Paducah Home Theater

I've had the iNuke for like 4 maybe 5 days. In that time I've mostly finished an 88 Special build, took out and shipped back an UltiMax, packaged up and shipped back the QSC amp that wasn't working out, as well as the CleanBox, ordered about 10 grand worth of other speakers, and somehow kept my job as well as ran a business plus started another one plus planned a vacation, somehow getting a printer fixed in the meantime. I'll let you know when I crap a big pile of time so I can play with the DSP. Or, just come over and do it for me.

Thanks for the pic. I have dual cab sealed subs and use one I Nuke 6000 DSP channel of the amp per driver. These are great drivers and if you are bottoming out the driver, you are using to much PEQ, bass boost, filter gain, or you don't have enough headroom. Set the limiters If you need some help, send me a PM. This way we will not hijack the thread. The sub looks great! I took the iNuke out of the box and hooked it up. Haven't messed with any EQ other than cranking up the sub outputs on my Marantz receiver due to a failed attempt at using a QSC amp first. It doesn't bottom out until there is super low frequencies on an obnoxiously strong recording. I can do it on the intro to Transformers 4 for example, and not much else. Otherwise they take anything I throw at them, usually there is so much bass compared to everything else that I turn it down due to the mix sounding bad before I max it out. I'll pm you when I find some time to play with it.

Not sure what you mean by "space to fill"... In terms of fitting equipment in there, cars are always easier to get lots of subs in compared to an extended cab truck. There's hardly anywhere to put anything in a truck unless you give up your bed, and what's the point of having a truck if you do that? In terms of filling the interior with sound, strangely, larger vehicles are often louder even with the same equipment. Something about the 1/4 wavelength rule and stuff. We used to put SPL microphones under the dash by the floorboard as far away from the subs as possible, which is where it was the loudest.

Don't want to post the whole setup here right now due to everything being a mess, but here is one of my subs. Had a KL-650 sitting on top at the time. Bad idea. Rattle rattle. Plus it looks dumb. I have two of these powered by an iNuke 6000 which is supposed to be feeding them 2,200 watts rms each, which I believe as the subs have been bested up to 1,400 watts rms, easily handling 1,100, yet I can bottom them out even in a sealed box and can easily trip a breaker if the amp is on the same circuit as my receiver, I have to run two separate circuits. Had them up front at first but was strangely more mushy than I expected. I moved them to the sides and they seem to like living there pretty good. Made these out of 18mm baltic birch, 5 cubic feet after driver displacement and bracing, stuffed with 5 pounds of poly fill. Finish is Behr paint+primer enamel in matte black, which is friggin amazing. The walls are their flat interior paint but it marks up badly if you touch it plus looks chalky. It is super dark when the lights are out though. The matte is darker, doesn't mark up as badly, and hides imperfections better. Probably reflects a little more light but the other positives probably outweigh that. It is also a near perfect match for the DIY matte SEOS horns, the horn just blends right in to the cabinet.

I've seen a single 15 hit 151 decibels in an extended cab Silverado before. Dude cut out the metal behind the cab and the front of the bed, sealed it with a gasket, put a truck bed cover on, then fired the sub towards the tailgate from about 2' away.

What you said makes sense. It just hasn't evolved much from that point in terms of mainstream offerings. I mean, today's hardcore home theaters have evolved way beyond the point of having a lightweight sub with a plate amp in the low 3-digit range. Typically it's either DIY or throw money at JTR or similar, usually DIY. I suppose the marketing people know not many will sell, but it would be nice if there was some better solutions that let people take advantage of what is truly possible with home subs without having to spend tons of hours and money experimenting with DIY stuff. It's kinda fun, or at least it was when I was younger, but I'm to the point that I've got enough responsibilities that I think it would be nice to have a turn-key slamming solution without having to mess with the nuts and bolts as much. I don't have as much time and patience to finish my cabs perfectly for example, and I typically always wish I did something differently when I'm done.

I can and have done DIY but I don't particularly enjoy it anymore, plus if you ever need to sell it you pretty much have to give your projects away. JTR performance offered by a household name though, that would be awesome.

I want one that is a smaller cabinet, with a flat frequency response, while retaining 18" drivers, and can take a ton of power. The JTR is a good example of that. Comparing apples to apples with one driver each yeah the JTR is quite a bit smaller, yet flatter. The JTR is only 1 db down at 22 hz while the Klipsch is down 3 db at 27 hz. The Klipsch can barely get to 18 hz at -10 db and I imagine it's done after that, while the JTR can shake your house down to the single digit realm. The Klipsch can take 600 watts RMS and the JTR pairs it up with a 2,400 watt rms amp, the S2 jumping to 4,000 watts rms. Yes I'd love a Klipsch version of something closer to the JTR Captivator just like my original statement said. Of course they are internet direct so it's a little hard to compare, but the single 18 is $2,399 and that includes a 2,400 watt rms amp.

