Make my HT better please!

Re: Make my HT better please!

I'm thinking you need to step WAY up the receiver or separates food chain.. Your speakers and sub deserve much better than a Sony receiver.

Re: Make my HT better please!

It's an "ES" series Sony, so it should be pretty decent.
What part of current system are you unhappiest with?

Re: Make my HT better please!

I agree with Brett, I think the biggest change would be the upgrade on the receiver. Which one, well that's a different story, for me HK or Denon would do it.

Re: Make my HT better please!

I don't suppose you'd want to switch to a front projector and larger screen? That's my only suggestion.

Re: Make my HT better please!

Martin,

Just wanted to welcome you aboard here and hope you make
this forum your new home. Glad to see the veterans helping you out.

Re: Make my HT better please!

I don't believe that Sony can push enough smoke to drive the BP2004TL's. Even though the sub section is self powered, you are still trying to push five drivers per cabinet off of 120 watts a channel, and that's a manufacturer spec with 1 channel driven, with both channels driven for music it's probably more like 90 a channel and probably dips into the 70's with all channels driven.

I personally believe that Dafy Tech makes great speakers and I think they need more oooomf to sing. You may also be experiencing cancellation issues with three subs going, and since the mains are Bi Polar, they are most likely very picky on positioning.

How do you have them positioned?

Re: Make my HT better please!

Werty,

I do not personally feel that 100 watts per channel is enough (even if it was a true 100 watts RMS all channels driven). That many drivers need more power, and I am a firm believer in that you can never have too much clean power. Too much power and you just won't be turning up the volume as much. Too little power and you clip the solid state amp, producing a square wave, which is not only very fatiguing to the human ear, but also very damaging to tweeters and midbass drivers.

I wouldn't go with anything less than 200 watts per channel, all channels driven (250 or 300 watts a channel wouldn't hurt!).

I also think you may have some positioning issues. If you have the integrated subs facing one another and you do not have one switched to reverse phase, you are essentially canceling the subs out that are in the towers.

I have my integrated subs facing away from each other for that reason.

The other thing is, your towers are very similar to mine (minus the Bi-Polar and internal amps) I have a D'Appolito M-T-M derangement with side firing reflex 10's. These drivers will only reach down into the 30's and quickly roll off from there. I think you need to find out where your mains start to drop off and then you need to set your Dynamo to fill in that lower octave.

Either that, or don't use the 10's in the Mains, see where the crossover takes place from the mids to the 10's and then set the Dynamo to that point.

Sound is subjective, the best amp in the world may not "sound good" if the source feeding it is not clean. In other words you may be better off just finding a "good" high power amp, rather than a "great" high power amp, because you are going to feed it off that Sony.

Thoughts?

Re: Make my HT better please!

Brett: From looking around on the net those Def Tech towers use two 5.25" midbass drivers and two tweeters. I am not sure how loud Martin likes to listen to his movies, but even "just" 70 watts for those 4 drivers should be enough to produce Beavis & Butthead levels.

I do agree having too much power is preferable to not enough, but as someone who grew with power meters on all his receivers, I know that - using large unpowered floorstanders with 12" woofers & @89dB SPL numbers - only around 10 to 25 watts was required in "typical" living rooms to produce sound levels that require one to raise their voice to near-shout levels to carry on a conversation. As volume increases power needs rise exponentially but still, at 60 watts NO conversation was possible! Again those were unpowered speakers I used.

Plus, most soundtracks don't have the same amount of action going on in every channel at the same time. And the rears hardly have anything bass-heavy occurring. So a receiver generating its rated stereo power output could actually be possible when watching a 5.1 movie (surround music though is a different story!).

Umm, if one subwoofer's phase is reversed, both subs' output will definitely be canceled out.

There's a chance, just a chance, that where his towers are located now could be a good place for low bass reproduction without a separate subwoofer. The DT towers' built-in subs are quite potent - and we're talking about 2 of them in the same room - and any drop in volume because of their placement might easily be overcome by simply turning their amps' volume knob.

As far as phase cancellation between the separate sub and the towers' subs, that would only occur if they are reproducing the same bass signal.......and AFAIK no soundtrack mixing engineer is going to place identical bass signals in the front channels AND the soundtrack's LFE channel (there is no need to - the LFE channel partly exists for that reason). ---> This is assuming the front channels are set to "Large" in the receiver's bass management system. If not, there could be some phase issues in the tower/sub crossover region.

