Emotiva XPA5 blew out my Emotiva ERM6.3 & ERD speakers!

[snfekf]

A couple weeks ago, we had a party and the music was up pretty loud, but not loud enough that we couldn’t talk over it. I had my ipod hooked up to my Onkyo receiver, with pre-outs to my XPA5 which drives my ERM6.3 L/C/R and 2 ERD1’s. I had the receiver set to all stereo.

The next day, I noticed one of the ERD’s was not working at all! I sent it to Emotiva for repair. After I sent it, I noticed my ERM’s sounding very “hollow.” I put my ear directly against each driver and there was no sound at all coming from any of the midrange drivers on all three speakers! I called Emotiva to tell them I was having problems with my ERMs too. They informed me the ERD I sent in was fried! They went on to tell me they repaired the speaker as a courtesy but they will not repair my other speakers under warranty because it was my fault! The speakers are about 2 years old, the amp less than a year old.

Here’s the text from the email they sent me:

Thank you for your email. After looking into your case and speaking with the technician who completed the inspection it was found that the voice coils and the crossover received damage because of abuse from the amplifier being over driven. The result caused the audio signal to clip the amplifier and distort the audio signal. This caused the driver voice coil to over heat and damage the speaker. Attached you will find three pictures of the damaged voice coil. The color of the voice coil winding should be a shiny copper color however as you can see from the photos they are a dull black and the winding have been pull from the center pole. The voice coil should be tightly wound around the center pole of the driver.

There is also evidence of abuse in the crossover. In the picture labeled "Damaged Transistor" the elongated white component should have lettering on it. The transistor heated to such a temperature that the lettering has been burned off and the transistor has started to discolor. Also on the pictures labeled "Damaged Capacitor" you can see the top of the capacitor is curved and pushed outward. These damages can only be caused by an amplifier being over driven causing excessive temperature. As stated in the product manual for the speaker, damage to our speakers caused by misuse or abusive operation is not covered by the warranty.

We are happy to complete the repairs on your other speakers however as it is not a failure of the speaker or the amplifier you will be responsible for the repair costs. Our technicians estimate that [/b]it will be approximately $200 per speaker to complete the repairs. Thank you for your understanding.

So Emotiva is blaming me for “abusing” my speakers! I was just listening to music through my ipod! Shouldn’t the amp have shut itself down before causing such dramatic speaker failure? Those speakers are rated up to 350 watts. I don’t understand how playing music at a loud volume can cause such enormous damage. And I’m really surprised at Emotiva for telling me I did something wrong and they won’t do anything about it!

 

[agarwalro]

The description of the pictures Emotiva provided unequivocally shows that too much power or clipped signal got sent to the speakers, probably both.

While you perceived the volume to be reasonable, it must have been too much for too long.

The Onkyo receivers are known to have hot pre-outs. Perhaps the XPA5 was clipping.

 

[Darkwing_duck]

In the event of being driven into clipping I too would assume the amp would shut down. It wouldn't be far fetched to make that assumption; emotiva amps are exceptionally engineered and seem to be assembled with a high execution. So it wouldn't be stupid to think its not a manufacturing/operating defect within the amp. The only possible explanation I can think of would be the speaker components. I'm not saying they were faulty but maybe subpar in their selection in respect to their allowed tolerances. You know, like choosen air their extreme allowable tolerances but still acceptable to meet their designated performance standards. I'm not saying emotiva dropped the ball on the speakers when they were manufactured and when the parts were choosen but maybe you just got the bad batch of speakers still operating within their engineering specifications.

I could be wrong all together. I don't know. Maybe someone here could make a better diagnosis. For what it's worth, I don't think emotiva is trying to screw you either. They just call it as they see it.

 

[fuzz092888]

What size space were you filling? Was it open to other areas? Were you indoors/outdoors/both?

 

[j_garcia]

If your ipod was sending a less than stellar signal to a receiver with hot pre-outs at party levels and duration, I'd have to guess abuse is an unfortunate candidate, or rather contributing factor, here. The amp did not cause the issue, and no it won't shut off simply because it is clipping if it is within the limits; it would likely need to physically fail or go into thermal protection before it would shut down IMO.

