuKE=-]

Thanks for the reply. I will try the grills first then try hanging a sheet infront of the window, My mum and dad go on holiday tomorrow so will be able to try everything out with the volume turned up .

Luke

[dknightd]

It could be your room. It could be the speakers. It could be your source. It could be your ears.

Assuming you are using a high quality computer source, Id look to the room first. Some absorption at first reflection points on the wall, floor, and ceiling can make a huge difference.

[-=PLuKE=-]

Am using a pretty decent soundcard and a decent cable from the soundcard to the amp. Am gonna give it abit more running time, and see, My mate had a listen and said they sound alittle to bright. I will start with running them in more, And then with some curtains on the wall its firing at.

Luke

[RebelMan]

Luke, what are you using for media? Compressed MP3's? My first guess would be your equipment is working against the natural voicing of your speakers which can tend to sound somewhat forward and bright. Beyond that I think your room looks fairly broken up which will promote dispersion and the feeling of liveliness in the room. But it could probably use some modest domestic treatments to tame the higher ordered reflections and lower reverberation decay times.

I agree with beden1 that you should experiment with something, like a blanket or comforter, in various positions throughout the room to isolate the source of your problem. Then treat the area with room complimenting materials like draperies or tapestry, though I wouldn’t recommend that you go hog wild treating your room, unless you plan to be there a while. Do just enough to get by and be satisfied.

Good luck and let us know how it turns out.

[-=PLuKE=-]

Yes am using MP3s, I hear you can get full CD quality songs off the internet but they are not called MP3s they have there own format.

I will try curtains in the windows and see what that does, Am still happy with the sound of them and the looks, Just sometimes i need to turn the treble down to -1 / -1.5 when listing to curtain songs on high volumes.

Will let you know what happends, Thanks for the replys!!.

Luke

[c0v3rr1d3]

flac, ogg, ape are all lossless audio codecs out there, which will give u cd quality without the compression.

Also interested in what you find out about these as i'm considering the 685's also.

[-=PLuKE=-]

Where can i find songs that are in that format?.

Dont get me wrong the 685s are nice, I havent stopped listen to them since Saturday!. There is plenty of bass there and midrange, Just the top sometimes sounds harsh. They look very very nice aswell and there is something about them that attracted me to them!.

Luke

[beden1]

Luke, what are you using for media? Compressed MP3's? My first guess would be your equipment is working against the natural voicing of your speakers which can tend to sound somewhat forward and bright.

Luke, I didn't notice before that you were using compressed MP3 files for your primary media. I agree with RebelMan that this would be a key issue, along with trying to improve your room treatments.

I just started using an iPod that my wife gave me as a gift. It's a nice tool for using in the car, but, I've found it generally reproduces a poor quality sound when trying to listen to it on my home setup.

I have found that many MP3 files seem to really accentuate the mids and highs for playback. B&W speakers are very accurate, and they will reveal the unnatural dynamics of these compressed recordings. I have also found this to be true of some of the "lossless" files I've downloaded and were reproductions of the "master reordings".

Try listening to CDs on a player to determine how your speakers will sound from playing a quality recording.

[-=PLuKE=-]

Will have to give it a try. But where abouts can i download this lossless files? I want to test them out over the MP3 format.

Thanks

Luke

[beden1]

Will have to give it a try. But where abouts can i download this lossless files? I want to test them out over the MP3 format.

Thanks

Luke

I'm sure you could no doubt find them cheaper, but I got some on iTunes Plus. The downloads are 256 kbps AAC encoding instead of 128 kbps bit rate.

[-=PLuKE=-]

So i did some searching, And the lossless and AAC files only put back the extreme lows and high in the music, But with more lows wouldnt that make my problem worse?. I think i really need to start on the room. I hooked some other speaker cable up, And it did take abit of the edge away but not much, It was Ixos Superflat speaker cable.

Luke

[c0v3rr1d3]

what are your musical preferences i can send you some lossless audio files i have for you to test out ranging from clapton to trance etc.

[-=PLuKE=-]

Thats good of you mate!. Anything really. Dance, R&B, Rap, Indie. Any of that is good, Maybe with some vocal stuff something abit like +44 or Blink182 is the sort of stuff that comes out harsh at times.

Thanks!!!

Luke

[-=PLuKE=-]

You have a PM.

Luke

[PewterTA]

Give your speakers some time, I thought my B&Ws were bright the first month or so I had them. After that they seemed to change for the better, not quite as bright and the low end really came alive. So I think you just need to put more "use" on them so that they (and your own ears) adjust.

Room treatment will definitely help, just try to get rid of as many flat and smooth surfaces as possible (like blank walls for example).

The best place to get lossless files is off your own CDs! Use Exact Audio Copy (EAC) with the AccurateRip plugin and rip them to FLAC. You'll have perfect copies that you can then play back with something like WinAmp.

[-=PLuKE=-]

I have one CD to my name 8O so i would need to download all of my songs.

Am glad that after some use they will sound better, This weekend am defo gonna try some curtain (or drapes in the US) and see what the sound is like then.

Thanks for everybodys import into my thread :T :T .

Luke

[jjahshik32]

hey pluke i was wondering, I just recently purchased the 602 s3 and was wondering why did you choose the 685 instead of the 602 s3's at the same price? Have you compared the two and you preferred the 685 instead? If so what were the advantages between the two?

[jjahshik32]

hey pluke one other thing.. where did u get that stand for your receivers and amps??

[-=PLuKE=-]

Hi mate. Well i looked at the 602 S3s but IMO i dont like the look, I have listen to them before but it was to long ago to remember. But i saw the 685s in the reviews and there was something that i liked right away with them, Listen to them and bought them, At the time i was listen and looking at the MA BR2s and the Kef iQ3s. So i cant really say how much beter the 602s are to the 685s, But its been said they they are alot better with the new drive and tweater units.

BTW, The stand was from B&Q i replaced the clear glass with black glass. It was £50.

Luke

[jjahshik32]

thanks for the advice I went back today but I ended up leaving with the 705's lol, its so very close to the 805's that the 705's for its price is the sweet spot =D

[jjahshik32]

do you know what model that B&Q stand is?? or refer to me their websites? I love that stand =D

[-=PLuKE=-]

Funny you say that mate about B&Q. My bro wants one but they havent any left i dont think. They are in the shelving part of B&Q you will seem the flat packed in a big box. There is two of them, One has 56 shelves and this has 4.

Luke