For music from stereo sources, there's a situation where operating multiple subs all reproducing the same bass signal - fronts set to "Large" & subwoofer "On" - could result in some messy low frequencies if the receiver's distance settings and the speakers' room locations are not chosen carefully. This is not impossible to accomplish, because I've done it myself in my "mancave" where no WAF is required, but not everyone has that capability.

Re: Make my HT better please!

Lance,




We agree too much power is not a "bad" thing. These Def's need 300 watts per channel, RMS, all channels driven, to sing. That is heavy amp territory!

Sure, if the OP never listens to them at reference levels, they may play ok, but they are never going to be dynamic with such low power. For the mids to have the impact that they should, they need power to move air!

As for the sub section, I was under the impression that if you had two speakers (of any frequency range) sitting parallel from each other, each producing the same exact signal and both in the same phase, that they are going to cancel each other out where the signals meet each other in the air.

Reversing phase of one, makes it push and pull with the other driver so that the signals will sum, rather than cancel. Am I completely wrong on this? (serious question, I am here to learn).

Werty,

How many Midrange drivers are in your Def's ? All the photos show a total of (4) Four 5.25" Midranges (two per front, two per back) but Def's info on the web site says (2) Two midrange drivers per cabinet. I can't find any "large" cutaway images for the 2400's I thought that each did have four mids.

Re: Make my HT better please!

Wow, three hundred watts? Er, even if the DT used four 5.25" midbass drivers that's still a lot of power IMO, e-x-p-e-n-s-i-v-e power. And reference level is really loud, even for me so unless Martin listens at that level regularly (and is able to i.e. he doesn't live in an apartment) I would think a solid 100 watts - for two 5.25" midbass drivers - should be sufficient, and a Sony ES receiver costing $1,000 should be able to provide that. AFAIK their ES line is built much more heavily than the stuff BB and CC sell.

You have it right, but the terminology you're using is backwards.

To sum the bass, the two drivers need to be IN phase. Out of phase means one driver is moving outwards while the other driver is moving inwards & when that happens it's like adding +1 and -1........which adds up to zero.

Since a musical signal is an AC signal, as long as two drivers or speakers are wired the same they will be in phase. In other words, if the speaker wire is reversed on one speaker i.e. positive lead going to the negative connector post/negative lead going to the positive post, as long as the other speaker is *also* wired that way the two speakers will be in-phase (and proper stereo imaging, the other very audible casualty of out-of-phase speakers, will result). Disclaimer: I've personally never seen a speaker or amplifier damaged by wiring the speakers as described above, so if someone tries doing that and the speaker and/or amp DOES get damaged, don't blame me!

The easiest way to demonstrate the out-of-phase effect is to place two speakers about 6" from each other, each facing the other. Play some bass-heavy music with ONE speaker's connections reversed, and the bass should disappear. If it doesn't disappear, then somewhere one of the speaker's leads have been reversed all along. I've seen this a lot in A/V retailers' speaker demo rooms. Most obvious example was a pair of large DCM speakers equipped with 12" woofers. Sales guy said their bass output sucked, surprising since those DCMs were built much like a Cerwin-Vega. We looked and the wires were connected correctly.....on the speaker end anyway. So I theorized the wires of one speaker at the receiver end were reversed & he reversed the leads on one speaker and when we hit "play" ta da!! it was the disco era all over again!

Re: Make my HT better please!

Lance,

I thought I was partially correct. I am still confused though, I thought if you had to identical speakers, wired phase correct and placed them equidistant towards each other, they would cancel rather than sum? I have tried this before and noticed the lack of sound when they cancel but I may have reversed the phase of one speaker to achieve cancellation (it's been a while since I did that)

So you think his receiver is outputting enough power to drive those speakers? I still think he needs more power, I know it doesn't come cheap but I don't think these are efficient speakers, certainly not like running a pair of horns.

I guess if he doesn't listen to the music at higher volumes it will be sufficient. And if that's the case then I have no clue what he can do to improve the sound other than room treatments, positioning or new speakers or a new source.

Re: Make my HT better please!

Werty,

Amazing how different rooms respond so differently isn't it? My subs do not work inward facing. I am glad that having yours turned in seems to be the best setup in your room. It's always worth experimenting, that's about the only free thing we can do!