 

[zhimbo]

A couple weeks ago, we had a party and the music was up pretty loud, but not loud enough that we couldn’t talk over it.

That isn't very informative...if the music is loud enough that you can't talk over it, that's really frickin' loud. I would hope no one ever plays music so loud that it's impossible to be heard over. If you could only talk to people standing next to you, that's still really frickin' loud.

I don't really know what happened of course, and I don't want to just "pile on", but realize that from our (forum readers') end, the Emotiva information is far more detailed and objective than anything you're going to be able to report. That's not really your fault, I'm just assuming you didn't record SPL measurements over the course of the party, monitor electrical draw and signal clipping, etc. But I would at least take this as evidence to consider that something went wrong on your end and not just assume Emotiva is screwing you over.

 

[TLS Guy]

A couple weeks ago, we had a party and the music was up pretty loud, but not loud enough that we couldn’t talk over it. I had my ipod hooked up to my Onkyo receiver, with pre-outs to my XPA5 which drives my ERM6.3 L/C/R and 2 ERD1’s. I had the receiver set to all stereo.

The next day, I noticed one of the ERD’s was not working at all! I sent it to Emotiva for repair. After I sent it, I noticed my ERM’s sounding very “hollow.” I put my ear directly against each driver and there was no sound at all coming from any of the midrange drivers on all three speakers! I called Emotiva to tell them I was having problems with my ERMs too. They informed me the ERD I sent in was fried! They went on to tell me they repaired the speaker as a courtesy but they will not repair my other speakers under warranty because it was my fault! The speakers are about 2 years old, the amp less than a year old.

Here’s the text from the email they sent me:

Thank you for your email. After looking into your case and speaking with the technician who completed the inspection it was found that the voice coils and the crossover received damage because of abuse from the amplifier being over driven. The result caused the audio signal to clip the amplifier and distort the audio signal. This caused the driver voice coil to over heat and damage the speaker. Attached you will find three pictures of the damaged voice coil. The color of the voice coil winding should be a shiny copper color however as you can see from the photos they are a dull black and the winding have been pull from the center pole. The voice coil should be tightly wound around the center pole of the driver.

There is also evidence of abuse in the crossover. In the picture labeled "Damaged Transistor" the elongated white component should have lettering on it. The transistor heated to such a temperature that the lettering has been burned off and the transistor has started to discolor. Also on the pictures labeled "Damaged Capacitor" you can see the top of the capacitor is curved and pushed outward. These damages can only be caused by an amplifier being over driven causing excessive temperature. As stated in the product manual for the speaker, damage to our speakers caused by misuse or abusive operation is not covered by the warranty.

We are happy to complete the repairs on your other speakers however as it is not a failure of the speaker or the amplifier you will be responsible for the repair costs. Our technicians estimate that [/b]it will be approximately $200 per speaker to complete the repairs. Thank you for your understanding.

So Emotiva is blaming me for “abusing” my speakers! I was just listening to music through my ipod! Shouldn’t the amp have shut itself down before causing such dramatic speaker failure? Those speakers are rated up to 350 watts. I don’t understand how playing music at a loud volume can cause such enormous damage. And I’m really surprised at Emotiva for telling me I did something wrong and they won’t do anything about it!

Unfortunately common sense is rare.

Just think about how hot 350 watts gets a light bulb. Now consider fine wire confined to voice coil gap.

To get that much heat away requires loudspeaker drivers that cost more than you whole rig.

The big problem is vile pop music. It is compressed and the speakers never get a break. You can not play modern engineered pop music at any sort of high volume on any rig the average consumer can afford.

Music needs to have lots of quiet passages, and a big difference between loud and soft.

However the musicians and he engineers who record, produce and master this type of program, are vulgar types without even a modicum of common sense, and now the repair bill is down to you.

 

[snfekf]

I appreciate very much all the insight! I also posted this on Emotiva's site. Most attributed the failure to a poor signal coming from the ipod, possibly magnified by the receiver. I spoke with a friend of mine who is a customer installer and av expert, who also suspected it was the ipod. To be honest, I never really liked those speakers too much. Don't tell my wife, but I'm kind of glad it happened, now I can get new speakers!!!

