AVR vs Seperates for Heresy 3's

[SpursFan]

Hello,

 

I'm new to the Klipsch family with a set of H3's and looking for some recommendations to drive them. They are part of our entertainment room in a 5.1 setup currently driven by my older Denon AVR891 but I have a NAD 777v3 ready to go. I have a new sub, cables, wires etc on order so haven't tore everything apart to install the 777. That said I really wanted seperates and I'm still kicking around the idea.

 

Any thoughts on which would be better:

 

NAD 777 with Dirac or

Marantz 7705 with M8077 amp

Other options?

 

I'd love to try a tube amp but thats further down the road.

 

The H3's sound pretty amazing on my older Denon, looking forward to locking in the rest of the gear and really hearing these things sing.

[willland]

@SpursFan,

 

Welcome to the forum.

 

Maybe a little biased but I think the NAD 777v3 will be incredible with the H3s.  Plenty of juice to drive them without even a sweat.  Dirac live will be the icing on the cake.

I am a pro separates kind of guy but we are talking an NAD/Klipsch Heritage combo here.

 

Bill

[Schu]

+1 For separates also... but some will be along to refute the monoblock claims.

[SpursFan]

1 hour ago, willland said:

@SpursFan,

 

Welcome to the forum.

 

Maybe a little biased but I think the NAD 777v3 will be incredible with the H3s.  Plenty of juice to drive them without even a sweat.  Dirac live will be the icing on the cake.

I am a pro separates kind of guy but we are talking an NAD/Klipsch Heritage combo here.

 

Bill

Thank you, there is a wealth of knowledge here.

 

I too anticipate the NAD will be a great combo but I just can't get past most people saying seperates always beat intergrated. Most every thing I read about H3's was "feed them with a great amp and be rewarded", "don't use an AVR" etc. I guess that has me hung up on seperates. I've got 2-3 days before everything else arrives to swap in the 777v3. 

 

Thanks for you feedback.

[willland]

9 minutes ago, SpursFan said:

I too anticipate the NAD will be a great combo but I just can't get past most people saying seperates always beat intergrated.

As mentioned, I am a huge fan of separates for both stereo music listening and home theater.  I lean in that direction under most conditions.  Being that your amp/AVR will be hooked up to very efficient, easy load to drive Heresy 3s, the NAD T-777v3 will be more than enough to handle the task.  In addition to the great amp section of the 777, it also possesses a great preamp section, high quality DACs, and some consider the premiere room correction/EQ with Dirac Live.

 

Now if the Marantz combo was comprised of their flagship AV8802/M8077, then my thoughts might be a bit different.

 

Bill

[glens]

1 hour ago, SpursFan said:

... but I just can't get past most people saying seperates always beat intergrated.

 

Would be better to say "separates (can | possibly | sometimes) beat integrated."

 

It really depends on all the specifics.

[garyrc]

Separates, with the power amp able to provide at least 130 true watts per Heresy III channel, all channels operating.  In a 4,000 cu.ft, room, of typical liveness, at 13 feet distance, you need 130 real w.p.c. to reach THX/Dolby/cinema reference peaks of 105 dB per each regular channel [the subwoofer needs to produce clean peaks of 115 dB, but it will have its own (hopefully big) amplifier built in (there are rare exceptions)].   Most AVR specs are fudged in that they don't spec with all channels operating to sufficiently stress the power supply.  I can't imagine NAD doing that, but I haven't checked its specs yet.  I'll EDIT with details.

 

EDIT: O.K., NAD is claiming 80 w.p.c., with all channels operating (good), so, with safety head room built in, etc., you would be about 2 dB short (not so good).  BUT the IHF Dynamic power is 160 watts at 8 Ohms, and, given NAD's honesty, you might have enough, particularly if you set the Heresy IIIs for SMALL, which you should do anyway, and about an 80 Hz crossover, with LPF for LFE at about 120 Hz so your sub can handle the heavy lifting that those movie madmen impose.  Using SMALL will also make your H IIIs even clearer than otherwise.

 

Dirac Live is very, very tempting.

 

So, I'm vacillating. 

 

You could use the NAD with Dirac Live ... ... or

 

Get a good NAD AV preamp-processor with Dirac Live, and a > 130w RMS per channel (all channels operating) separate 7 channel power amp from NAD (if they make one).  We all love spending other people's money.

 

Y'know, the 777v3 is probably enough if you use SMALL, and your sub is good.  I just remembered that THX recomends cutting back reference level SPL by about 5 dB when in most home size rooms.  YMMV. 

