6.1/7.1 w/ a twist

[yromj]

Now that I have a 6.1/7.1 capable receiver, I'm thinking seriously about making my system either 6.1 or 7.1. My first idea was to buy a single RS-25 (I would prefer an RB-25, but there's no way I can put "that big black thing" on the wall), mount it, wire it, and be done. However, I'm not a huge fan of "sprayers" to begin w/, especially for the backs in 6/7.1. Then I started thinking, I've got a pair of white Quintets that I could mount back there and go 7.1. I used these same Quintets as surrounds for a short time w/ my Rx-25 front 3 and they impressed me. Now I'm wondering if I should recommission them into duty as rears. Besides the price ($0) is hard to beat. I would like to hear thoughts on 6.1 using a single RS-25 (dual RS-25s are out of the question because of the way the walls are the spray would reflect about 10 times before it ever got to me) or using dual Quintets.

John

[jephdood]

I'm going to be trying dual quintets this weekend for rear centers. I've got RF3s in the front and back corners and an RC3-II front and center. We'll see how the little 'tets handle middle rear duty with the much bigger RF3s on either side. I'm hoping they'll do okay, but if, say, there's a rear left to right sound shift, there may be a distinct change in sound as it passes through the middle. I'll let you know how it goes.

Anybody off hand know of a good movie with good sweeping side to side sound?

[avman]

run the wires for both scenarios 'across the floor'(aka temporarily)and answer your own ?

i would GUESS that the single 'sound sprayer' would be a better match.they are designed to radiate a 180 degree sound pattern,and it is a superior speaker overall to the quintet,and a better timbre match as well.

try both ways and let US know.

avman.

[HornEd]

John, the essential sound from your amp is 6.1... because there are only six discrete channels (and usually the sixth is made up in the receiver from data contained in the side/surround channels). 7.1 is kind of a sales rip off concept since all it does is split the sixth channel into two identical signals to spread the same sound on two rear channel speakers. This is useless unless you have a very, very wide room.

I use six identical speakers in a thirty-foot circular room and tested it in six and seven speaker configurations and determined that the seventh speaker was a total waste and reconfigured the room to six primary speakers plus two front effects speakers... and an adequate subwoofer array.

Six speakers more nearly identical should beat a hodge-podge of smaller speakers in creating natural sound and ambiance from modern DVD's. Going to a sound sprayer is committing yourself to a shortcut "gimmick advantage" that will color every sound... even when that's not what the sound engineer intended when he mixed the music or movie.

Use an SPL meter from Radio Shack (or better) and a set-up disc (like Avia) and make your monopole choices agree in timbre as best as you can... and you will have a home theater that only a lot more money can improve... -HornEd

[TauRus]

Until recently I was using white Quintets as "B" surround speakers ("A" surrounds are RB5s) in combination with a Infinity center channel CC1 servinf as rear center. The front speakers are RF3/RC3. This set up worked out very nicely for me for both movies and music. I have sold the Quintets recently since I am totally re-doing my setup. That CC1 center channels is available for anyone that might be interested.

[avman]

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On 4/15/2004 1:23:13 PM HornEd wrote:

John, the essential sound from your amp is 6.1... because there are only six discrete channels (and usually the sixth is made up in the receiver from data contained in the side/surround channels). 7.1 is kind of a sales rip off concept since all it does is split the sixth channel into two identical signals to spread the same sound on two rear channel speakers. This is useless unless you have a very, very wide room.

-HornEd

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exactly!!

now Ed, i figure that you would recommend a RC-25 as center rear? the problem w/that scenario here is 'the big black thing on the wall'. so i would say a white rs-25 would be better than 2 white quintets.

avman.

[HornEd]

Whoa, jephdood... don't forget front-to-back as well as side-to-side. "Saving Private Ryan" does a good job on both... particularly in the German tank scenes where non-timbre matching speakers do a "Doppler effect phase shift each time the majority of sound comes from a different speaker. And sound sprayers just create an effect that the tanks are everywhere in the room... which looses a good bit of the positional excitement of impending doom (or joy) that honest directionality brings.

Better receivers and set-up disks have a provision to run "pink noise" sequentially around the room. While this might not be as exciting as a movie portion... the "phase shift" effect stands out dramatically... as does the unnatural forced ambiance of sound sprayers.

