Klipsch RF-7ii - bright?

[garyrc]

Unless you are playing back lossless (no compression) music files I can understand why they would be bright. The PC's drive is not what I would call a quality playback source by any means. Your sound is only as good as your weakest link. I think your weak link is using your PC as your source. Changing to a receiver won't make a difference you need a better source than a PC for quality audio playback.

Fiskeren:

I agree with the above ... in fact, I agree with virtually everything that people have posted concerning your problem.

First, have confidence that you can improve your sound.

I haven't heard the ii, but Klipsch speakers in general are a little on the bright side, but that would be perfectly O.K. with a good source. My best SACDs, CDs, and movies sound wonderful on my Klipschorns and Belle fronts, and Heresy II surrounds. My worst disks sound like crap. It is not part of the Klipsch philosophy to produce a "veiled" sound to make problem disks sound good. They are ruthlessly revealing.

I have different settings for different disks, with the Rx written on little stickers on the disk boxes. For truly good disks, I generally use Audyssey Flat, which, since it attempts to be (near) flat, is brighter than regular Audyssey. For problem disks, I often turn up the bass control, and, only if absolutely necessary, turn down the treble control to mask any distortion present.

I think the notion that eliminating tone controls on amplifiers, so that you can (supposedly) "hear exactly what is on the disk," misses the point on many counts. The first count is that it is naive to assume that the manufacturers have made a good disk, or, sometimes, have even tried to make a good disk. We have to try to make up for their errors by frequency compensation (and dynamic range compensation, if possible) at home. The second count is that no speaker is flat. Then, we have to listen in rooms, and there is no standard room, although there are bad room designs to avoid, if possible. I could go on.

I'd try absorbers in the first reflection areas of the walls (where, if a mirror is held up against the wall, you can see the reflection of one of your speakers from the listening position), and diffusors -- or diffusing objects, such as books, vases, etc., nearly everywhere else -- adding them a few at a time.

A thick rug on the floor, at least at the floor's first reflection point, might help.

How high is your ceiling?

Since your room length and width are equal there may be a room mode problem, depending on how wide the open end to the kitchen is. If it is narrow, the room may behave like a square room. This would not make the speakers seem bright, but it might get in the way of the possible antidote of turning up the bass. If there is a room peak in the upper bass, that may keep you from using the bass increase that might solve your problem. Something like Audyssey might help tame the peak, if any. A tuned bass trap might attenuate the peak, as well, but locating the peak would require taking room measurements from your listening position with something like Room EQ Wizard.

[Fiskeren]

Room is 3,5*3,5 meter - carpet floor- with a "half" open side wall to the kitchen. I have approx 2,5 meter to the ceiling. So quite a small room for those speaker - i know.

I found the problem to be very noticable with vocals especially words containing the letter S are very sharp at high levels. Tonign down the 2k by 3-5 db helps a little but its still sharp at high volume.

[Heritage_Head]

2k to me would be closer to mid not highs. I would drop 16k (most) 8k a few and even a little 4k. I would drop 2k also but not for this reason.

[garyrc]

Some hardware, including some Audyssey configurations, creat a dip at about 2K, just because of harshness at that point. Audyssey MulriEQXT gives you the option of selecting a roll-off based on cinema experience that is about - 2 dB at 10 K, and something like - 6 dB at 20K, but, honestly, that is not the zone that has provided the most trouble for me. I think that what most people mean by "too bright" is either an elevation from about 4 K to 10 K, or distortion in that zone that is revealed by a good speaker.

As to the "S" sound being piercing, that sibilance could be due to an elevation in upper mid and treble frequency response, or just microphones that are too close to vocalists. Does it happen often in pop, rock, etc., and rarely in other genres? Has it ever happened with a vocalist singing clasical music, opera, etc.? Does it happen only rarely in movies? Some pop recordists have performers practically swallow their microphones. If you put your ear 1 inch from a singer's (or actor's) mouth, you might hear sibilance in live music. I guess I try to avoid turning down the upper mids and highs, because I need the "air," and, with singers, I want good high frequency response to illuminate the fricative consonants.

[derrickdj1]

The simbilat S is coming from the 3.5 kHz to 6 kHz range. Messing with the 16 kHz band is not very useful. The power behind what you don't like in your sound is lower, coming from 1kHz to around 4kHz.

[Heritage_Head]

I disagree 1k is 100% midrange and on the 7s the horn hasn't even crossed over yet (1200). 16k will absolutely tame the ultra high shrill sound. But best thing to do is try different things and see what sounds best to your ears.

http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=audio%20frequency%20band%20chart&source=web&cd=6&ved=0CDwQFjAF&url=http%3A%2F%2Fen.wikipedia.org%2Fwiki%2FAudio_frequency&ei=X77UUcPkDqGzyQHOvoHYDQ&usg=AFQjCNEi9SvqPl8Y85wpf-QGQLh9KheORA&bvm=bv.48705608,d.aWc

If you look at the chart sibilants of speech is in the 10th octave 8192-16384hz.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sibilance

[derrickdj1]

2 kHz is also where Pioneer Elites avr's cut to decrease brightness with the X curve function. The X curve was oririginally developed for theater use where brightness was a problem. 1-4 kHz is the presence range which the human is has better perception of the sound. Upping or lowering this area will have more impact on how the sound is precieved. Due to room influence the OP will just have to play with some of the suggestion to achieve the sound that is right for his taste. The RF 7II XO at 1200 Hz and the RF 7 XO is at 2200 Hz. The OP has RF 7 II speakers.

