Tempest Build

[KEW]

If you just have a stereo setup for music, then please,please, PLEASE do your self a favour and get rid of the surround receiver and get a proper stereo amp with pre-out for sub instead.

The sound quality cannot be compared IMHO.

The problem is that there are not many of these products on the market!

Well, how many are on the market depends on whether or not you want bass management! If you are content to run your mains full range (which is a loss of a major benefit of having a sub) and willing to use the full-range pre-out, then there are still options (although mainstream stereo receiver are almost the exclusive domain of Yamaha among the big manufacturers).
Personally, the benefits of allowing your mains to produce a 80Hz signal without the driver (as well as amp) attempting to produce 30Hz at the same time are greater than any disadvantage from being a surround receiver.
I do wish there were more stereo units with competent bass management!

 

[MrBoat]

I was hoping to look at the RC for your unit and see how it manages different setups, but given looks to be a touch screen remote, it is harder to know what controls it offers.

He gave me the original remote but they had stored it with the batteries in it and they leaked and the thing is basically trashed. I could find an original one on ebay cheap enough if I had to have it. He did program an aftermarket universal remote for it but it has all the video stuff on it too so the menu is a bit overkill for my situation. So far, I have only used the on/off and the volume, the latter of which I find more convenient and instantaneous just to operate from my media keyboard for the pc.

 

[MrBoat]

Just in case... if you are worrying over this, don't sweat it. It sounds like the OP did not understand how the large vs small speaker setting works. Although it may be a bit antiquated, the idea behind this is the sub is there for LFE only, and you would only use a sub for 2 channel music if you desperately needed bass (i.e.- had little satellite/cube mains). Subs are now commonly integrated into high quality 2.1 systems. But the conventions of setup (at least with Audyssey) are to assume you would not use a sub for stereo content.

I wasn't really worried, just that in that thread, people explained how to set up this particular AVR with a sub, outside of that OP's problem. That's what I bookmarked that thread for.

 

[MrBoat]

If you just have a stereo setup for music, then please,please, PLEASE do your self a favour and get rid of the surround receiver and get a proper stereo amp with pre-out for sub instead.

The sound quality cannot be compared IMHO.

This has a pre-out for a sub at least. Surely with that, the 2 channel external amp I have, there should be some configurable option for at least 2.1 or 2.2, even if I have to set the thing by ear. This is all centered around direct listening in an area no more than 10ft away from the mains. I don't care what the sound does past that. Even though, it's sounded quite good throughout the main part of the house whether I needed it to or not. This is a rectangular room roughly 20+' x 12', with 8 ft ceilings.

 

[rojo]

This has a pre-out for a sub at least. Surely with that, the 2 channel external amp I have, there should be some configurable option for at least 2.1 or 2.2, even if I have to set the thing by ear. This is all centered around direct listening in an area no more than 10ft away from the mains. I don't care what the sound does past that. Even though, it's sounded quite good throughout the main part of the house whether I needed it to or not. This is a rectangular room roughly 20+' x 12', with 8 ft ceilings.

Have you considered keeping the receiver you have and just adding a miniDSP? It wouldn't allow you to high pass your mains, but it would give you complete control over your subwoofer.

 

[MrBoat]

Have you considered keeping the receiver you have and just adding a miniDSP? It wouldn't allow you to high pass your mains, it would give you complete control over your subwoofer.

In the AVR menu, there is crossover settings

 

[roadrune]

I know atleast most NAD amps have line in/out, so with one of those and a Minidsp 2x4 you could have sound which i think would be far superior an old Denon avr.

 

[lovinthehd]

The problem is that there are not many of these products on the market!

Agreed. Some have sub pre-outs but most all lack bass management. If you don't want/use subs, that's fine, but old useless tech when it comes to subs. Besides, an amp merely being limited to 2ch does not make it inherently better, got a few avrs and a few 2ch rigs, the 2ch rigs are just limited in function.

 

[KEW]

I know atleast most NAD amps have line in/out, so with one of those and a Minidsp 2x4 you could have sound which i think would be far superior an old Denon avr.

If you want far superior, you should be looking at speakers, not amps. Denon and Marantz (and NAD) all know how to make good amps and they didn't forget when they started making AVR's. Of course, AVR's do allow you to screw up the sound in many ways, so you have to be up for the learning curve.
I will agree that if you have demanding speakers (like inefficient 3 ohm speakers) AVR's will be brought to their knees in short order! Of course, so will most stereo units! However, in that situation you can probably only find the capability you need from a stereo Amp because there are limits on what you can fit (and keep cool) in one box (and what you can draw from one 15A outlet).

 

[MrBoat]

So, how did everyone manage bass when the 3805 was made? I will re-read the manual again but IIRC, this was covered in the owner's manual and I think I recall seeing it when I was flipping thru the onboard menu when I first hooked it up. The crossover option is certainly in there and it was set to 80hz.

Is it automatic bass management we are talking about here at the mercy of the AVR?

