The first thing you notice when listening to ADAM P11-A bi-amped monitors is the incredible detail. These aren't overly bright, thumping speakers with smiley-face frequency response curves-the midrange is very clear and very defined. The top end is accurate without being harsh, and the stereo imaging (in terms of both soundstage width and depth) is simply a notch above other speakers I've heard in this price and spec range. The low end is the only place these speakers don't shine-that's not surprising as each speaker is only equipped with one 7'' paper-coned woofer. The lows could get a bit muddy and loose sounding at times, but this never masked any serious problems; things behaved predictably. The first time I heard the P11-A was when I used a pair to engineer a radio broadcast of a mellow, six-piece band playing live. When setting up, I was guessing that mixing would be hairy (lots of equipment, not much time to soundcheck), but the added clarity of these speakers helped everything turn out fine. I was especially pleased at how well the mix translated to other systems. Like its much costlier brother the S3-A, the P11-A is equipped with an ART tweeter and has similar controls for trimming its in-room response. Frequency response is stated as 48 Hz - 35 kHz (+/-3 dB). These are great powered monitors, and using them was a blast! ($1700, www.adam-audio.com)
Monitoring | No. 136
FX80 Coaxial Powered Monitors
by Mike Kosacek
I've been using the same nearfield studio monitors for almost ten years now. My main pair is no longer in production, and my alternate pair is from a company that shut down – and I've been...