After more than 20 years in Ibiza, David Guetta's personal studio on the island has recently been upgraded with a pair of 7380A subwoofers, which have joined his existing 1234A three-way main monitors to create a smart monitoring system that Guetta describes as “my perfect setup”.
The new solution came about after Guetta identified a problem with the mixes he was creating on his old setup. “On the previous system I had, the sub-bass was so loud that it wasn't realistic,” he explains. “If I mixed with those subs, sometimes I'd end up with a record that didn't have enough bass when it played on other systems, because the bass in my room was too big.”
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With the 7380A installed, Guetta's mixes now sound just as good in his studio as on the dance floors of Ibiza, and the subwoofers have helped improve the overall sound of the room.
“By installing the subwoofers we were able to reposition David's main monitors to avoid first reflections. By finding the best spot for the subwoofers we also achieved a great frequency response across the entire range from low to high frequencies,” explains Paso Pönkkä of Genelec, who traveled to David Guetta's studio to calibrate the system using Genelec's GLM software.
With GLM, Pönkkä was able to analyze the acoustic environment of Guetta's studio and, based on that analysis, optimize each Genelec monitor and subwoofer, thereby reducing the room's negative influences on listening.
Pönkkä explains that “each 7380A subwoofer is paired with a single 1234A monitor, so that low frequencies can be better localized. Also, the locations were chosen so that the subwoofers summed without canceling each other out. The overall result was that we were able to give David more bass extension, but with a much flatter and smoother response.”
An added benefit Guetta is enjoying is that he can now work for much longer periods without the listening fatigue he used to experience.
“When I produce, I'm not really playing back very loud, and the Genelec 1234As, even though they're so big, still sound accurate even when they're not very loud,” he explains
“What I like about the 7380As is that I can work at a low volume so I don't feel tired after a few hours, and yet it's very accurate. But if I want it to sound really hard, it's powerful enough to feel like in a club.”
Reflecting on his recently upgraded monitoring system, Guetta is sure he made the right decision. “It gives you a feel for how it's going to sound in the club, but it's also realistic,” he says. “This is my reference, and this is my perfect setup.”