Another thing, do you have your mains toed in and tilted up at all? I run my mains at about 30 degrees toed in, and about a 2 degree tilt, higher in the front. That all depends on the height of the tower and ear level at seating position, but since it's free, something else to experiment with.

Right now in my setup (and the high frequency side of my towers are somewhat efficient) I am running the mains off an Onk 806 in Bi Amp mode. The high side is a pair of pure magnesium 5.25" mids and a 1" Ti dome per cabinet. I am sending one channel to the high side and one channel to the low side. In a perfect world that would be 130Watts + 130 Watts, but due to the passive internal networks, it's more than likely that they are not getting anywhere near that much.

I still think my mains could use MORE power... I've seen 5.25's do amazing things when fed lots of good clean power.

Speaking of car audio...

In my last boat, I was running a Kicker 700.5 off a Pioneer Premier CD8900 head unit and feeding four Polk Audio Momo 6.5 coax's and those things sung like you can't imagine.. They were fed lots of clean power and even in the open air environment of a boat, even with a big block roaring behind you, they still put out enough to drown out an unmuffled big block

I subscribe to the theory that all components have to be good. If a source isn't up to snuff, there's no sense using high end amps and speakers. And the same goes for using a great pre/pro, amps and cheap speakers.

Balance is a good thing!

Also, is it possible that the Def Tech's just aren't accurate enough for you? I love those DT Towers, but Bi Polar mains aren't known to be point source accurate. They are, airy and open because of the diffuse nature of the design.

That may not be pleasing to you?

I personally love airy and point source accurate speakers, just depends on the day of the week

I'm going to refrain from making any power recommendations because I'd have you buying a set of Parasound Halo JC1 Monoblocks

Re: Make my HT better please!

I think what you may be thinking of is the situation when two speakers are in a room together and that their output cancels out in certain locations in the room. That happens when their soundwaves move through the room, reflect off of the walls/ceiling/floor and as a result their phase - relative to each other - changes so when they meet they partially or completely cancel each other (depending on how out of phase they are). Let's put it this way: if someone asked me how much power a small unpowered speaker - a speaker comprised of just two 5.25" woofers and a couple of tweeters (say one of these faced to the rear, a not-uncommon design feature), I would have no problem recommending a one thousand dollar receiver, which I am quite sure would power a pair of these to very high levels.

There is of course the chance that the Sony just doesn't have the type of sound Martin likes. I am one of those wacky people that beleive different receivers can also sound different - preamps and power amplifiers can be easily "tuned" to produce different sonic signatures. This is not some dark secret or anything & can be found in any comprehensive amplifier design book. And heck some amps sound audibly different simply because they cannot handle a certain speaker's impedance and other similar issues!

And you're right about the DT's special sound radiating capabilities. Like electrostatic and dynamic planar speakers (Magneplanars & 1970s and 1980s Infinitys), DTs "spray" their sound (pretty much) all around the room so they sound softer in a manner of speaking than conventional speakers, even if the volume level is the same. The exact opposite would say be a pair of Klipschs, especially from their Heritage series: a pair of Cornwall IIIs would be like a Corvette and the Definitives, an Audi sedan with a V8. Both very competant designs but very different in their goals.

Re: Make my HT better please!

Martin: Very few mid-fi companies like Pioneer or Yamaha sell power amps anymore so this is one of the amps I would recommend to try:

B&K Reference 125 (@$600, built in Buffalo New York!)

This amp may seem to produce little more power than your Sony, but power amps like this usually have much sturdier power supplies and much more heavily-built amplifier sections, so this amp's 125 watts has much more "grunt" behind it than the Sony's. Car analogy again! A hi-rpm 2.0 liter four cylinder and a 5.0 liter Chevy V-8 may both be generating 200HP, but the Chevy will have much more torque on hand. So when the A/C is turned on and all your friends pile in, the V-8 will barely notice vs. the 2.0 liter engine which will be huffing and puffing trying to deal with the extra load.

Re: Make my HT better please!

Werty,

Your comparison of car audio to home audio tells me you need more power....

With a solid system in a car it's easy to hit 110-120Db and to do the same in a home environment requires tons of good clean power and drivers that can capitalize on the power.