 

[Darkwing_duck]

Unfortunately common sense is rare.

Just think about how hot 350 watts gets a light bulb. Now consider fine wire confined to voice coil gap.

To get that much heat away requires loudspeaker drivers that cost more than you whole rig.

The big problem is vile pop music. It is compressed and the speakers never get a break. You can not play modern engineered pop music at any sort of high volume on any rig the average consumer can afford.

Music needs to have lots of quiet passages, and a big difference between loud and soft.

However the musicians and he engineers who record, produce and master this type of program, are vulgar types without even a modicum of common sense, and now the repair bill is down to you.

So it's the music' fault now? LOL

 

[AcuDefTechGuy]

Next time you better measure the volume and document via video.

We need distance & measured SPL.

What surround mode did you use? Subwoofers? XO?

 

[AcuDefTechGuy]

I listen to highly compressed pop music too. Max SPL in 2.0 mode is 94dBC. Average SPL about 85dBC. Distance 3.6m. Never an issue.

But I don't listen continuously for 4 hours, though.

May just a few songs before changing it up.

But in terms of OSHA SPL limits, my max volume is never above 85dBA.

 

[ichigo]

Sounds like OP needs a dedicated pre-pro, or get a Marantz receiver, as Marantz pre-outs go can go as high as 5 to 7 VRms before clipping. Your Onkyo receiver's pre-outs are clipping as they are only rated to around 1 VRms.

 

[agarwalro]

Re: Emotiva XPA5 blew out my Emotiva ERM6.3 & ERD speakers!

Sounds like OP needs a dedicated pre-pro, or get a Marantz receiver, as Marantz pre-outs go can go as high as 5 to 7 VRms before clipping. Your Onkyo receiver's pre-outs are clipping as they are only rated to around 1 VRms.

Actually having high pre-out voltage will clip the amp's inputs sooner, depending on the amp's input ratings.

I'm pretty sure the Onkyo's can produce more output. Can you provide a reference for the 1 Vrms statement?

 

[TLS Guy]

Sounds like OP needs a dedicated pre-pro, or get a Marantz receiver, as Marantz pre-outs go can go as high as 5 to 7 VRms before clipping. Your Onkyo receiver's pre-outs are clipping as they are only rated to around 1 VRms.

This concept of too little power is pretty much a myth. Speakers are blown by too much power period.

Having said that, the type of music played is highly relevant. Natural instruments have a very different acoustic power spectrum compared to electronic instruments. The clipping of your system is totally dwarfed by the clipping deliberately added to pop music. Distortion in large amounts is deliberately added to pop music which drives the frequency spectrum upwards drastically increasing the probability of speaker damage.

In recent years we have the frequent use of a program called Abelton live. This program adds very unnatural power content to the frequency spectrum including square waves, which add enormous mid and HF content to the source, as well as enabling the addition of power in frequencies that most natural instruments would not. In addition sounds generated can be continuous without decay over extended time. In the music schools I try to make students understand these concepts, but most seem way too spaced out to understand the consequences of what they are doing. So I expect the issue of blown speakers to increase over time.

The bottom line is that for this type of program played at high spl on the vast majority of domestic speakers will always spell death. In a party situation you can pretty much guarantee to have blown speakers in the morning.

 

[slipperybidness]

OP may not know if some drunken party-goers turned it up even louder at some point too.

 

[agarwalro]

Re: Emotiva XPA5 blew out my Emotiva ERM6.3 & ERD speakers!

It needed to be said that if the iPod was connected via USB, signal quality is a non issue. Choice of music having low dynamic range and amount of compression in MP3s further increasing the average volume of tracks, is still relevant.

 

[j_garcia]

This concept of too little power is pretty much a myth. Speakers are blown by too much power period.

I agree with this, however the mechanism that typically triggers the event is not enough power causing that spike in demand vs. available. There was a really good article on how it occurs but I can't find it now; sort of like how a tube amp is able to deliver power beyond its rated capability because of the behavior of the tube. In the case of SS, it will attempt to deliver that power up until the point where it no longer can and then clip, causing massive spikes in output as it tries to correct the bad waveform; something along those lines.