 

[lovinthehd]

Is the 80hz able to be set per individual speaker, or sets or is it universal? How about speaker settings for small/large (bass management on/off for a given speaker/channel) in the same vein?

The manual and that thread seem to flesh it out when I glanced at 'em.

 

[MrBoat]

Is the 80hz able to be set per individual speaker, or sets or is it universal? How about speaker settings for small/large (bass management on/off for a given speaker/channel) in the same vein?

The manual and that thread seem to flesh it out when I glanced at 'em.

Each channel maybe? I didn't look far into it. Was just trying to get this to work in 2 channel only at the time. There is a large/small option. For full range, I think I read to set the mains to large so I did. I was still using the JBL 3-way speakers then.

 

[lovinthehd]

Each channel maybe? I didn't look far into it. Was just trying to get this to work in 2 channel only at the time. There is a large/small option. For full range, I think I read to set the mains to large so I did. I was still using the JBL 3-way speakers then.

Sounds like fairly flexible bass management so far. I really hate the large/small thing, penis oriented marketing people I suppose not wanting to offend your junk....it should be bass management off (aka large) or on (aka small). I always set bass management on when using a sub (but always use more than one ), if not then off.

 

[roadrune]

If you want far superior, you should be looking at speakers, not amps. Denon and Marantz (and NAD) all know how to make good amps and they didn't forget when they started making AVR's. Of course, AVR's do allow you to screw up the sound in many ways, so you have to be up for the learning curve.
I will agree that if you have demanding speakers (like inefficient 3 ohm speakers) AVR's will be brought to their knees in short order! Of course, so will most stereo units! However, in that situation you can probably only find the capability you need from a stereo Amp because there are limits on what you can fit (and keep cool) in one box (and what you can draw from one 15A outlet).

Have you actually compared good avrs to good stereo amps?

Ok, now i am at a computer with more time on my hands...

From my experience:

I started with surround sound somewhere around 1995, with a NAD pre-amp, whitch never gave me anything decent (i was to young to understand how things should be set up, also the surround sound at that time was not all that good). Somewhere around 2000 i got a Denon avr introducing Dolby Digital, but still with manual calibration (cannot remember the model) this had somewhat better soundquality, but was never great.

All of the above was in various livingrooms as we moved a little bit around, but from now on we are settled in our own self-built house

Then around 2011 i think, i got my first Audyssey avr, the Denon AVR2313 ($700 range), this was a great leap in surround sound duo to auto calibration (i still did not understand how this should have been set up, nor the interrest to find out), however stereo sound with music was never any good.

Last year we stopped renting out the basement, and the possibility for a dedicated home theater opened, so time to start shopping!

I stumbled across a used Hegel H80 stereo amp with a good pricetag ($700, new price around $1500 here in Norway) since my living room now would be a dedicated stereo setup this seemed like a good choice, and boy was it!
It really brought my Bowers & Wilkins 683's to life, with sound and dynamics i did not know they where capable of, i could simply not belive how much better it sounded!
This in spite of the rated 80W compared to my AVR's rated 105W...

At this point i really started to read and find out how things actually worked, and why things can sound that different, so after a while a decided to get my HT up and running on my budget and desired quality i would need to build speakers myself.

So i built a pair of ER18's finding the plans on this foum.
This speakers are known to be pretty efficient (as opposed to the B&W's) and can be driven by pretty much everything, the Hegel amp drove them to perfection, sounding way better then the B&W in my livingroom.

When they finally where moved in to the HT after the room had been completed i used the AVR2313 on them, and where never happy with the sound (some room related, and some electronics), to make things better i built some Hypex amps (2x60w @ 4ohm) for them, but it only made the sound slightly better, i also borowed a huuuuge Parasound from a friend (i think it was rated to 250w pr channel), this actually sounded just like the Hypex amp, so i can conclude that the problem is not the power amp, but the pre-amp or DAC in the 2313.

I have also tried the Hegel in my HT and it was a different ballpark.

So now recently i got a Denon AVR X6200W on sale (paying $1300 for a $2000 amp) and it sounds way better then the old 2313 whitch was also a good avr, but still not as good as the Hegel.

This is now in a acoustically treated room.

As i dont know Mrboat's amp specifically, i would say by the model number it is a fairly old avr, and have no problem to conclude that a decent stereo amp would out-perform it easily.

I agree that speakers may prove to be the biggest change in a system, just next to the room itself ( do a bit of reading on room acoustics and you know what i mean), however the amp and DAC is also a really big contributor to a great sound.

Sorry for the long post (also slight offtopic) and for my poor english (obviously not my native language), but now you can see where i am coming from and what i mean with the new amp comment.

If you have a nice dealer nearby (or a friend with a decent amp) just see if you can borrow one home for a demo and listen for yourself.

 

[lovinthehd]

At this point i really started to read and find out how things actually worked, and why things can sound that different,

So how do things actually work then? Why do they sound that different?

 

[roadrune]

So how do things actually work then? Why do they sound that different?