[garyrc]

2 kHz is also where Pioneer Elites avr's cut to decrease brightness with the X curve function. The X curve was oririginally developed for theater use where brightness was a problem.

2 KHz is a problem area because of:

1) Harshness (frquency peaks) which center on that frequency in many bad recordings

2) The effects of crossovers at about that frequency (according to Audyssey ... somewhere in the huge "Ask Audyssey" file under "midrange compensation," I think)

3) The ear being very sensitive there

4) That frequency zone being what some subjective describers call "telephone-like" (Martin Mayer). That is not a complement. IMO, decreasing the response at that point is worth a try, if harshness is a problem.

The cinema X curve is not appropriate for the small rooms most of us have, but several companies have modified the X curve to adapt it to the home environment. Perhaps that is what Pioneer has done (?). Audyssey did it, producing a target curve that takes into account both the frequency domain and the time domain. As I said before, with great recordings I tend to prefer their alternative, Audyssey Flat. Contrary to the opinion of most writers on the subject, I think cinema sound went down hill a little with the advent of the X curve and Dolby. There was an interim curve which seems to have vanished into some black hole of cinema history. It was used after the horrible old Academy curve, and before the X curve in a small number of theaters (usually those equipped for 70 mm & 6 channel stereo). For 70 mm, the 6 soundtracks were magnetic and moved at 22.5 inches per second. The sound was rich, dynamic and warm, and sounded balanced to me. The 70 mm films that played in the theaters with this house curve were released between 1955 and about 1975. When Star Wars came along I believe most of the theaters in question had converted to the X curve. Star Wars, while just as dynamic as its predecessors, sounded worse to me ("knife in the ear").

It is hard for us to find out exactly what is going on with the X curve, despite some graphic reproductions. Common ideas are that the goal is to make sound from the screen match the sound of a nearby excelent speaker, and to allow the audience to hear what the engineers and filmmakers in the recording/mix down sessions heard. Here are three articles that will further muddle our understanding:

"The X curve is not an EQ curve" https://smpte.org/sites/default/files/files/X-Curve%20Is%20Not%20An%20EQ%20Curve.pdf

"The Mythical X Curve" http://www.hps4000.com/pages/general/the_mythical_x_curve.pdf

"Is the X Curve Damaging our Enjoyment of Cinema?" http://www.aes.org/technical/documentDownloads.cfm?docID=391 [scroll down!]

Due to room influence the OP will just have to play with some of the suggestion to achieve the sound that is right for his taste.

[Y] That's the only way

[Fiskeren]

Im starting to lose faith here. I have got a GREAT deal on those RF7ii. I need confidence that I can make them sound "good-not shrill", or else I have to return them within the return policy. Is it certain that I can tame those high levels with a good receiver?

Jonas

[garyrc]

Im starting to lose faith here. I have got a GREAT deal on those RF7ii. I need confidence that I can make them sound "good-not shrill", or else I have to return them within the return policy. Is it certain that I can tame those high levels with a good receiver?

Jonas

Nothing is certain.

You can probably make good recordings sound good with a good receiver, and some minimal (first reflection) room treatments, particularly if you get a receiver with EQ.

Some bad recordings can be made to sound better by using speakers inferior to your RF-7iis, speakers that veil the sound. But with such speakers, you lose the ability to hear "the real thing" from your good recordings. This conflict is probably as old as the industry. In the 1950's and '60s, people had to choose between revealing speakers (such as JBL's high efficency line, Klipsch, EV, and some Altecs) that might expose shrillness when playing some records, and speakers that veiled the sound (some from Acoustic Research, and others). There were some speakers in-between, such as Bozak. Wharfdale, etc. About 20 years later (1980), the situation was similar. I spent hours listening to a B & W 801F (I think) v.s. Klipschorns. The B&W was more "forgiving," but the music didn't sound as present as with the Khorns. The Khorns sounded more "there." I finally decided on the Khorns, which we have upgraded once (with a kit) since then.

Music off of your computer is iffy, unless you are using a great (external ?) soundcard and one of the (newer) hi tech formats which are either uncompressed or sound like the data is not compressed (FLAC, etc., etc. -- others know far more about this than I). Even the best format provides no guarantee if the engineer is sloppy, or the producer or artist has strange taste. Some of the preceeding goose up the mids and highs, especially if they are listening to veiling speakers. MP3 is a bad joke, not meant to amuse audiophiles, although its problems don't show up as much with the extra spaciality of headphones/earbuds.

Did you get the RF-7iis from a local dealer? Many of these will let you take a receiver home over a weekend to try it out with your speakers. Suggest this. The ideal receiver would have something like Audyssey (half a day to set up) AND tone controls that will operate AT THE SAME TIME.

I don't recall if you are using a sub ... turning up a sub a bit can -- sometimes -- have the psychological effect of mellowing out mids & highs. Part of this may be that you don't turn the volume up quite as high if you have a strong bass line to begin with, i.e., bass as strong or stronger than ever, but mids/highs proportionally softer. If the sub comes in at the THX recommended 80 Hz, it will fail to turn up all of the impact of timpani, bass/kick drum, tom-tom, etc. That's when a bass control to turn up the bass being fed to your very capable RF-7-iis comes in handy.

I'd be careful not to go downhill from your HK 990, power wise. Even though the RF-7 series is very efficient, other posters have recommended (with the old RF-7) a receiver with at least a true 150 watts per channel (or more), RMS, 20 to 20K, with all channels operating at once. To get good EQ, you might have to go to an AV receiver. Most AV receiver manufacturers are a bit deceptive about this, by measuring the receiver without all channels operating (and thus taxing the power supply), but they can't outright lie, I don't think, so look at the fine print.