I just sent back one of my Ultimax 18's just yesterday, voice coil is fried, but, they were like that the minute I took them out of the box. You could press on the cones and it sounded like sandpaper. Hooked it up and it worked but this muffled buzzing sound kept getting worse and worse. I don't think the quality control of these Chinese speakers are what they ought to be. If you put that ultimax in that box I'd plug the port. You can try it but they need at least 8 for ported. I have mine in 5 cubic feet sealed.

It's just massive for home use, thought that's why you sold yours: https://community.klipsch.com/index.php?/topic/150471-behemoth-kpt-884-subwoofer-for-sale/ For a visual: One JTR captivator with a single 18 - 21 x 21 x 16.25 : One kpt-884 with a single 18 - 22.5 x 35.75 x 49.75:

The reason for my previously stated opinion of mine is that one of the best home theaters I've heard didn't cross the subs over until 40 hz. He let his towers run full range and only kicked in the subs as the towers rolled off. He had a set of $22,000 Revel's but the ones playing at the time were slightly smaller, powered by an external Marantz amp. We played Ironman 2 where Whiplash was slashing the cars in half. It was literally scary, I have seen this movie multiple times before, but here I was bug-eyed with my jaw dropped. The dynamics and the way all the sound blended together and the entire frequency spectrum appeared to come from the screen during the bullwhip hits was amazing. The thing is though, it was all from beautiful furniture-grade consumer level speakers. I don't think he would have had quite as nice of an effect if he had choked off his towers at 80 hz.

You're talking about two huge pro audio paper woofers in a massive 156 pound cabinet and likely a low tuning frequency and a 104 db stated efficiency, which is likely accurate and not exaggerated like some others are. Yeah I imagine it does have some slamming midbass. Will you get that same effect by bumping up one or two sizes in the same family of consumer friendly towers while keeping the crossover fairly high? I doubt it. I agree though, bigger is typically always better. I just like to let the fronts go as low as they can handle with music. If there's a big hit from a floor tom, I don't like nearly all that material getting sent to the sub. Getting large towers that would sound great with material like this but choking them off anyway and sending it to the sub is a bit of a waste in my opinion.

Bottom end punch and power handling would obviously be a bit lacking comparatively but if you cross them over high enough that part doesn't matter much. In terms of output of smaller speakers, here's some real world examples: 1. Let's just say that my KL-650's with two 6.5's can EASILY blow you out of my room when crossed over at 80z. It's all the output I can stand with my (uncalibrated) receiver set at -15 db, you can't really talk over it even when there isn't any big dynamic peaks going on, but they easily handle the dynamics. They can easily keep up with my massive dual 18 sub setup. And, the sensitivity of the RF-52ii's is stated to be only 1 db less than these THX's. 2. My living room is over 30x30, over 900 square feet, and I have a pair of Wharfedale 6.5" bookshelves there powered by an old school JVC receiver. That's it. In terms of music playing and not movie dynamics, I can easily fill not just the entire room but pretty much the entire house plus my porches with sound, over 4,000 square feet. I'll go chill on the porch and hear them at a good volume with these things not even breaking a sweat, and that's full range. If I have doors open these two things can literally fill the house to uncomfortable levels of volume that you cannot comfortably talk over even without them being anywhere near being maxed out. The bass is surprisingly good too, most people would probably think there's a 10" sub getting a workout. Nope, just two little 6.5" bookshelves running full range. 3. I recently put on a class reunion but nobody wanted to pay for a DJ. A cheap $300 Sony receiver powering two Wharfedale towers with two 6.5" drivers was way more to fill up a medium sized ball room with 10-12 fairly large tables plus several people, if anything it was severe overkill. So, sheer output by smallish speakers in a smallish room isn't an issue in my opinion. If you want that big and dynamic sound and want to cross over lower you'll have to get bigger towers though. If you have a decent receiver and sub setup, especially if you cross these over at like 80 hz, you'd probably literally be shocked at what they can do. I like that big rock growl coming through the front towers though so while personally I'd go bigger, I can't say that it would matter much if crossing over fairly high, unless watching the Metallica movie of course.

You'd get a little more punch and power handling on low stuff if running full range, plus they look cooler, with the woofers taking up more of the baffle area. If you cross both of them over fairly high I doubt you'd be able to tell much of a difference, but the RF-82ii's ought to growl better in full range mode.