You sound a lot like me.. Don't get me wrong, I listen to music quietly too, for example right now it's not more than 75Db and that's the norm for me.. But when I crank it up, I really like to crank it up.. I love my mains, and they are pretty dynamic.. But when my Line Array's are done... nothing is going to compare

I don't want to thread jack to talk about my DIY speakers, but if you are curious, feel free to private message me

Re: Make my HT better please!

Let me offer a bit of a different view here.

First, Lance is on the right track regarding power. Don't let cabinet size or number of drivers confuse the reality of physics. DefTech rates the 2004TL at 92dB. Assuming they're following industry norms, that means 92dB from 1 watt at 1m. Double the power gets you +3dB, so you only need 8 watts to get to 101dB...from one speaker!! Sound does drop off with distance, hence the need for a bit more than 20ish watts to hit reference level in the real world. But, you should get the picture by now. More drivers might give you more power handling, but it doesn't have to create a "need" for more power.

Sound & Vision did a bench test on the 5200ES. While it's not great in the all channels driven test, that's not a condition that has happened with real world soundtracks, yet.

I would suggest trying a different configuration before adding a separate amp. You have all of the ingredients for a fine sounding system.

I can't find a manual or any real details on the 2004TLs, but I gather they have at least a line level LFE in for the subwoofer section and possibly a full range line level in as well...not exactly sure what the difference would be. I would get a splitter and run line level from the 5200ES's sub out to the 2004TLs (experiment with LFE and full range input for best sound) and Dynamo. Then configure all mains for small with an 80Hz crossover. This will take the bass load off of the Sony's amps...even though the 2004TLs have built in subwoofer amps, by running all channels as "large", the Sony's still trying to provide power into the subwoofer frequencies. When you run only speaker level to the 2004s, the 2004's crossover simply uses high resistance to bring the bass frequency signal back down to line level voltage before feeding it into the sub amp...just like the hi-lo converters from your car audio days. You'll get a cleaner signal by sending line level to the sub amps from the start.

DefTech has also been shown to be rather optimistic with their frequency specs when independently measured...BP6's with 6.5" woofers will not produce useful output in the mid 20's as claimed...it's that physics thing again. Regardless of their tower cabinets, those are "small" speakers in any system with a decent subwoofer. Sound&Vision still has some bench tests for the BP7002. On paper, it should be even more capable than the 2004TL. Unfortunately, in a max output test, Nousaine measured only 83dB at 32Hz when held to a 10% distortion limit. I'm sure it will play louder, but distortion will sky rocket.

You don't mention how you set your system up. That's the first place to start. Get an SPL meter from Radio Shack so you can properly calibrate all channels. This will also allow you to find out how loud you're really listening. I personally find 100ish dB peaks to be plenty loud; for movie playback that's about -15dB below Reference. If you check the OSHA charts, they recommend 100dB exposure be limited to less than 2 hours per day. Protect your hearing, once you lose it, it doesn't come back.

Once you get an SPL meter, you can also download Room EQ Wizard from HomeTheaterShack and take some room measurements. This would allow you to find out if you're getting any bass cancellation from running three subs. I will also allow you to find out if you're sitting in a null, among other useful tidbits.

BiPoloar speakers should inherently sound "big". You might also try expremimenting with different distances to the rear wall and angle. If the rear wave can't get out into the room, you've defeated the purpose and voicing that DefTech gave them.

-Brent

Re: Make my HT better please!

Great post!

Here is a question though, "How" precisely is efficiency rated on any speaker? Do you build out the speaker, put it in an anechoic chamber and feed it a 2000Hz sine wave and say, ok it produced 92DB with 1 watt and 1 meter. Does that tell the whole story? Or do you test a speaker from it's lower FR limit to it's upper FR limit, using sine wave tones at each notch, and then average it out?

I am asking because it will require more power to produce the mid bass and low frequency tones than it will to produce higher frequency tones, right?

So if something is rated at 92Db 1W 1M does that mean it's going to sound "Dynamic" on 20 watts of power?

Thanks in advance,

Re: Make my HT better please!

Ideally, it's just as you said. Place the speaker in an anechoic chamber or outdoors and run a frequency sweep with a 1 watt input. Then average the SPL over the published +/- 3dB bandwidth of the speaker.

