Spark Tones lacking Spark(le)
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Replaced both speakers and installed poly fil type material to all internal surfaces. It's never going to have a ton of "sparkle" without dedicated tweeters, but at least I got ride of the muddy, boomy-ness. Sounds way better if you are willing to take the time to do those 2 things.
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@cbrandst The next step would be to find 2-way speakers (woofers with cone tweeters built in) that would fit as replacements in the Spark.
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@dhbailey Yeah, I think that's the ultimate solution. I didn't try to find that just because of the "don't send raw output to tweeters" thing, but I don't think there is raw output being sent. But if that's not the case, why would PG not include tweeters? Maybe some of the modes do send raw output.
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@cbrandst I think Spark didn't put in speakers with tweeters simply because of the cost. When they're selling the amp for only $220 (for the early bird specials) they can't put very expensive speakers in the amp. I think that by the time the signal gets to the speakers it's not "raw output" anymore. I think the original speakers, like the carrying strap, are more of an economic decision than anything.
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@dhbailey True. We have to remember what this is, a low cost practice amp with some cool sounds and features. Lots of little tweaks and improvements can really drive the price up. Any one thing by itself might seem insignificant, but combined, they do start to add up.
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Which is a shame because its only as good as its weakest link. The fact that the software and marketing is aimed at supporting full range for music playback/backing tracks is at odds with the drivers they've used, which are in line with traditional guitar amp speakers which don't need to cover the upper range and not usually subjected to the amount of bottom end in a full mix with bass, drums, etc.
Now I don't know how much the oem speakers cost in the spark but I've put a pair of coaxials in that cost £7 each and they've transformed the sound so I doubt its about cost. -
It's a practice amp that does a whole lot yet costs less than some single guitar pedals. It's hardly worth complaining about the tone of the speakers at this price. I agree it's a bit bass heavy, but found that adding an EQ pedal before going into the Spark was just the ticket. I normally run an EQ pedal into amps anyway as it can make all the difference in the world. Give that a try before swapping speakers or making mods.
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@cbrandst said in Spark Tones lacking Spark(le):
Replaced both speakers and installed poly fil type material to all internal surfaces. It's never going to have a ton of "sparkle" without dedicated tweeters, but at least I got ride of the muddy, boomy-ness. Sounds way better if you are willing to take the time to do those 2 things.
So, how do Vox, Fender et al amps do it? Why does my Axe FX thru my Xitone 2x12 FRFR cab get sparkle, all without a tweeter. Why does my Spark, when playing Sirius/XM and other Music sources get it, AND on some amp models?
IMHO. it's some of the amp models, not the hardware. There are some that should have it that don't, and no way to dive down in the Amp model, like on a Helix, Axe FX etc can. But, some models do on the Spark.
Now, I have my spark up on a desk, with the front elevated with acoustic grade hard foam. And that makes a difference. Being off access reall muddies the Spark quite a bit.
And you can always use a treble boost or clean drive to boost top end as well. My Klon Centaur Clone does this great.
I kind of wish PG would add a treble boost to the drive pedal area.
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@cybermgk Not sure. Maybe they forgot to "carry the one" somewhere in the code when they calculated how much of a given frequency to send out. I hope that's it. Mine sounds subjectively better than before my tweaks, but it could still use some improvement. I notice it most when sending audio to the device from something other than the guitar, like a music source on the phone. Some phone EQ might help, but an EQ pedal in line with the guitar wouldn't touch that.
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@folkunlimited same here. Playing instruments for a long time and used many amps. Spark is a good beginner amp but sound quality is tricky and it feels exactly like you described. At the end of the day it does the job I guess, but don't keep high expectations. Also, if you want to use it as a bluetooth speaker sound quality is really low and you cannot tweak anything. I keep this in my office just to kill some time in between office work and that's it. If I want to play and hear what I play, I plug my guitar into big guys
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@homerdan Wow, using my Spark as a bluetooth speaker playing audio from my iPad the sound quality is great. I'm sorry you're finding the sound quality low. I wonder if that might improve if you raise the volume on your device and control the actual sound from the amp with the audio volume control on the Spark.
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Hi guys.
I know it's quite an old topic but it perfectly fits what I was looking for.
I always had a bit the feeling that while creating a tone via headset to then play it at decent volume through the speakers there was something missing. I play and chase for most of the time the Metallica tone, which never sounded as tight through the speakers as it did through the headphones.
I definitely had the confirmation it is just an hardware related issue this week. I bought Bias FX 2 and worked a lot on getting the Master of Puppets tone, which means scooping the mids and keeping relatively high bass and treble. It sounds very tight, on headphones. I then thought about using the Spark as speaker basically, through the AUX jack and most of the tightness I loved about my tone nearly disappeared. Not completely, but you know when you spend days working on the details you immediately feel when you're missing something.
Plugging the headphones to the spark gave me back the tone I was used to while listening directly from the laptop headphone jack. I then tried to fix the tone in bias fx 2 by means of Equalizer, boosting bass and treble basically and I got back a good chunk of the tightness I was looking for. It is still not perfect, but it is getting close. Indeed the tone feels too much boosted on headphones, which means I would have to create 2 tones, 1 for spark speakers and 1 for headphones.
To me this little experiment confirms that there is absolutely nothing wrong with the tones themselves, you just don't get all of it through the speakers, and it seems to me to get worse when you purposely shrink some frequencies of your tone as I did now scooping the mids, running a v shaped equaliser in Bias fx 2.
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@matteomarini Some people have "fixed" this by using the headphone out into an aux in to other gear. Others have hard wired speaker outputs to bypass the output of the Spark and get great sound. I have a ticket that I opened with support where I showed them that when you use the Spark as a sound output on the PC, the first time you play sound the volume is elevated and you get a boomy bass sound along with the elevation. But if you pause the sound for 15 seconds and the resume it, the boomyness goes away and the volume drops way down to normal levels. I still think there is some sort of firmware issue. I changed out the speakers in the spark, added sound dampening to the inside of the amp and plugged the bass port, all with minimal positive results. It's possible PG tuned the output to make the most people happy and will not change it up to "fix" the issue, but there are work arounds that I mentioned above here:
https://www.facebook.com/groups/241616417119881
And there's more of a focused discussion there as well. If you are willing to take dig in, speaker outputs seem to be your best bet. Really wish they had included that on the amp. Would have added very little cost and been a huge bonus. I'll probably do that myself at some point if they don't fix the issue or add in an EQ. The difference in headphone and speak out is just way too much to convince me they did that on purpose.
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@cbrandst thank you for your reply. Very interesting stuff.
Though I am wondering how big of an issue it is. By tuning the tone to sound too aggressive on headphone I had a decent sound through speakers (both using the Spark app or by just playing a tone shaped in bias fx 2) . I think that generally the Spark software is more than capable to shape the tone you want and the amp itself is not shy in terms of output etc (for home usage) . I tend to think that the main issue might be if you shape your tone on headphones and then discover that through speakers the tone is actually different, which is also true if you do the other way around. It is probably the tone inconsistency comparing the two rather than the amp not being able to sound as you want. Isn't it?
Probably if you really aim for extreme tones it might become a real limitation, but otherwise I wonder if I would have ever complained about the sound quality for instance. Not knowing the difference via headphones probably I would have just kept shaping the tone until I got what I wanted. Or close to it.
What do you think? You spent way more time than me for sure in this topic. Cheers!
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Spark sounds awful
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@cybermgk I know I'm covering old ground here, but the reason the speakers in the Spark could do with a tweeter or better upper mid response is they are being sent a speaker simulated guitar tone, not one a guitar amp would send to a speaker. It has had treble removed.