Kenwood 409 Center Question (1 Viewer)

[Scott Bourden]

Hi,

I was over at my fathers today, where he has a Kenwood 409 (last years version of the 509, without DPL2 basically)

ANyway, he's had it about a year, but when I check it, I realize the entire time he's owned it, his center has NEVER worked, he just didn't know better (he got it as a casual thing, not as a enthuiest) and it seems the guy who sold it and set it up said the center isen't always making sounds, only on special parts does it kick in, much like surrounds not always having sound coming to them.... Which is stupid, because there are no voices or the like... And, even though all his connections are perfect (I unhooked and redid everything myself) the reciever always displays the center as "downmixed" to the fronts...

The front three speakers are "A" and the rears are considered "B" via their hookup to the back. When A+B are on, the center is downmixed, and the rears work fine. When only B is selected, the rears work, but not the front three (obviously, they are set B). But when A only is picked, both fronts AND the center work perfect.... Turn back on B, and bang, the "downmixed" lights up and the center channel is sent to the mains once again. I checked the setting, and reread the manuel about 50 times, but it doesn't even list the downmix "feature" let alone how to disable it.

In the setup menu, the center is set as normal (though I set it to large to try, still nothing) and he has no sub. The distance's and levels are all balanced, but I adjusted all to their extreme's to see if anything would change, though still nothing, the DVD player is a JVC XV-45 and it's hooked to the reciever via optic cable.

Can anybody explain what exactly is going on with this, he has had his 5.0 setup for almost a year, but hasen't had anything but 4 speakers work for the entire time, not realizing how much is supposed to actually come from the center, so he didn't suspect anything was wrong.

Any help is much appriciated.

 

[Tim Hoover]

Why do you have the rear speakers connected to the B terminals? This is, in effect, giving you two sets of front speakers - as the rears in this fashion would reproduce exactly the same material as the front speakers. Now, for the rest, I'm working from a VR-407, so I hope they match up well enough.
On the back of the receiver, the surround speaker outputs are just below the B speaker terminals. There are two "blocks" of speaker terminals. The block on the right contains the B speaker terminals on the top strip and the surround speaker terminals on the bottom strip. Make sure the surround speakers are hooked up to the bottom strip.
The downmix light comes on when the number of source channels exceed the number of playback channels, i.e. if you tried to play 5.1 material in stereo, the receiver would downmix it into the main L/R speakers. This sounds like what is happening. The receiver cannot send 5.1 material to the A speakers AND a stereo signal to the B speakers. When B are activated, the receiver must downmix for both speaker sets. Just remember that the B terminals are for a second set of mains, and make sure that the surround speakers are actually hooked up to the surround outputs

 

[Mark Gurney]

Tim,

As Scott says, the rear speakers should not be plugged into the B terminals. My neighbor just recently bought the Kenwood HTB-509 and he did the same thing. The way that A and B speaker terminal are setup on these receivers are a little confusing. Once everything is plugged into A, everything should work fine.

Mark

 

[Albert M]

The VR-409 is the same as the VR-407, the 409 has SRS Circle Surround included.

 

[Tim Hoover]

Mark, I think you got us confused
Albert, thanks for the confirmation. I was 90% sure that the physical layout of both receivers was the same, but I wanted to make sure.
The more that I think about it, I'm willing to bet big $$ that that's the problem. Scott, let us know if that fixes it.

 

[Scott Bourden]

Hmm, weird, I didn't even notice that there was a seperate block... Maybe I'm just stupid :b

None the less, I'll have to run over and take a look for him again in the next couple days, thanks for the help, much appriciated.

 

[Mark Gurney]

Is it just me, or is there a big mix up here on who said what? In my message, I meant to address Scott, acknowledging Tim's solution worked for my neighbor as well.

I think Tim meant to say that Albert comment was a little confusing. Does this clear things up? At any rate, I hope this fixes your fathers problem Scott!

Mark

 

[Tim Hoover]

Don't sweat it Scott, the Kenwoods have some strange little UI problems. I could tell you many stories of me cursing the thing because of some little mix-up (usually my fault, but not helped by poor design) that the Kenwoods seem to engender by seemingly random placement of inputs and outputs.

Mark, perhaps I should have said that you got Scott and myself "reversed" in your post. That is how I meant confused - not as in, well, confused... Albert just provided confirmation that the 407 and 409 were physically alike, since I was working off a 407 and Scott had the 409.

All in all I guess this is fitting, a confusing thread for a confusing receiver!