Some manufacturers are more forthcoming than others with how the measurement was arrived at. Either PSB or Paradigm actually publishes both in room and anechoic sensitivty ratings. Of course, that opens up the question of what does "in room" mean; distance to boundaries, etc. DefTech (sorry Martin, I actually do like the BP models I've heard) doesn't specify tolerances or how measurements are achieved and objective measurements have proven some of their claims to be rather out there. Like those 7002s that claim a 15Hz cutoff (no tolerance, but industry standard is +/- 3dB) when Nousaine put their f3 at 35Hz and sensitivity at 89dB (92dB claimed).

Bass doesn't require more power just because it's bass. A 15" woofer with an 89dB sensitivity will measure 89dB from 1 watt at 30Hz, just like an 89dB tweeter fed 1 watt at 5000Hz. The "power demand" of the bass region comes from the way we hear (Fletcher-Munson curve) and the spectral distribution of sound frequencies.

We're less sensitive to bass frequencies so they have to be recorded and played back louder to be perceived at the same level as midrange content...the lower you go, the more boost is needed. If you listen to a 1Khz tone at 60dB, a 30hz tone would need to be played at 80dB to be perceived as the same volume. That 20dB would require nearly 128x the power assuming the drivers had equal sensitivity.

Similarly, typical sound content has more information in the lower octaves. I found a link once that tried to break down the percentage of content per octave, but I can't seem to find it again. Memory says that it claimed >60% of music's power demand was below 600Hz, but don't quote me on that. I did find this site where he took a few specific songs and broke their power demands down into <300Hz, 300-3KHz, and >3KHz. For The Talking Heads and Dianna Krall, the <300Hz content used over 60% of the average power! For the selected orchestral piece, the balance shifted to to the 300-3Khz midrange. Obviously this will vary some based on the indvidual song, but TTH and DK are probably pretty typical of most modern "pop" music. I would expect an action movie soundtack to be even more heavily biased toward the bottom octaves...think dialog and explosions.

Dynamics are really just the variations in the recording level. The dynamic ability of a system will depend on the desired average SPL level coupled with the range of the source and the capability of the amps and speakers. Tube fans seem perfectly happy with single digit wattages on tap. Someone who's not been kind to their ears with car dB racing or spent time around heavy artillery will probably prefer a higher "base" level that will challenge a lot of systems if dynamic source material is used.

However, with the "loudness wars" going on with modern pop music, the typical dynamic range is down to around 3dB, IIRC. IOW, the difference from loudest to softest sound on the recording is only 3dB. Compressed music sources, such as MP3 will also squash the dynamics out of even good recording. When we calibrate for THX/Dolby Reference level, we're attempting to give ourselves at least 20/30dB of dynamic range, depending on whether you use a -20/-30dbFS signal with 0dBFS producing 105dB at the seats. Some movie tracks are following pop music and are "all loud all the time" (Blade and Underworld come to mind). On the other hand, something like the LOTR movies will use all of the dynamic range available so that you have to strain to hear whispered dialog and then the battle scenes will run you out of the room, possibly bottoming a driver or clipping an amp in the process.

-Brent

Re: Make my HT better please!

Brent,

Thanks for the in depth response!

Compressed sources probably are the biggest contributor to why some music on my system sounds extremely dynamic and others do not. Some audio just sounds so darn good, and others, meh... And I suspect it's hard to get everything to sound good on any system even the most high end gear is only going to reproduce the source it's fed, so garbage in is definitely garbage out.

I agree with you about the Def Tech's, especially on the low end, I believe that DT was a bit overzealous with the low frequency spec. From what I recall when Nousaine tested my mains (it's been years since I read the review) my F3 was 38Hz at 89Db. There is no getting around physics, a separate sub that is built right and positioned right is going to outperform these mains.

I still waiver on is it just better to run the mains as small and use the external sub, or run these type of mains as large and use an external sub.

I know that a well mated pair of bookshelfs and sub will sound fantastic and full. I have a whole separate system in my bedroom, while no where near high end, it's very decent and it sounds very good with music. (it's also in a bit smaller of an area too).

Re: Make my HT better please!

Louder != better sound quality.

In stereo mode, the Sony clipped at 142 wpc into 8 ohms.

To play a barely noticeable 3dB louder you'll need a 300 watt amp (technically 284). While we can differentiate 1dB increments under lab settings comparing pure tones, with music in a real world environment, our smallest perceptible increment increases to 3dB.

In surround mode, *if* you listened to a source that was full scale into all channels simultaneously, you would only get 70ish watts to each speaker...a limititation of the power supply, kind of like trying to take two showers in your house at the same time. However, since all channels driven doesn't happen, any given channel probably has 100+ watts availble when needed.

