Large or small speaker setting

[sonny]

After deciding to use 2 KSF 10.5's for fronts and 2 KSF 8.5's for rears I ran my Onkyo Audysey and it set fronts and rears to large. I had my 8.5's previously as fronts set to small with SB-2's as rears also set to small. My crossover is still set at 80. I have seen and heard mixed opinions on this. Any experienced advice would be welcome.

Thanks

[falcon20x]

Having a sub is the reason for setting the x-over, are you using one?

I do not know about onkyo, but on my receiver if you set the speakers to large the X-over setting stays in the memory and it is not being used until I set the speakers to small again.

[sonny]

Yes I have a KSW12 sub. The receiver sets the crossover for all of the speakers. So are you saying that if the towers are set to large the reciever is not sending to the sub correctly?

[falcon20x]

Not excatly.

The purpose for the X-over is to let the sub handle all the frequencies below your setting.

It takes a good speaker to handle the bass, so setting the X-over (
usually around 80 hz) helps by allowing the sub to do the job

If you use the large setting the towers will handle the full signal but that does not mean the sub is not getting anyhting. Most of the receivers have various settings to compensate for that such as L/R + sub.

[sonny]

So would you suggest small or large for the fronts and surrounds. They are all towers with a low end of 36hz.

[falcon20x]

I do not know the KSF series at all so take my advise for what it is worth, but if you are using the system for mainly for movie watching I would start with the X-cross over at 80 Hz and go from there.

[lakedmb]

I would set them as small and set the crossover at 80hz.

[sonny]

Thanks for the advice

[sonny]

I am doing that as we speak. It seems a little boomy so I may adjust my sub a little. It is at -3db at present with crossover at 80Hz.

Thanks

[falcon20x]

set small and 80 Hz for the X-over is that I meant.

The sub should have a X-over setting as well set it to the max HZ, it won't matter since you have the x- over set at 80 HZ on the receiver. You always want the sub X-over at be set least at or above the receiver setting

There is a setting for the sub DB as well on most receiver make sure you set that as well I usally set O DB correction for that one and adjust the volume directly on the sub

[colterphoto1]

If you have a proper subwoofer, always SMALL and 80 Hz. Some of these auto-setup programs guess wrong!

If your main or surround speakers truly can handle the LF, put them to LARGE (for instance my CW rears are set to large)

If any of your speakers is not capable of down to 80 Hz, set that channel or the main xover to the -3 db down point of that speaker (SB2's go down to ??) WIth the Onkyo you can select a different xover point for each set of speakers. I prefer to go 10-20 Hz above the -3 db down point. In other words, if a speaker can make it down to 40 Hz pretty flat, you may xover at 60 or so if you wish.

Yeah, you've got to outthink the durned computers.

[sonny]

The SB-2's go down to 56Hz but I am not going to use them for now, maybe as surround backs in the future. The KSF 10.5's, I am going to use as fronts go down to 36Hz as do the KSF 8.5's that I am going too use as surround L&R so that is why I am unsure if I should set them as small or large.. I have turned the crossover on my sub all the way up and set the reciever crossover to 80Hz.

[colterphoto1]

Good, by turning the crossover on the Sub all the way up (clockwise, usually 120 Hz), you've effectively shut it's filter off. This tells it to 'play whatever we send you'.

Now set all speakers to SMALL and 80 Hz. Even if the speakers will go down to 60 or so, getting those two octaves of bass out of them will increase total system clarity and power handling. This is especially important with the center speaker that has to deliver crystal clear dialog.

If you really insist, you could use the 10.5's as large or Small with a low xover like 50Hz. But I'd only do that if my sub wasn't capable of all the output you needed.

[DrWho]

This question comes up all the time, so I went ahead and wrote a little article with my current viewpoint on the issue:
http://www.klipschcorner.com/Articles.aspx?guid=feb5d669-1513-426d-a8fc-29f8aa90869f
Hey, if you read it on the internet, it must be true right? []

Ultimately, the purpose of the large and small setting has to deal solely with the crossover to the subwoofer. In like 90% of situations, you'll want to run everything small with a 80Hz crossover (bypassing the crossover on the subwoofer).

[sonny]

Sounsd good, I am going to go with the small setting and 80Hz and see how that sounds for a couple of days. I can tell you that so far using all towers plus a center and sub really fills the room.

[Rich_Guy]

The setting LARGE/SMALL is a little confusing, a better way to have labeled this setting would have been LFE ON/OFF in other words using SMALL is turning LFE ON.

Yes, in most cases the best setting is SMALL on all speakers and setting the receivers crossover to 80hz. Subwoofer settings vary turn on LFE or set the sub to the max hz, in other words use the receivers crossover and not the subwoofers.

[sonny]

I have had some great advice on this particular question and your answer makes it even clearer. Thinking of LFE on/off makes sense.

Thanks!

[falcon20x]

If they had made it simple there would not be anyhting for us to talk about []

[CAS]

It seems a little boomy so I may adjust my sub a little.

Thanks

Actually that's the nature of the KSW-12. It's a bit of a boomy little box.