which speakers from crutchfield would you get??

N

nicknewbie

Audioholic Intern
I have $1000 to spend at crutchfield on speakers and would appreciate some opinions on which ones "you" would get for music listening only...I have a denon avr-x4100 to power them,...thanks a lot guys
 
N

nicknewbie

Audioholic Intern
wow,....I know I am new to high end audio but I cant for the life of me see myself spending $1100 on some small bookshelf speakers... can someone please explain what makes these speakers so expensive ??? It seems like you could get towers for that price...
 
KEW

KEW

Audioholic Overlord
wow,....I know I am new to high end audio but I cant for the life of me see myself spending $1100 on some small bookshelf speakers... can someone please explain what makes these speakers so expensive ??? It seems like you could get towers for that price...
You can get towers for $1100 a pair, but if you want towers that sound as good as the Imagine B, you need to spend twice that ($2200) for a pair:

http://www.crutchfield.com/p_760IMGNTB/PSB-Imagine-T-Black-Ash.html

They will provide a bit more bass (but if you use a sub, that is not going to matter) and often can play louder; however, most of us would rather pay for better sound quality than extra cabinet and extra SPL (which depends on how loud you like to listen).
 
N

nicknewbie

Audioholic Intern
I like to listen to music VERY loud yet I like it to be VERY clear....I think that is why I have blown 3 tweeters in the past week... I thought I was spending a lot of money on this set up, but I am seeing now that $2500 is chump change when it comes to high end audio...I just cant see those little bookshelf speakers putting out BIG sound, I may be wrong ,.......I really wish I would of found this site before I went with what I got...This whole ordeal is starting to take its toll on me....I have klipsch rp-280f speakers coming tomorrow at 10am and I bet by 3 or 4 o'clock I have the tweeters blown with this "GREAT FIT" receiver that "crutchfield" "ASSURED" me was MORE than enough to push these klipsch speakers....really frustrated at this point, wish I still smoked pot right about now
 
crossedover

crossedover

Audioholic Chief
I like to listen to music VERY loud yet I like it to be VERY clear....I think that is why I have blown 3 tweeters in the past week... I thought I was spending a lot of money on this set up, but I am seeing now that $2500 is chump change when it comes to high end audio...I just cant see those little bookshelf speakers putting out BIG sound, I may be wrong ,.......I really wish I would of found this site before I went with what I got...This whole ordeal is starting to take its toll on me....I have klipsch rp-280f speakers coming tomorrow at 10am and I bet by 3 or 4 o'clock I have the tweeters blown with this "GREAT FIT" receiver that "crutchfield" "ASSURED" me was MORE than enough to push these klipsch speakers....really frustrated at this point, wish I still smoked pot right about now
The difference in maximum SPL between the silver 2 bookshelves and the silver six floorstander is 113 vs 115. What type of music do you listen to, in which format and what sources?
 
TLS Guy

TLS Guy

Seriously, I have no life.
I like to listen to music VERY loud yet I like it to be VERY clear....I think that is why I have blown 3 tweeters in the past week... I thought I was spending a lot of money on this set up, but I am seeing now that $2500 is chump change when it comes to high end audio...I just cant see those little bookshelf speakers putting out BIG sound, I may be wrong ,.......I really wish I would of found this site before I went with what I got...This whole ordeal is starting to take its toll on me....I have klipsch rp-280f speakers coming tomorrow at 10am and I bet by 3 or 4 o'clock I have the tweeters blown with this "GREAT FIT" receiver that "crutchfield" "ASSURED" me was MORE than enough to push these klipsch speakers....really frustrated at this point, wish I still smoked pot right about now
If you want loud and clear that means a big budget.

As I have posted many times, a speaker that can play at power, without distress and not blow up is a formidable affair. To do that your budget is nowhere near enough for the drivers involved, with nothing left for the cabinet and crossovers.

If you are on a limited budget then you you need quality over quantity.

A nice smooth frequency response with good dispersion aces high volume any day.

If you really want both, then you need to spend thousands, lots of them.

This is not Crutchfields fault. Your receiver is fine. That receiver has quite enough power to destroy any speaker in your budget.

Just think how hot a 100 watt incandescent light bulb gets. Now put that power in a coil on the end of the cone in a narrow magnet gap and just consider the problems.

The voice coil not actually blowing does not nearly end the problem. As the voice coil heats up the resistance goes up, so the output falls. This is called dynamic thermal compression, and it really mucks up the sound.

So the heat has to be dealt with fast. Only a few really renowned manufacturers of drivers begin to solve this problem.

It does not end wit the drivers, making them work together with a good crossover design that also helps with power distribution is another big issue. Then putting it all together in a well constructed and braced cabinet providing the correct loading comes into play. Good loudspeakers are heavy and so freight is also a major issue.

That is why there are so few good speakers, and good high powered speakers even rarer animals.

One last point, avoid Def Tech, I rate them unreservedly in the awful category.

If you can't up your budget, then buy either the PSB, Monitor audio of Focal bookshelves that have been recommended and watch your volume levels, especially rock music.

Lastly, speakers are far more often than not blown by too much power and not too little.