Personally, I think you'd be able to tell if you were driving the 5200 into distortion. If you over drive it, it'll shut down to protect itself. Another example. My living room is probably north of 6,000 ft^3 of acoustic load by the time you take into account the two story foyer where one wall should be. My living room receiver is a lowly Pioneer 516 ($100 Black Friday Special). I've measured peak SPL readings of 105dB at the seats, 14' from the L/R mains. The maximum rate power draw of that Pioneer is only 360 watts. Assuming 70% efficiency for class A/B, there's only about 240 watts left available from the amp section...so 5 channels driven would be about 50 watts a channel at most.

Worst case with no room. A single 92dB/1w/1m speaker driven by 200 watts would produce...
92@1/95@2/98@4/101@8/104@16/107@32/110@64/113@128/116@256.
So call one speaker 115dB @ 1m with 200 watts. Each doubling of speaker cone area with the same signal & power will increase SPL by 6dB so 7 would be capable of just over 127dB. Can you hear me now?

Auto setup routines are getting better, but they're not infallible. An SPL meter with the internal test tones or even the THX Optimizer routine on a DVD will allow you to make sure all speakers are playing back at the same level at the prime listening location. You should also use a tape measure to make sure the auto setup routine got the speaker distances correct...distance sets the appropriate delay from each speaker. Weird room acoustics are more likely to trick an auto setup routine than an SPL meter and your ear.

You'd undoubtedbly think a separate amp sounds better. It's the way we're wired. The real question is, can you tell a difference in a blind test?

You've really got to decide what you think is missing. Is it sound quality, SPL, or both. You can't judge sound quality using a compressd music source like Rhapsody, IMO. You would be doing yourself a favor by investing in a SPL meter for both system calibration and determing how loud you're currently listening. People are different, but most will agree that 100dB is plenty loud...you have to shout to talk over it.

I still don't understand how you're configured. Are you daisy chaining the low level connections from the 5200ES to the Dynamo than then to the 2004s? Which crossover is handling the bass management in that case...the 5200 or the Dynamo?

I really think you should try running the LFE direct from the 5200 to each LFE input, not daisy chain. Set the Dynamo to bypass its internal crossover if you can, otherwise turn it all the way up. Then set all speakers to small in the Sony and crossover to 80-100Hz.

-Brent

Re: Make my HT better please!

Didn't address your M-L question earlier.

Human nature being what is is, we'll always pick louder as better unless it's grossly distorted. Bottom line physics of SPL is doubling the power only gets you +3dB, half the power loses -3dB. An M-L is just as bound by that as any other type of speaker. However, M-Ls are generally less efficient and more difficult to drive than a conventional speaker...both conditions requiring a higher power rated amp to achieve similar results.

Just randomly checking a couple of their models, they're spec'd to drop as low as 1 ohm at some frequencies. Lower impedance draws more wattage, which requires a healthier amp to keep up. Most receivers will quickly go into protection mode if asked for any decent volume with an impedance load like that.

M-L also "cheats" a bit. They rate their efficiency at 2.83 volts, not 1 watt. 2.83 volts into 8 ohms = 1 watt. 2.83 volts into 4 ohms is 2 watts. For example, the Vantage is rated at 92dB/2.83v and a 4 ohm nominal load...that would really be 89dB if converted to watts. The more they stretch or round the nominal rating up to 4 ohms, the lower the 1 watt sensitivty gets while becoming harder for an amp to drive.

-Brent

Re: Make my HT better please!

oops forgot about this thread!

Oh wow, if you like music LOUD, then maybe the Sony receiver can't provide that kind of power. And I'm kind of thinking the DT's aren't really "into" high sound levels i.e. sounds like what you need is either some Klipschs or - don't laugh! - Cerwin-Vega's "Classic" series which are very efficient but are more refined than the traditional Cerwins many of us grew up with. As an example of that difference, these are one of the very rare CVs that use soft-dome tweeters, sourced from Vifa of Denmark & which use a copper shorting ring to lower distortion.

So..........

* IIRC Klipsch sells a bookshelf model in their Reference series with an 8" woofer - if they still make that, IMO that would be a great choice to pair up with the M-L sub. Edit: here it is. Unlike most tiny sats with 3 inch "woofers", IMO its 8" woofer makes blending it with a sub easy and very seamless because it can easily make it down to 80Hz without straining and probably even 50Hz (my own Bostons with an eight inch make it down to 42Hz +/-3dB).