As you think of cost cutting approaches, remember that for multi-channel sources, the front center is the most important loudspeaker in the room and the subwoofer array is often the second most important consideration then one should consider the flanking left and right speakers then the full-range side/surrounds and lastly, the rear center.

Most music rarely gets down below a K-horns 35 Hz potential as PWK envisioned the essential sound that should come from his speaker design. So, the subwoofer constituent is primarily for more naturalness in movie tracts. Most people do not realize that a fairly normal sound my contain elements that reach 121 dB at 20 Hz for a fraction of a second. Not long enough to hurt your ears but certainly important enough to make a difference in the naturalness of the sound! -HornEd

[HornEd]

Sorry Avman... I was off in the acoustic ethers and missed your post. I am afraid that I have gotten insensitive to big black things on the wall that are quite a bit smaller than the four big black KLF-30's horizontally arranged on my wall... with only two left standing on either side of the screen.

In my experience, Avman, few people have arranged their sprayers as you have... for you allow one side of the bi-pole to target the sweet spot... and therefore convey directional information while the other side of the bi-poles bounce around the back wall and contribute a more nearly honest ambient effect. Sadly, most folks set up their sound sprayers by the book... and they are clearly less honest that way.

In this particular case, there is a redeeming aspect in that most 6th channel info is coming from sampling the discrete content of the left and right side/surrounds and the sprayer would be throwing its dipole aspects to bounce off the left and right walls with only the under 2 kHz content being aimed at the sweet spot. Granted some folks like this gimmick rather than having a big black thing on the wall but maybe the answer isnt lowering ones audio standards just, maybe, the answer may be coming up with some cosmetic cover up that would make it an acceptable black (or white) thing in a piece of custom furniture on the back wall.

For whatever its worth, when it comes to loudspeakers they should say it and not spray it IMHO. -HornEd

[avman]

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On 4/15/2004 1:11:02 PM yromj wrote:

(I would prefer an RB-25, but there's no way I can put "that big black thing" on the wall

John

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Ed-

you have been very 'generous' in your opinion of MY use of KSP-S6's in MY ht room,and if you heard them,i think your generosity would continue

i was merely referencing John's statement about him not wanting a black speaker on the rear wall,and your suggestion of 'dressing' that speaker is a good one.if a speaker were to be 'dressed' in the center rear,wouldn't you suggest a RC-25 instead of a RB-25?

avman.

[jephdood]

I'm just going to try the Quintets because I already have them and want to see what they can do in that capacity. That, and yromj thought about the possibility as well. If I don't like 'em, they'll go back to the spare room or on Ebay.

After the test, I will consider another rc3-II for rear center in a 6.1 setup. Or, something else?

I'd get an RC-7 for front center and slide my rc3-II to the rear, but I'm afraid the RC-7 would be too much speaker to play nicely with my rf3's up front.

[yromj]

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On 4/15/2004 3:27:50 PM avman wrote:

Ed-

you have been very 'generous' in your opinion of MY use of KSP-S6's in MY ht room,and if you heard them,i think your generosity would continue

i was merely referencing John's statement about him not wanting a black speaker on the rear wall,and your suggestion of 'dressing' that speaker is a good one.if a speaker were to be 'dressed' in the center rear,wouldn't you suggest a RC-25 instead of a RB-25?

avman.

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Avman,

I thought about using an RC-25 (again the issue of "big black thing on the wall would have to be addressed") but I was concerned about the rear port. (Ala m00n and his threads.) Wouldn't I have to either make an opening behind the speaker of move it away from the wall far enough to allow it to breathe.

John

[yromj]

Ed,

Actually you and I share a lot of the same thoughts on the acoustical stuff. I would be running six RB-25s if I had my own theater room. However, given my current situation, I had to make the compromise and go w/ the RSs. (Actually, the right rear is slightly in front of my primary seating location so one horn does point behind the seating area and does help w/ that.) I also agree w/ your take on 6.1 vs. 7.1. At first I thought about using just one Quintet for the sixth channel, but it's so far back, and less effecient (90dB vs 96dB) that I figured two of them would help overcome this.