 

Whirling, whirling, whirling.  But I love NAD.

[SpursFan]

15 hours ago, glens said:

 

Would be better to say "separates (can | possibly | sometimes) beat integrated."

 

It really depends on all the specifics.

Very true, its crosses over into the "all amps sound the same" discussion. So many options (and opinions) out there with not as many listening options makes its a tough decision!

[SpursFan]

14 hours ago, garyrc said:

Separates, with the power amp able to provide at least 130 true watts per Heresy III channel, all channels operating.  In a 4,000 cu.ft, room, of typical liveness, at 13 feet distance, you need 130 real w.p.c. to reach THX/Dolby/cinema reference peaks of 105 dB per each regular channel [the subwoofer needs to produce clean peaks of 115 dB, but it will have its own (hopefully big) amplifier built in (there are rare exceptions)].   Most AVR specs are fudged in that they don't spec with all channels operating to sufficiently stress the power supply.  I can't imagine NAD doing that, but I haven't checked its specs yet.  I'll EDIT with details.

 

EDIT: O.K., NAD is claiming 80 w.p.c., with all channels operating (good), so, with safety head room built in, etc., you would be about 2 dB short (not so good).  BUT the IHF Dynamic power is 160 watts at 8 Ohms, and, given NAD's honesty, you might have enough, particularly if you set the Heresy IIIs for SMALL, which you should do anyway, and about an 80 Hz crossover, with LPF for LFE at about 120 Hz so your sub can handle the heavy lifting that those movie madmen impose.  Using SMALL will also make your H IIIs even clearer than otherwise.

 

Dirac Live is very, very tempting.

 

So, I'm vacillating. 

 

You could use the NAD with Dirac Live ... ... or

 

Get a good NAD AV preamp-processor with Dirac Live, and a > 130w RMS per channel (all channels operating) separate 7 channel power amp from NAD (if they make one).  We all love spending other people's money.

 

Y'know, the 777v3 is probably enough if you use SMALL, and your sub is good.  I just remembered that THX recomends cutting back reference level SPL by about 5 dB when in most home size rooms.  YMMV. 

 

Whirling, whirling, whirling.  But I love NAD.

Great feed back, thank you!

 

Our room is just under 3,000 cu. ft. and we sit right at 12ft from the L/R channels. We don't play movies terribly loud but I'm known to crank up 2ch from time to time. That should give some editional overhead to the NAD plus I plan to bi-amp the H3's since we are only in a 5.1 setup. I also just checked my existing speaker wire and realized it's only 16ga. Between the better pre/amp section in the 777v3, Dirac, 12ga bi-amp wiring, Dirac and break-in I should see a nice improvement over the current setup (which already sounds really nice). 

 

I'll just stick with the NAD and make any decision based on how the setup sounds, plus I might be better served playing around with speaker setup. Currently spaced about 8 feet apart and 6 inches or so off the wall, no corner loading. My current sub sits next to my left channel 4ft from corner, I'm going to try and hide the new sub in the corner so that may drive me to add more spacing between L/R channels.

 

Thanks again for the great feedback

 

 

[glens]

8' between and assuming the amp is not too far off to one side, let us know if you note any difference whatsoever between 16 and 12 ga. wire.

[SpursFan]

2 hours ago, glens said:

8' between and assuming the amp is not too far off to one side, let us know if you note any difference whatsoever between 16 and 12 ga. wire.

Will do, should have it all setup next weekend.

[glens]

Just looked, that 777 has A and B speaker selector so you can run both sizes of wire to the speakers and directly within mere moments between draw a comparison.

[billybob]

15 minutes ago, glens said:

Just looked, that 777 has A and B speaker selector so you can run both sizes of wire to the speakers and directly within mere moments between draw a comparison.

Nice insight, imo...will always be nice to have a NAD with the capability of running a direct comparison. Hope all is well and, good fortune...welcome the forum OP...

[Fish]

I'd hook up that NAD with any old speaker wire 16g or better and move on to the next parts of your system. If you don't like it after a few days you'll know. I seriously doubt you would be dissatisfied. If you are however , thats when the search starts. There can be avrs better than separates, old am/fm receivers or integrateds, better than avrs or any combo, it's all about taste and money.

[SpursFan]

Great idea to test with the A/B function, probably try it on my Denon first as I supsect there will be some differences just moving to the NAD. I've never done a direct comparison changing cables/wires so that will be interesting. For now I'm trying to get some hours of the H3's so they are settled in nicely before swapping everything over.