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Need advice to wring the bass out of Cornwall III


Sunnysideup

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I have a set of Cornwall III which is supposed to have amazing bass. On jazz tracks, there is sufficient body to the low notes, but I can’t feel the kick of the woofer when I play rock. I have tried using an equalizer (4 band) to raise the lower freq, but it sound bloated. They are currently powered by a 9W 300B SET amp.


My speakers are back against a partition wall (not solid), left side is in a corner while the right is next to a bookshelf (does that qualify as a false corner?).

 

Need your kind advice on how I can get my speakers to kick like a mule. 

 

Do I...

1) Get an amp with more than 9W. Perhaps a Benchmark AHB2 or Parasound JC5?

 

2) Get a subwoofer.

 

3) Convert the Cornwall to 2 way active and Use a DEQX to bi-amp and EQ at the same time. 
 

Thank you in advance! :)

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Are they fully up against the wall?  If so, move them out 12 inches or so.  Are they toed in, or flat to the listening position?  I would toe them in a bit.  No, the bookshelf does not qualify as a "false corner".....What other surfaces are in the room?  Carpet/rug?  Windows, furniture, etc?  Size of the room?  Ceiling height?  All of these factors could be playing a part in your issues.

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Hi,

 

I use CWIII with passive bi-amplification thanks to the internal filter of CWIII. I put a solid state McIntosh MC2125 in the bass and the equalizer button on the McIntosh C504 preamp at 1:00 am for the 30Hz. Then I have a tube amp in the middle and treble.

 

It's very good like that, I tried the tube amp on the whole spectrum of bass until the treble: the bass is less good and less punchy : For Jazz and Rock

 

Take this test keeping your 300B 9W at the top and a solid state for the K33E bass

 

😀

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2 hours ago, jimjimbo said:

Are they fully up against the wall?  If so, move them out 12 inches or so.  Are they toed in, or flat to the listening position?  I would toe them in a bit.  No, the bookshelf does not qualify as a "false corner".....What other surfaces are in the room?  Carpet/rug?  Windows, furniture, etc?  Size of the room?  Ceiling height?  All of these factors could be playing a part in your issues.

Speakers are 11 inches from the wall and toed in, spaced 2.5m apart. Ceiling is about 2.8m. No rug. If it matters, there’s a sofa in between and nothing in front of them.
 

2 hours ago, Peter P. said:

One wonders whether it's your room's acoustics which are canceling out bass frrequencies. Have other speakers in the same room performed better in the bass department?

The JBL along the other wall, puts out more impressive bass response IMO despite a 5.25” woofer. That’s a solid concrete wall behind though, but it is too short for me to place the Cornwalls there. Baffles me how the K33E can’t outdo them. I must have done something wrong. 
 

@mustang_flht @pzannucci
I will try connecting the Akitika which is a 60W class A/B to the woofer tomorrow, but I read bi-amping with passive crossover doesn’t reap any sonic benefits. Or did I misinterpreted?

F93BA728-5BEE-4459-B432-82F739F07C52.jpeg

Edited by Sunnysideup
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12 minutes ago, wuzzzer said:

@mustang_flht has the best advice and said exactly what I was going to suggest.  Give those woofers some solid SS power. 

That would be my suggestion as well.  I have C2's and another rig with comparable single 15BB's and they do not lack bass at all listening to most music, but I typically run a sub with everything.  

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Yep.  Dynamics will eat up 6 watts in no time.  I run a tube amp (VTA ST-70) at 35wpc on Belle clones sometimes but mostly it's an 80wpc Onkyo Reference M-5000R amp and currently it's a 450wpc Carver M-1.0t amplifier.  Not that I need it....but it's there.  Same thing applied when I ran them on Klipsch CF-3's or any others I currently have.

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8 hours ago, Sunnysideup said:

Speakers are 11 inches from the wall and toed in, spaced 2.5m apart. Ceiling is about 2.8m. No rug. If it matters, there’s a sofa in between and nothing in front of them.
 

The JBL along the other wall, puts out more impressive bass response IMO despite a 5.25” woofer. That’s a solid concrete wall behind though, but it is too short for me to place the Cornwalls there. Baffles me how the K33E can’t outdo them. I must have done something wrong. 
 

@mustang_flht @pzannucci
I will try connecting the Akitika which is a 60W class A/B to the woofer tomorrow, but I read bi-amping with passive crossover doesn’t reap any sonic benefits. Or did I misinterpreted?

F93BA728-5BEE-4459-B432-82F739F07C52.jpeg

Hi,

 

Passive bi-amplification is a good thing, but it also activates it especially today with DSP. The simplest thing for passive bi-amp is to have a volume button on the amplifiers, like on McIntosh amplifiers for example, Pro amps like Crown, QSC, Electro Voice, Lab Gruppen, .... work wonderfully in the bass, your Akitita should be good too. The advantage is that if you already have an SS amplifier in your cabinet and with your 300B the passive bi-amp will cost you $ 0.

 

 

Test and make your own opinion 😉

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1 hour ago, avguytx said:

Yep.  Dynamics will eat up 6 watts in no time.  I run a tube amp (VTA ST-70) at 35wpc on Belle clones sometimes but mostly it's an 80wpc Onkyo Reference M-5000R amp and currently it's a 450wpc Carver M-1.0t amplifier.  Not that I need it....but it's there.  Same thing applied when I ran them on Klipsch CF-3's or any others I currently have.

Agreed.  Kick requires kick.

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1 hour ago, grasshopper said:

 I assume the CWs were on the floor. Maybe try elevating them?

I'm no acoustic tech so take my suggestion/questions for what they are worth.

 

have you run a sweep to see what you are getting?

 

He wants more bass.  Getting them off the floor will do the exact opposite. 

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9 hours ago, grasshopper said:

 

Have you tried them on the other wall, same as the JBLs?

That was going to be my suggestion. But since the Cornwalls are more difficult to move, I'd suggest placing the JBL's in front of or on top of the Cornwalls and see what happens. Try to duplicate the JBLs' current height.

 

Looking at a photo of the room, I see LOTS of hard surfaces. Slap echo has got to be an issue in that room, and that will blur the bass. I still think there's frequency cancellation going on. One rug on the floor isn't going to solve the issue.

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