In my view under powering as a cause of speaker failure is rare if not non existent.
 
crossedover

crossedover

Audioholic Chief
wow,....I know I am new to high end audio but I cant for the life of me see myself spending $1100 on some small bookshelf speakers... can someone please explain what makes these speakers so expensive ??? It seems like you could get towers for that price...
Tower speakers do not equate to better performance most agree that the midrange frequencies from 200 - 5000hz are the most audibly important range. So a good mid/woofer and tweeter along with a well designed crossover is needed. These drivers are usually not cheep. Tower speakers added volume can allow for a lower F3 and slightly higher SPL, though not always.

 
N

nicknewbie

Audioholic Intern
wow,...that's a lot of info and much appreciated...I have a question for you. In your opinion why do you think I keep blowing tweeters in these klipsch speakers? my receiver is supposedly supplying 125 watts per channel, and the klipsch speakers "supposedly can handle 150 watts 'CONTINUOSLY"...
 
TLS Guy

TLS Guy

Seriously, I have no life.
wow,...that's a lot of info and much appreciated...I have a question for you. In your opinion why do you think I keep blowing tweeters in these klipsch speakers? my receiver is supposedly supplying 125 watts per channel, and the klipsch speakers "supposedly can handle 150 watts 'CONTINUOSLY"...
First of all no domestic speaker will handle 125 or 150 watts continuously without blowing up. Speakers are predicated on playing music, which is dynamic and not continuous sign waves.

However your speakers have this miserable unit at the mouth of the horn.



This is what Klipsch tweeters used to look like.



The felony is compounded as the crossover to your miserable tweeter is 1400 Hz, where as 2500 Kz is a more reasonable point for all but the most robust drivers.

This latter is significant because the power spectrum of music rapidly falls off at higher frequencies, and there is usually a very significant drop in power demand above 2500 Hz.

Only very robust compression drivers really tolerate the power demands of a crossover at 1400 Hz and below.

Now rock music is a particular problem, as it uses a lot of unnatural instruments with excessive high frequency energy.

Unfortunately mix engineers make their way here to Benedict from Minneapolis to check their mixes from time to time and often times have me do the final master here.

I mastered an album Monday.

Among a lot of metering I can see the energy spectrum of the music on a continuous basis.

Last Mondays production was even a little worse than average for HF content with a lot of energy out and beyond 2.5 KHz. There was a lot of energy out to 15 KKz!

These guys like it pretty loud, but I can tell you I put limits on them for my own hearing and for fear of damaging my very expensive tweeters.

With the exception of a lot of pipe organs classical music has an energy spectrum that falls off significantly above 2.5 KHz, at least on a continuous basis.

A tweeter like yours will likely blow if fed energy on a fairly continuous basis in the 10 to 20 watt range.

So factors in blowing tweeters are small size, low crossover point and playing loud compressed music with a robust HF spectrum.

In closing a power spec, of a speaker is pretty much meaningless, as it depends, and depends and depends on a host of variables.
 
KEW

KEW

Audioholic Overlord
It varies by company, but specifications for speaker power handling are often determined more by the marketing department than the techs!
 
N

nicknewbie

Audioholic Intern
is there a replacement tweeter I can buy to replace the one I have?? thank you for all the info,cant imagine what your studio sounds like, very nice set up.....Hell it wouldn't do me any good to have all that stuff lol ,,,,I could never get it all hooked up ,way tooooo many wires for me to figure out...but it was fun to look at all the pics
 
TLS Guy

TLS Guy

Seriously, I have no life.
is there a replacement tweeter I can buy to replace the one I have?? thank you for all the info,cant imagine what your studio sounds like, very nice set up.....Hell it wouldn't do me any good to have all that stuff lol ,,,,I could never get it all hooked up ,way tooooo many wires for me to figure out...but it was fun to look at all the pics
Not really. An expert could redesign the crossover for a new tweeter. With a crossover at 1400 Hz it would need to be a much bigger tweeter. This would be a complex project.

If you want to keep those speakers after you replace the tweeters, then turn the volume way down.

Remember your budget does not extend to high powered speakers, so you need to turn the volume way down anyway.
 
N

nicknewbie

Audioholic Intern
just got off the phone with klipsch and he assures me that the denon receiver is underpowering the speakers and that is why the tweeters keep blowing...He suggested getting a 200 watt amp ,will this solve the problem?
 
slipperybidness

slipperybidness

Audioholic Warlord
just got off the phone with klipsch and he assures me that the denon receiver is underpowering the speakers and that is why the tweeters keep blowing...He suggested getting a 200 watt amp ,will this solve the problem?
Of course they are gonna say "not our problem", which is exactly what he is telling you.

If it were my $, I would not be springing for a 200W amp right now.
 
S

shadyJ

Speaker of the House
Staff member
If you are cranking the speakers and they are dying, the speakers are the problem. They are not meeting your demands. Like TLS Guy said, the tweeters are not doing the job for you. Here is the speakers you need from Crutchfield. Those will not die from under-powering the tweeters. They will get much, much louder than the Klipsch speakers. The Klipsch tweeters are sadness. Those JBL live sound speakers will crush you.
 
N

nicknewbie

Audioholic Intern
why not....? I am not broke , just wasn't looking to spend $10k on a solid system, but it looks like I may end up doing just that in the end......I have a pair of rp-280f arriving this morning and if they blow then I will upgrade again until I find a pair that will play LOUD and CLEAR
 

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