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Yes or no: are the RP260s/ 280s too big for a 13x13 room?


Man in the Box

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I own a pair of RP 160s, an SVS SB2000 sub and a Yamaha RN602 receiver. Someone offered to buy the bookshelves over the next day or two for a price that would make it worthwhile to replace them with the RP260 or RP280. 
 

I love those speakers, but after adding a subwoofer, I think that the woofer is the weak link because they make me have to sit closer for me to hear them. However, the caveat is that I can’t actually hear them as coherently as possible because of the room’s reverb. I plan to somewhat heavily treat the room over the next couple of days.

 

Would the 260s/ 280s exacerbate the reverb problem even further?

 

I’m considering upgrading mainly because I imagine that floor standers would sound better when playing orchestral music.
 

Thoughts? Thanks in advance. 

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1 hour ago, Tarheel said:

Where are you located Man in the Box?  I have a pair of RP-280Fs in a 13'x14' room and you're welcome to stop by.  I may even be willing to sell them to you as I bought other speakers.

I’m based in Bahrain; probably not where you are. I appreciate the offer though.  

 

 What’s your experience like with the 280s? Do they overwhelm the space? And have you treated your room for them to sound good?

Edited by Man in the Box
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A bit far for an audition.  No treatments but pull the drapes on one large window if I'm going to be listening for awhile.  I like the 280F's.  Gary (Tigerman) in the "right this minute" thread has a lot of experience with them and also did a small modification.  May want to chat with him.

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19 hours ago, Tarheel said:

A bit far for an audition.  No treatments but pull the drapes on one large window if I'm going to be listening for awhile.  I like the 280F's.  Gary (Tigerman) in the "right this minute" thread has a lot of experience with them and also did a small modification.  May want to chat with him.

I spent $200 to heavily treat the room. Now the subwoofer sounds great but the woofer can be underwhelming, depending on the source or how close I sit. 
 

The room may be able to handle the RP 280s now, I imagine. Definitely the RP 260s, considering that the woofer size is the same as the ones in the RP160s. 

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1 hour ago, willland said:

I think that you should experiment more with the crossover and see/hear what you get.  Sometimes 5 or 10Hz up or down can make all the difference.  Start at 100Hz and work you way down.

 

Bill

The crossover seems to be working well since I’ve used the LFE port or whatever it’s called. 
 

Am I correct in thinking that a bigger cabinet + extra woofer will improve improve the lower midrange? The 280 has a bigger tweeter so I imagine it would represent a more detailed overall sound. 
 

Thoughts?

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31 minutes ago, Man in the Box said:

The crossover seems to be working well since I’ve used the LFE port or whatever it’s called.

 

16 hours ago, Man in the Box said:

the woofer can be underwhelming, depending on the source or how close I sit. 
 

Maybe you have the subwoofer coming in too high and drowning out the RP's 6.5 inch woofers. What frequency LPF frequency is the subwoofer set to?

 

Bill

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8 hours ago, willland said:

 

Maybe you have the subwoofer coming in too high and drowning out the RP's 6.5 inch woofers. What frequency LPF frequency is the subwoofer set to?

 

Bill

Once I plug into LFE and set it at 180, the crossover and phase knobs get deactivated. So I don’t know; presumably 80 hz. I’ve experimented with manually changing the crossover on my own, but nothing sounded as good as the auto crossover. 
 

You’re onto something though: the sub has to be controlled or else the bottom frequencies sound too loud when compared to the RP’s woofers. 
 

This is basically why I’ve identified the woofer as the weak link. 
 

On the plus side, I’ve managed to make the speakers “disappear into the room,” as some audiophiles would say. Would I lose that if I replace them with tower speakers?

Edited by Man in the Box
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1 hour ago, Man in the Box said:

 

On the plus side, I’ve managed to make the speakers “disappear into the room,” as some audiophiles would say. Would I lose that if I replace them with tower speakers?

Not necessarily.  If you have the subwoofer set up properly(placement, phase, volume, crossover), then it should not matter whether you use floorstanders or bookshelf speakers.  I will say this, from my experience, bookshelf speakers seem to image better that floorstanders.  Again, my experience.

 

Bill

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1 hour ago, willland said:

Not necessarily.  If you have the subwoofer set up properly(placement, phase, volume, crossover), then it should not matter whether you use floorstanders or bookshelf speakers.  I will say this, from my experience, bookshelf speakers seem to image better that floorstanders.  Again, my experience.

 

Bill

I see. I’ve been experimenting a lot with placement and volume, but I left phase and crossover constant by letting the receiver take care of them. On this note, is there a consensus on letting the receiver take control of phase and crossover is better than doing it on your own?

 

Thanks for your overall input. It’d be good to rationalize keeping the bookshelves over spending more money that way. I could look into other ways to upgrade my setup, like investing in better music input (universal/ CD player, maybe, as ppl here suggested to me in a prior thread). 

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New member, new set up.RP280 front,504c centre. States one single photo is over 2mb, and won't load.My room is 26x16feet. Personally, I have found smaller rooms may need more treatment than larger ones, stating the obvious, will depend on layout etc. Living in Scotland my Croft (Single story bungalow!.) has 3ft thick Granite walls, and is excellent for sound, so no treatment needed, even using 3 subs without a problem, and as an added bonus, no neighbours!.

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