Mr._bowtie Posted August 3, 2014 Share Posted August 3, 2014 I have a set of ksp400's. I tried hooking the woofers up on a line level input today and running the just the miss and highs with my carver. Sounded terrible. Weak, soft, unresponsive bass. So I hooked em back up on a speaker level input. Running all three inputs, highs, mids, and lows off my carver. Sounds great. So here's the question, when I hook my ksp's up on a powered speaker level input does it bypass the klipsch amp and run soley off my power? How does that work? Because they're seriously unimpressive with a line level input running the lows. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
T2K Posted August 3, 2014 Share Posted August 3, 2014 (edited) Do you have an owners manual? Keith http://images.klipsch.com/KSP400C6S6Manual_635042115637990000.pdf Edited August 3, 2014 by T2K Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
T2K Posted August 3, 2014 Share Posted August 3, 2014 Are you sure that the built-in amps are working? Keith Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mr._bowtie Posted August 3, 2014 Author Share Posted August 3, 2014 I have the manual and it never really says clearly what happens when you hook in with a speaker level input. I "think" the amps are working because the woofers were working and producing sound just doing it poorly. I don't know the amp specs or how they're supposed to perform. After what I tried it comes across as the klipsch amps just aren't that good. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
T2K Posted August 3, 2014 Share Posted August 3, 2014 (edited) I have the manual and it never really says clearly what happens when you hook in with a speaker level input. I "think" the amps are working because the woofers were working and producing sound just doing it poorly. I don't know the amp specs or how they're supposed to perform. After what I tried it comes across as the klipsch amps just aren't that good. The speakers have an auto-on feature. The switch has positions on/auto-on/off. After you have them wired up flip the switch to auto then turn on your receiver/amp/whatever. When you start a CD or DVD the amps should switch on and the red LED should turn green, indicating on. Set the volume control on the speaker plate to the suggested setting shown in the manual. You should be able to feel with your hand at sub grill the 15" subs moving air. The subs put out hellacious bass. If you're not hearing it you either have not wired correctly/volume adjustment on rear plate turned down too low/amps are not working. Do you have the brass jumpers (or wire) in place across the high/mid/low speaker posts? Do you have the speakers set to large on your preamp or receiver? Is the sub-out/line out on your pre/avr turned on? For starters you should use the BASIC hook-up outlined in the owners manual. That requires all 3 speaker binding post (positive & negative) have jumpers connected. You only need one speaker wire connection per speaker (red & black) since all 3 are connected via the jumpers. Turn the LFE volume control all the way down to 0. I bought my KSP-400's used. When I went to audition them the original owner inserted them into his 2-channel system and we tried for hours to get the amps to kick-on with a signal. They never did. When I got them home I wired them to an AVR and turned everything on. As soon as sound from a CD started playing the amps kicked on and the LED turned green indicating 'on'. I never could figure out what caused that other than maybe something to do with the signal from his amp. Who knows. If you have everything set up/turned on correctly and you feel the 'klipsch amps are just not that good' that would be because they're not working. Keith Edited August 3, 2014 by T2K Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mr._bowtie Posted August 3, 2014 Author Share Posted August 3, 2014 Well when I brought them home I hooked them up on a single wire input with all the jumpers in place. They work great like that! I was just curious about hooking them up the other way and seeing how they sound, so I pulled the jumpers to the low side input and ran a line level input from my sunfire preamp. (Which has three sub outs) and that's when I couldn't get any bass out of them. The amps seem ok. Switch was set to auto, led showed a signal present, woofers were "moving" just not performing well at all. Both speakers were doing the exact same thing When they are wired with a single wire and all jumpers in place are the woofers running on the internal amp or on my carver amp? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mr._bowtie Posted August 3, 2014 Author Share Posted August 3, 2014 And all my preamp settings are good. Sub is turned on, crossover is set correct, speakers set to large although I tried it both ways. I know the sub out puts are working because I ran a 5.2 setup for a little while and both of my subs were working just fine. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
T2K Posted August 3, 2014 Share Posted August 3, 2014 Your amps will not power the subs at all. You send a signal to the sub amplifier, via high level or low level, and the sub amp powers the subwoofer. Keith Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mr._bowtie Posted August 3, 2014 Author Share Posted August 3, 2014 Ok. Then they're working great, I wonder why running them on line level wasn't working... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
T2K Posted August 4, 2014 Share Posted August 4, 2014 I haven't messed with mine in years so I've forgotten a lot of the results I got when trying various hook-up combinations. I do know that I have the jumpers removed from the low speakers posts and have a line level cable running to each speaker. At the rear of each speaker I used a 'Y' adapter on the line level cable to feed a signal to both the low level and LFE inputs. The bass shakes the walls and the volume is set about 1/3 maximum. My receiver, which is used only as a preamp, has a setting for 'low + LFE' or something like that. I had 2 Klipsch subwoofers when I bought the KSP-400's and after a short time I sold the subs because I knew I would never use them. You should have ample if not abundant low bass. Have you tried adjusting the 'boost' knob? Keith Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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