Speaker issues...

I'm getting an intermittent problem with my monitor speakers, where after being powered on for a few hours the bass drops from the left channel and a strange static/white noise comes and goes in waves every 20 seconds or so. The sound is not loud at all but it's not occurring in the right speaker.

This has been happening for a while now but because I've been off my music game for various reasons, and haven't been having long sessions recently, I've not delved any deeper into the issue.

What I notice with my interface is that at very low volumes (for late night sessions) the monitors tend to have a slight bias toward the right anyway. Setting it to '1' on the volume control will result in a one sided image but at '2' the stereo field equals itself out. I can live with that and it doesn't seem to be out of the ordinary, but the weird bass drop and static on the left side is starting to piss me off!

Is this a symptom of a popped speaker? A dodgy cable? An interface with issues? All three?!

It wouldn't be so bad if the problem was there all the time, but it comes and goes at random... usually when everything has been powered up for a while though.

Any thoughts?

have you tried 'isolating' the problem?

I'd start with the cheapest possible cause, the cables and then if that doesn't work I'd continue to to try and isolate it, like AntonPD suggested.

I had a similar issue about a year ago where I would lose volume on the left of one pair of monitors, except the loss was uniform in frequency. It was a lose connection at the back of the monitors (XLR In). Better that than an interface or internal fault but maybe your issue will also be an easy fix.

AntonPD wrote:have you tried 'isolating' the problem?

This shit always seems to happen in the middle of the night when it's tough to do any kind of serious fault find. What I did last night was quickly swap the XLR connections around so the left out was going to the right speaker and vice versa. This seemed to balance out the frequencies on both speakers for some reason. When I swapped them back round the problem was there again.

Low and behold everything works perfectly today.

Undertow wrote:I'd start with the cheapest possible cause, the cables and then if that doesn't work I'd continue to to try and isolate it, like AntonPD suggested.

I had a similar issue about a year ago where I would lose volume on the left of one pair of monitors, except the loss was uniform in frequency. It was a lose connection at the back of the monitors (XLR In). Better that than an interface or internal fault but maybe your issue will also be an easy fix.

Hopefully it will be an easy fix, but my monitors and interface are both covered under a standard warranty until June so I'm not fretting too much. I just need to isolate the problem like you both suggested and then move forward from there.

If you swapped them and haven't changed the settings on the rear of the monitor from previously...and they evened out that means that the previously louder monitor has dropped in volume. So the drop in volume and frequency may be somewhere other than the monitors, it would seem. Do you think you've isolated the problem to the cables or one of the outputs of your interface?

I think I need to wait for the problem to rear its head again (hopefully during daylight hours), and then carry out a more extensive test. The cable swapping I did last night has told me next to nothing unfortunately. The problem could still be either the monitor, the cables or the interface.

Coz wrote: the bass drops from the left channel and a strange static/white noise comes and goes in waves every 20 seconds or so. The sound is not loud at all but it's not occurring in the right speaker.

Honestly it sounds like you have a failing amp in that speaker.

Do this, disconnect your speakers and physically move the left to the right and right to the left then reconnect them.
This will basically allow you to eliminate a lot of aspects at one time.

If it moves with the speaker it's in the speaker.
If it stays on the same side then the speakers are fine and you can move to an earlier stage in the path.
If it doesn't do it anymore than verify the condition and quality of your power cables to the monitor and the audio connect cables.

The best part is you can still use the setup while waiting to see if it does anything.

Good advice mate.

For whatever reason it only happens after everything has been powered on for 3 or 4 hours. I've got a busy few days but the first chance I get I'll be trying to crack the problem.

I think I've cracked it... Everything points to it being the speaker.

ntalec wrote:disconnect your speakers and physically move the left to the right and right to the left then reconnect them.

I did this and initially and it was inconclusive (seriously late here again which makes it tough), but after half an hour of playing around the problem was as plain as day.

I'd previously overlooked the "dim" control on my interface, but it's actually a great way of cranking up the volume and avoiding that one-sided first part of the volume curve. I'll be using it from now on for my late night sessions.

I'll probably be without a working setup for a while now, but it'll be worth it to get everything functioning exactly as it should.