It needed to be said that if the iPod was connected via USB, signal quality is a non issue. Choice of music having low dynamic range and amount of compression in MP3s further increasing the average volume of tracks, is still relevant.

That's what I was getting at when I said iPod connected, more toward the media quality not the connection or iPod itself.

 

[TLS Guy]

I agree with this, however the mechanism that typically triggers the event is not enough power causing that spike in demand vs. available. There was a really good article on how it occurs but I can't find it now; sort of like how a tube amp is able to deliver power beyond its rated capability because of the behavior of the tube. In the case of SS, it will attempt to deliver that power up until the point where it no longer can and then clip, causing massive spikes in output as it tries to correct the bad waveform; something along those lines.



That's what I was getting at when I said iPod connected, more toward the media quality not the connection or iPod itself.

That is not the behavior I have observed. When the voltage limits are exceeded then harmonic distortion occurs. For class A amps it is mainly even harmonic distortion, so these are X2, X4, X6 of the frequencies involved at deceasing power as the order of the harmonic increases.

A class A/B amp at clipping will be operating entirely in class B mode, and the harmonic distortion will be largely odd harmonic which is much more unpleasant and damaging.

So it is X3, X5, X7 of the frequencies involved, at decreasing power as order increases.

So it is shifting the spectral power balance of the program.

This is important as tweeters and mids can not handle the power of woofers. So if a speaker can take 200 watts say, the tweeter will likely only handle 10 to 20 watts without burning out. So if you feed a 200 watt speaker with frequencies at and above the crossover point you will likely burn the tweeter out with as little as 10 watts.

But as I point out, the point at which distortion is added, is irrelevant as to whether you will have speaker burnout. So a guitarist engaging his fuzz box is just as harmful to the speaker as amp clipping. Things like synths can put all the power at tweeter frequencies if producers are not careful and cause a lot of trouble.

In general woofers bite the dust from mechanical damage and also a combination of mechanical and thermal damage.

Mids and tweeters are almost exclusively damaged by thermal burn out.

The take home message is that very little power in a program with the energy spectrum in the wrong frequency band will burn out a speaker. You can do this easily without getting an amp anywhere near the clip point, and certainly way below the speakers rated power handling.

 

[snfekf]

So I took apart the three speakers today and took the 6 midrange drivers that were not working, along with all the electronics. They tested all the drivers and they were working fine, no damage. However, there was damage to some transistors, capacitors, etc. I do think at some point a certain partygoer decided to see if they could take the volume to "11!" A Spinal Tap fan no doubt! The good news is, it's only going to be around $50/speaker to repair the electronics. The ipod was connected via USB to the front of the Onkyo. I had the receiver set to all channel stereo. It was played at a pretty high volume for an extended period. From all the responses here, along with all the responses on the Emotiva Lounge, I feel it was probably not the fault of the speakers or amp, but a poor source played at a high volume for an extended period. I like the suggestion of getting a new receiver, or dedicated pre/pro, I just haven't been able to convince my wife of that! The take-away for me in all this is simple, turn it down!

 

[TLS Guy]

So I took apart the three speakers today and took the 6 midrange drivers that were not working, along with all the electronics. They tested all the drivers and they were working fine, no damage. However, there was damage to some transistors, capacitors, etc. I do think at some point a certain partygoer decided to see if they could take the volume to "11!" A Spinal Tap fan no doubt! The good news is, it's only going to be around $50/speaker to repair the electronics. The ipod was connected via USB to the front of the Onkyo. I had the receiver set to all channel stereo. It was played at a pretty high volume for an extended period. From all the responses here, along with all the responses on the Emotiva Lounge, I feel it was probably not the fault of the speakers or amp, but a poor source played at a high volume for an extended period. I like the suggestion of getting a new receiver, or dedicated pre/pro, I just haven't been able to convince my wife of that! The take-away for me in all this is simple, turn it down!

You're right! This thread is the LONG version of "turn it down!"