Help! I don't know what im doing

[Masonvg]

Ok, so about a month ago my wife and I bought the beginning of our first home theater system. We bought the Pioneer vsx 830-k, the Polk rti a9's and the csi a6. I'm sure it was not the best choice but this is where I need help. I've been reading online and I keep reading that the rti a9's need a lot of power which i'm assuming the receiver I bought is not doing them justice. My main problem is that when I have the receiver in stereo mode the speakers are loud and the bass is really good but then as soon as i put it into extended stereo mode or 5.1 mode or any other mode the center channel speaker would be in use, its echoey, quiet, and there is not even close to the amount of bass as i was getting from just using it in stereo mode. My question is what do i need to buy to give my system what it needs? I am wanting to buy rear speakers and a sub in the future. I would be willing to spend close to $2000 on either a new receiver, pre amps, power amps, ect. whatever i need to make this system as good as it can be. Thank you

 

[speakerman39]

Ok, so about a month ago my wife and I bought the beginning of our first home theater system. We bought the Pioneer vsx 830-k, the Polk rti a9's and the csi a6. I'm sure it was not the best choice but this is where I need help. I've been reading online and I keep reading that the rti a9's need a lot of power which i'm assuming the receiver I bought is not doing them justice. My main problem is that when I have the receiver in stereo mode the speakers are loud and the bass is really good but then as soon as i put it into extended stereo mode or 5.1 mode or any other mode the center channel speaker would be in use, its echoey, quiet, and there is not even close to the amount of bass as i was getting from just using it in stereo mode. My question is what do i need to buy to give my system what it needs? I am wanting to buy rear speakers and a sub in the future. I would be willing to spend close to $2000 on either a new receiver, pre amps, power amps, ect. whatever i need to make this system as good as it can be. Thank you

Hello Mason welcome to the audioholics forum. I have a full Polk RTi set-up so I think I can be of some help. The RtiA9's YOU have are known to be power hungry. YOUR receiver is NOT going to be up to the task. But, first we need some more info.

How big is YOUR room? How far is the listening position from the the fronts? Do YOU and the wife prefer mainly music listening? Or, are YOU both more of a movie/tv watcher? YOU do any gaming?

My advise it to set all of YOUR speakers to small and set the crossover to 80 Hz. Then, run the center level up a few db's to see if that helps. If YOU run everything as "Large" mode, then YOU will NOT be able to crank it to reference levels. I have the CSi5 which is very close to YOUR CSiA6 center. Mine, is plenty loud, but not a ton of bass. Of course, it is set to small as are all of my speakers.

Let us know how it sounds after setting everything to small. A sub is certainly going to make a BIG difference when YOU get one. Hope this helps.

Cheers,

Phil

 

[Latent]

First thing to make sure is that your bass management is setup right for your setup. You can try re running the MCACC auto setup with the supplied microphone in your seating position. If you don't have a SUB (Get one soon as it will help a lot!!!!) then you need to make sure it is set to sub=NO. Your front speakers need to be set to Large (if you had a sub set them to small) and your center needs to be set to small (even though MCACC will say Large by default). Set surrounds to small as well. Set crossover frequency to 80hz to start with (but try adjusting it up and down and find the setting you like the best). What this setup will do is any sound sent to the center and sourround speakers with frequency below say 80hz will be redirected to your main speakers (because they are set large). The cause of your problem is that some sound modes when feed a stereo source that is the same left and right (ie mono which is 90% of all content really) will all be output of the center speaker and nothing goes to the left and right and your center will always have weak bass output due to size limitations. Good bass management settings will help though and I also recommend trying with Center set to off and you may prefer it with no center channel at all and let your main speakers do the role. Also using the appropriate sound mode on the receiver may sound better with music sound modes that don't use center channel as much while movie modes use it for tv audio but don't work for music as well.