I think my original thought behind that comment is lost in translation, but ill give it a go:

Since an avr should do loads of things simultaniosly; dac, pre, videoconverting, room correction, surround processing and poweramplification and more at a price most people is willing to pay, it goes without saying they have to save loads on components compared to a stereo amp who can concentrate on dac, pre and poweramp (for only two channels instead of up to 11).

An avr with the same sound quality as a $1000 stereoamp would more than likely be in the $6-8000 range.

 

[lovinthehd]

I think my original thought behind that comment is lost in translation, but ill give it a go:

Since an avr should do loads of things simultaniosly; dac, pre, videoconverting, room correction, surround processing and poweramplification and more at a price most people is willing to pay, it goes without saying they have to save loads on components compared to a stereo amp who can concentrate on dac, pre and poweramp (for only two channels instead of up to 11).

An avr with the same sound quality as a $1000 stereoamp would more than likely be in the $6-8000 range.

Not my experience, which predates yours by 25 years, and yes I have several 2ch rigs and avrs right now (five setups in the house; three avr based, two 2ch rigs; to use 'em and I still have stuff sitting around).

If you feel the audio quality is directly related to the costs then why didn't you then spend that much on the multi-ch unit? I've seen the argument that expensive 2ch gear is so much better than cheap multi-ch gear, but always wonder why such people don't spend the equivalent amount on the multi-ch setup, why do they expect to compare the costs to 2ch gear? Just because they're only interested in 2ch sources? I don't think boutique manufacturing and the related increase in cost necessarily translates to a better audio experience; if they use better quality components and manufacturing techniques and have increased reliability then great. I've heard nice things about Hegel, but for the cost it had damn well better be pretty nice.

Enough of a hijack of this thread, sorry OP....roadrune and I should probably take this to PM

 

[roadrune]

I think we will just have to agree to disagree.

Btw: expencive does not equal great, that said you cant make great hi-fi products super cheap and still make a business out of it, i suppose this is why we do diy in the first place (and offcourse that i really like to diy).

 

[MrBoat]

Actually, $1000 or more for a receiver isn't cheap, especially considering what can be done with, or fit on a microchip these days. You can buy a pretty robust computer now for $1000.

I'm not knocking dedicated stereo gear. I have 2 channel amps, and still own an older adcom gfa 5500 that I was quite fond of. I wouldn't mind using dedicated stereo equipment being that's where I came from, and to be honest, that's even more my style.

But, between these Tempest speakers, the Denon, the luck of my listening area configuration, this is actually quite remarkable. The buddy who gave me the Denon, who is an everything snob to the point of being downright insulting at times, had to concede his criticisms when he heard this. First thing he said when he walked in the door and saw the Tempests was, and I quote; "Hahaha. . .those are PA speakers!" Then his tune changed to; "Those are kit speakers? That's nuts." And then finally, I played a random song, "Ride On" by AC/DC and he points to his arms to show me the goosebumps from the guitar solo part. And that with the volume at about 1/3rd.

I've been listening to music on my own for about 40 years. Heard a lot of incredible sound systems and live music. It occurs to me that Denon etc, are indeed aware that there are audiophiles listening to their equipment and are to be subjected to such criticisms. To me, who is possibly the most skeptical of anything modern, I have to admit they have done a bang-up job. That I am sitting on that fine line of a need for any improvements, without a simultaneous, side-by-side comparison, being humanly detectable enough to where it actually matters. Or how long that effect would last once I removed one or the other type from the equation.

I may revisit more dedicated music gear, but that would be more of doing away with all the features I don't need than any gains of actual sound quality. So far, I have been able to make the Denon do what I have wanted and without much fuss. It's already here and didn't cost me a nickel so I am curious now what all it can do.

 

[KEW]

Have you actually compared good avrs to good stereo amps?

For AVR's, I have the Denon AVR-4520ci and the Marantz SR-7008
For Stereo gear, I have my ~'79 Sansui AU-717 which I had rebuilt with upgraded cap's, etc. In case you don't know, at one time Sansui made excellent gear. This integrated amp has seperate transformers for each channel and, aside from the dual mono-block design, had a frequency response at one watt (so mainly out of the pre-amp section) from 0 Hz (DC) to 200,000 Hz at +0/-3dB!
For more modern gear, I have a Classe' Audio "four" pre-amp and a Aragon 4004 mkII power amp.

I will not say that I hear no difference simply because of the delay required to swap cables back and forth. However, I am very comfortable saying there is nothing decisive or "far superior" about one over the other (running the AVR's in pure direct mode and by-passing tone controls on the stereo gear so as to avoid any coloration of the sound).
In my mind, I'll always perceive that my Sansui maybe sounds just a little better than the others, but I must consider that I have had that amp for almost 4 decades, and while I am a "logical engineer type" I know that I have personified and grown fond of that amp for consistently producing great sound over the years. I haven't yet found that passage that I can hear something on one that repeatably sounds different on the other.

One difference between your gear and mine is, for stereo gear, I do not have a DAC (except the one in my CD player)!

...but the effect of swapping speakers is a radically different story!