It mainly depends on what you're listening to, how loud you like it, and what your budget is. Figure out these things first and the decision is easier. In my opinion that decision mainly hinges on how low you want to cross it over. If you want to run them full range at volume, that's where larger floor standers shine. However, getting them due to not having to use stands just means you have some really expensive stands. Somewhat of a waste of floor space as well. Bookshelves do well if you can cross over at 80-100 hz and let the sub(s) do the hard work. The thing is, for the same amount of money you can typically get a higher quality bookshelf compared to towers of the same price, but you'll have to rely on a sub more. The only problem in doing this is that some material isn't the greatest when you do that, such as hard rock, but movies are typically perfectly fine, that's even the THX specification, everything less than 80z from all channels gets sent to the sub(s), so the idea in general isn't inferior, some AV installers highly recommend getting higher quality bookshelves if there's a budget. But yeah if you like to crank Metallica up to 11, you're probably going to want to run them full range to get that good growl in the low vocals, bass guitar, kick drums and floor toms, so be looking for some larger floorstanding models. Getting large floorstanding ones yet continuing to cross them over fairly high is kind of a waste though. I'd get the largest sub you can afford, preferably two, due to lower frequency response and less distortion. When you run them hard you want them to sound like they're barely breaking a sweat, not out of breath. My room is only 3' longer on each side and I'm running two 18's that can flex over 2" each, with enough power that I can max them out and throw breakers, and I kind of want more. It's all subjective. I don't "need" that much for the way most people run their equipment, but when something scary happens onscreen I like to have the bejeezus scared out of me, plus I like old school 90's rap. The material that you are a fan of will drive how heavy your bottom end is. Or, to keep it simple, two 12's ought to more than fill your room the way most people use their system, but if you're like me, you can put more to use. Whether or not it is wasted is 100% up to you and your preferences.

I would really like to see a home version of the KPT-684, or even half that size, one that is more focused on low frequency response and not so much on sheer loudness, closer to the JTR Captivator S1 and S2. The hardcore home theaters are using this type of stuff and running powerful pro amps. It would be cool to see Klipsch embrace this in the consumer world. You're already making the KPT-684 so it seems like it wouldn't be that much of a stretch, it is obviously possible. Currently I myself am running an iNuke 6000 to two 18's, would have been nice to have a Klipsch alterative to such a thing. That amp actually works great for this, having a Klipsch cabinet even if it had no internal amp would be awesome. http://www.klipsch.com/kpt-684/details http://jtrspeakers.com/home-audio/captivator-s2/# http://jtrspeakers.com/home-audio/captivator-s1/

I think the CDT-5800-C II's would be great. Part of my reasoning on this particular one is due to what was said at the round-table discussion at CEDIA like a month ago. They basically said that Atmos should be ran full range, and in terms of ceiling speakers, you better get some bigger full range speakers that can handle some power because "they're going to be pushing a lot of air through them". To me that didn't sound like the typical THX setup of 80hz and above would be the goal. As of this moment these coaxial 8's are the largest ceiling speakers with the best bass response that Klipsch is offering.

I've always assumed that the people who say Klipsch is harsh has only heard the lower end stuff with aluminum tweeters.

Most people looking for Atmos is migrating to Marantz and Denon. Onkyo got away from Audessey, and I've yet to hear anybody say that their home brewed version is anything but worse.

The B&W towers I've heard sounded awful with that fiber midrange. Of course it wasn't calibrated, just a straight through direct power off the receiver, but still, it sounded nasally. A set of Martin Logan Motion 40's ran all over them. I did like their smaller bookshelves that didn't have this midrange.

I've never heard of such a thing. Do you have details on this? Surprised it would be useful on RF-7 ii's.

I can't say anything about the architectural line but I have a setup featuring the KL-650's and it sounds great for movies, specifically dialogue. They run all over typical setups such as something with a soft dome tweeter. Other more pro audio setups such as JTR can probably handle dynamics better but quite honestly these handle dynamics as much as I care to handle, I don't exactly want the peaks any louder and that's all you're going to gain, these are already really loud on the peaks. Even if you did get louder you're going to lose out in the frequency response department. Their only shortcoming is that they lack a good low midbass growl for rock music and whatnot. You have to rely on the upper extension of the subwoofers. Which, is fine, especially if you set it up to be flat. Personally I like full range speakers with the subs only kicking in on explosions to an obnoxious level, but that's just me. THX isn't the best for that. That are super flat though, very accurate, speech is amazing. I just don't like bass guitars and male speech coming through the subs, and that is pretty much a given when you go with the THX line. If you do that out of necessity but then crank up the bass higher than it ought to be it can sound boomy and muddy.

Teaser pic only, the good stuff is yet to come... "Abandon all hope, ye who enter here".

In my opinion, bi-amping is a waste of precious channels. YMMV.

It seems that most audiophiles will keep the grills off to minimize any disruption in the paths from the drivers to their ears, but just between me and you, I'd bet good money that they wouldn't be able to tell the difference in a blind taste test. It's mostly a matter of whether you want a bright shiny gold driver showing or a blacked out more refined look. I was kind of surprised when my wife recently just said she didn't know why anybody would pay good money for some badass gold speakers then cover them up.