With regard to power requirements don't worry as the 80W power from your unit is fine with those speakers and I don't think they would be that hard to drive. This is assuming you don't have a large room to fill or want to listen at high volume. Edit: Also once you add a powered sub and change the front speakers to small the power requirement will drop as the sub amp takes over low frequency hard to drive output leaving more power for mid bass and higher.

 

[fmw]

First, go add a subwoofer. Second, raise the center channel volume relative to the main speakers. If you still have an issue let us know. Sound quality problems are almost never due to amplifiers and almost always due to speakers or room acoustics.

 

[mtrycrafts]

Ok, so about a month ago my wife and I bought the beginning of our first home theater system. We bought the Pioneer vsx 830-k, the Polk rti a9's and the csi a6. I'm sure it was not the best choice but this is where I need help. I've been reading online and I keep reading that the rti a9's need a lot of power which i'm assuming the receiver I bought is not doing them justice. My main problem is that when I have the receiver in stereo mode the speakers are loud and the bass is really good but then as soon as i put it into extended stereo mode or 5.1 mode or any other mode the center channel speaker would be in use, its echoey, quiet, and there is not even close to the amount of bass as i was getting from just using it in stereo mode. My question is what do i need to buy to give my system what it needs? I am wanting to buy rear speakers and a sub in the future. I would be willing to spend close to $2000 on either a new receiver, pre amps, power amps, ect. whatever i need to make this system as good as it can be. Thank you

Welcome
Hopefully you did some research before buying the system.

Be careful what you read on line, lots of urban legends, myths and bs floats out there.

If the speaker specs are anywhere close to reality, Polk lists it as 90 dB spl sensitivity, pretty good, and 8 Ohm nominal.
So, it is not power hungry.
Depending on your room size, listening distance and listening volume you use, the receiver should be fine.
As mentioned, you need to read the manual to set it up properly. It seems to have some auto setup features that will help. Also, as mentioned, your room has a lot to do with sound quality.

Keep on reading the home page of this web site to learn as much as possible.

 

[herbu]

Masonvg, do you understand what setting your speaker(s) to "small" or "large" does?

The woofers in your speakers handle the lowest frequencies for that speaker. It's generally accepted that most people can hear down to ~20Hz. Below that you feel the thump or rumble, but don't actually hear it.

The lowest note on a bass guitar is 41Hz. Big pipe organs and of course synthesizers go lower. But a frequency response down to ~40Hz will handle most music. Movies are a different story... especially action movies. All the explosions, monster stomps, etc can go very low. In fact, the ".1" in a 5.1 system is a Low Frequency Effects channel used specifically for these effects.

A subwoofer is used for two things. First it handles the low frequencies in everything, (music/movies/tv)... and you set the frequency where you want it to take over from your regular speakers. This point is the crossover. In addition, your sub handles all the LFE channel. A receiver only sends LFE to a sub. So if you don't have a sub, you don't have LFE in TV/Movies.

Now to your system. The specs of your Left/Right speaker show a lower limit of 30Hz. (The "-3dB" in their specs means that 30Hz lower limit is 3dB below their target volume. It means that while the speaker can play that low, those notes are not as loud as the higher frequency notes.) If you set them to "Large" so they get the whole signal, they should be ok for music.

Your Center speaker specs says it goes down to 55Hz, with the same low frequency drop-off as your Left/Right.

My suggestion for you is to get a good sub first. When you get it, set all your regular speakers to "Small", your L/R crossover at 80Hz and your Center crossover at 100Hz. That will mean every signal, to every speaker, below 80-100Hz, will be routed to your sub instead of your speakers. This will not only give you strength in the lower frequencies, it will free up your speakers from trying to reproduce it, and it will enable your LFE for TV/Movies.

Until you get the sub, I would set your Left/Right to "Large", and your Center to "Small" w/ a crossover of 100Hz. That will let your L/R handle all the bass, and stop your Center from trying to reproduce something it's not capable of reproducing.