Could someone please explain "bi-wiring" and "bi-amping"? (1 Viewer)

[John ODonnell]

I am looking at purchasing the Diva 6.1 surround package to go with my Denon 4802. Is Bi-Wiring something that I want to take advantage of, or, is my receiver even capable of this? Does it require a second amplifier?

Thanks,

John

 

[JimN]

Biwiring takes two speaker wires from a single channel of amplification and runs one set to the tweeter connector and the second set to the woofer. Personally I have had very mixed results with biwiring. It seems to be very dependent on both the speakers and the amp. I have heard very few biwired systems that were worth the extra cost of speaker wire. Currently I run a set of Wharfedale 7.2 anniversary model biwired to a pair of ASL wave tube monoblocks in my den. The biwired configuration sounds marginally better to me than single wire runs.

Biamping is very different. You need two channels of amplification and an active crossover for every speaker you wish to biamp. The tweeter and woofer each get a seperate channel of amplification and only the frequencies each transducer needs to reproduce are amplified. This allows one to use different amps for bass versus treble although timber matching can become problematical if the amps are very different. I have heard some very nice bi-amped systems, but none of them were budget systems. Most of the "budget" biamped system I have heard did not sound that great to me but YMMV. Hope this helps.

 

[John ODonnell]

Thanks for the reply Jim. Am I correct in assuming that if a speaker has bi-wiring terminals that they not necessarily be used (as is the case with the Diva 6.1)? In otherwords, the woofer will still be driven with a single wire connection.

Thanks,

John

 

[JimN]

All biwireable speakers I have seen have a jumper between the sets of binding posts so that a single wire hook-up can be used. In some cases you can improve the sound just by upgrading the jumper if it is a cheap one. The jumpers on your Diva's are probably going to be good quality so you should be able to hook them up and enjoy.

 

[Vince Maskeeper]

http://www.hometheaterforum.com/htfo...threadid=44982
-V

 

[John ODonnell]

Thanks for the extra info! I agree that I do not see a need to bi-wire (bi-amping would be a different story).

Thanks again,

John

 

[Ted Lee]

here's another pretty good article on the subject:
http://www.soundstage.com/synergize/synergize031998.htm