In their gloss white incarnation the Adams are smart little boxes. A slight bevel on the front and side edges makes them look neat and may mean they’re less likely to get damaged in the rough and tumble of an office desk. The grilles attach magnetically, which is tidy, though the volume control, 3.5mm input and power switch make the front look quite “busy”. The gloss finish isn’t entirely smooth, so the boxes are a bit less reflective than high gloss would be, which IMO is no bad thing for a desktop.
I have them running via USB from my Windows PC playing ALAC files and using their internal DAC. The L and R are identical, and either can act as master. The speakers connected to one another by a single RCA. There are two “stereolink” sockets on rear for this purpose, input and output, and you connect the output of the master, but oddly not to the “stereolink” input of slave, rather to its standard RCA input. I had to put in a call to dealer to sort this out, as the speakers didn’t come with instructions and the links to the instruction manual on the Adam website seem to be dead.
The SQ is very impressive for the price (£549 new for a pair; the ones I have are £450 ex-dem). In what follows I’m going to be a bit critical, but I do really think these are excellent at their price point and small format.
It’s a cohesive and dynamic sound with tight and controlled bass, although to me the bass doesn’t seem very tuneful. In fact they’re slightly bass heavy, in a rather German way. I grant this may be because of where I’ve sat them on the bookshelf which could give rise to a bit of boom from their rear slot port. (My SFs also have a slot port, but it’s at the front of the box, and they don’t boom at all). I’ll try them in free space on a desk later. It’ll also be interesting to hear them close up: at the moment they’re 6ft away.
They certainly resolve lots of detail and give a clear window on the structure of the music, and they retain this insightfulness even at low volumes. I tried them briefly at high volume and they’re very impressive.
The treble is nicely controlled and generally transparent, just a little bit grainy, so that e.g. hi-hats can seem a tad woolly. In fact there’s a slight roughness right across the freq range, most noticeably with vocals and acoustic instruments (esp. piano) around the 1KHz to 4KHz range. This causes a bit of muddiness with vocals; that’s one of the main differences from the SFs which are clearer and more airy.
In fact the SFs are, as you’d expect given the price difference, more transparent and purer in all departments, without the slightest roughness. They’re on the end of much more expensive electronics though. I wouldn’t say the Adams have a colder or drier sound; just not as clear.
But they do seem remarkable value and quality for £550 new, considering the package includes amps and DAC. A more appropriate comparison would be Q Acoustics Concept 20. I’d also be interested to compare them with the Neat Iotas I have downstairs: I reckon the Iotas’ treble is cleaner, but they’re £700 a pair.
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