Others,

Thanks for the reply. (I especially liked the "tell US how it goes" line!) I had thought of running wires myself and might do that. The only thing is I don't have to an easy way to temporariyl mount the Quintets where they would have to go. I would have to make holes in the sheet rock and of course then repair the holes if it doesn't work But I've done that before so we'll see.

John

[HornEd]

As I understand them to be, both the RB-25 and the RC-25 are front ported so the issue of room behind the speakers is not a concern. In general, I would prefer the RC-25 over it's RB cousin because a horizontal arrangement with two woofers provides a larger sweet spot when used in side/surround or rear effects positions.

When customizing floor standing speakers to horizontal rear array applications, I spread twin woofers as far apart as the cabinet allows... thus creating a wider cone of ambient sound. In effect, the angle of the woofer cone on each side of the horizontally mounted center speaker creates a zone of sweet spot benefit. Tracing those angles for each rear array speaker will indicate the size of your rear array sweet spot.

Clearly, a single mounted woofer such as is in the RB-25 would not achieve as wide an angle. However, I have not had the opportunity to check out the respective speaker characteristics of these particular Klipsch speakers. -HornEd

[avman]

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On 4/15/2004 4:39:33 PM yromj wrote:

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On 4/15/2004 3:27:50 PM avman wrote:

Ed-

you have been very 'generous' in your opinion of MY use of KSP-S6's in MY ht room,and if you heard them,i think your generosity would continue

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i was merely referencing John's statement about him not wanting a black speaker on the rear wall,and your suggestion of 'dressing' that speaker is a good one.if a speaker were to be 'dressed' in the center rear,wouldn't you suggest a RC-25 instead of a RB-25?

avman.

http://forums.klipsch.com/idealbb/images/smilies/1.gif">

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Avman,

I thought about using an RC-25 (again the issue of "big black thing on the wall would have to be addressed") but I was concerned about the rear port. (Ala m00n and his threads.) Wouldn't I have to either make an opening behind the speaker of move it away from the wall far enough to allow it to breathe.

John

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RC-25 is FRONT-ported.

av.

[avman]

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On 4/15/2004 4:38:39 PM jephdood wrote:

I'm just going to try the Quintets because I already have them and want to see what they can do in that capacity. That, and yromj thought about the possibility as well. If I don't like 'em, they'll go back to the spare room or on Ebay.

After the test, I will consider another rc3-II for rear center in a 6.1 setup. Or, something else?

I'd get an RC-7 for front center and slide my rc3-II to the rear, but I'm afraid the RC-7 would be too much speaker to play nicely with my rf3's up front.

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a RC-3II or RC-35 would be a much better match for your RF-3's...a RC-7 would NOT be a good timbre-match.

av.

[JewishAMerPrince]

I would try one or two RSX5s instead of the Quints. The RSXs are true reference timbre where the quints have more of a Synergy type sound. One point though, the RSX's are only available in black or silver.

Jerry Rappaport

[yromj]

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On 4/15/2004 5:26:57 PM JewishAMerPrince wrote:

I would try one or two RSX5s instead of the Quints. The RSXs are true reference timbre where the quints have more of a Synergy type sound. One point though, the RSX's are only available in black or silver.

Jerry Rappaport

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Jerry,

I am only considering the Quintets because I already have them. The RSXs are as much as the RS-25s, too, so that makes them a little less appealing.

John

[yromj]

avman et. al,

Oops, forgot about the RC-25 being front ported. Just because I have one in the next room is no reason to know that is it?

John

[avman]

if you have one in the next room,even if it is your center-front,set your receiver to ctr.ch.-no,and try it as a center rear.if it is in another system,there's a perfect opportunity to tell US what it sounds like.

avman.

[JewishAMerPrince]

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On 4/15/2004 10:13:48 PM yromj wrote:

Jerry,

I am only considering the Quintets because I already have them. The RSXs are as much as the RS-25s, too, so that makes them a little less appealing.

John

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Sorry I missed that before. I tried the same thing myself because I had a spare pair of Quints arounf from the days when I ran KG's as mains and center. I tried them in my Reference system and found that the timbre match was just way off. The sound would seem to slump a bit in the rear even though I was well volume matched...and even a bit hot. Now I use RS 35s as my rear centers(s). The so called "spraying" effect of the RS as rear surrounds actually works quite well to deliver an enveloping surround effect on THX and PLIIx material.

JR