* pair of the Cerwin's Classics equipped with one 10" woofer apiece (that's the smallest floorstander they sell) plus your sub to handle the very lowest bass notes. Like the Klipschs and other high efficiency speakers, Cerwins usually trade off X amount of bass depth for effciency gains.

I don't know the bitrate of the Uverse service but IMO if it is below 128kbps, to me it will start sounding pretty lo-fi. For my ears, when I rip music to my MP3 player for my car, I do it at 192kbps and when played back while the car is in motion it sounds like the CD version for all practical purposes. There is still a little bit of raggedness in the cymbals and other "tinkly" sounds but I have to listen for it. At home, 256kbps on my music system is the minimum to get rid of that high frequency roughness, and 320kbps sounds like the CD to me.

Sounds good to me (heck I forgot some companies sold three channels amps! ).

BTW: be careful when running your receiver with its bass management activated i.e. when running any speaker(s) as "small". Because if the receiver's crossover is set at 80Hz and the Definitive's internal crossover (for the midbass to subwoofer system) is set at say 50Hz - whether the speaker level input or the line level input is used - then the bass between 80Hz and 50Hz will be missing. ----> The DTs' manual must say something about this issue.

Also, I am 99% sure I read on DT's site a couple months ago their preferred way to connect an A/V receiver to their powered towers was by using speaker level input *only* and the speakers set to "large" (remember, it is the LFE or .1 channel that contains the reaaaaally low stuff - in my experience the fronts and center just contain more upper-bass oriented frequencies). And of course the subwoofer choice set to "no" to make sure the LFE channel's signal is mixed with the front main channels' signal. I know what Brent means about those hi-level gizmos sold for car audio (usually used for adding power amps to head units with no preouts), but I am sure DT uses high quality versions, if that is what they use at all because I really don't know. And by doing this you'll avoid the hair pulling issue of having the receiver plus the DT's sub level controls to mess with while trying to calibrate your system.*

I am starting to think you really just might not be a good candicate for bipolar speakers i.e. their sound is too "nebulous". Plus for me anyway, using them for HT is not all that great because their sound is SO spread out it can interfere with location cues i.e. your eyes see one thing, but the speakers make it seem the action is occurring somewhere else.



* BTW if you want to get really precise while calibrating, I believe many receivers now include a level control specifically for the LFE channel. Let me repeat that: the LFE channel, not the subwoofer channel. These are not the same things.

That's because the "subwoofer" level control on most receivers I know of affects the level of the added-together bass redirected from all the satellites when set to "small" and the LFE channel all at one time. On the other hand, the level control for the LFE channel affects only the LFE signal level - the .1 channel - from a dvd, cable box or other similar source. This is handy for systems where no sub is used (sub choice set to "no") and UNpowered front mains handle that redirected LFE bass and the woofers are being overwhelmed by the powerful LFE-sourced bass that many modern action movies include (I ran my own HT system this way for 4 years and have personal experience with flapping/banging woofers! ). ---> But read your receiver's manual first before you try anything like this because my own receiver has no such control, so I am just throwing out untested ideas here.

Re: Make my HT better please!

I think he needs a set of my 8.5' tall Line arrays and 300 WPC Monoblocks

Re: Make my HT better please!

Forgot to add this last night, er this morning when I wrote the above post.

If anyone wants to hear a high quality MP3 stream check out these two college radio stations, both of which play a huge array of music that few modern commercial stations would ever touch - i.e. music made with imagination and originality - and both offer a 256kbps stream option:

KTRU - Rice University/Houston TX

FYI: on my moldy-oldy Windows ME computer, I have to click on the Real Audio option to hear the 256 stream (I think Real Player is a resource hog), since IIRC the "MP3 hi-fi" option uses Winamp but Winamp no longer offers a player for ME.*

WPRB - Princeton University/Princeton, New Jersey.

Choose Windows Media Player or Realplayer option.

Plus these stations have actual human DJs that usually know something about the music they are playing - amazing! ---> many commercial stations use recorded DJ announcements controlled by a computer.



* before I accidently deleted it last summer, Winamp's "Lite" player was awesome, a player built with just enough code to do the important stuff and that's it. My computer barely knew it was there.