AVR and Crossover

[Teetertotter?]

I recently replaced my mains with Klipsch RP-500M II 's in my 5.1 system. Speakers were set to small and performed the Audyssey speaker calibration. Mains are 6 feet apart with tweeters at ear level, speakers are pointed straight out into the room, and my listening distance is 6.5 feet, and AVR is set to Stereo. Using the Audyssey calibration, Piano, Classical, Soft Rock, and Oldies music, sounded so perfect. Perhaps the crossovers in the RP-500M II, made the quality sound difference?

I did change the speaker crossovers to 80Hz, but the music sounded horrible, in my case. I could not bear it, in my situation. The sub setting stays at 120Hz. I know we read/hear to set the crossovers to 80Hz. Am I an exception with my Denon AVR?? I don't like a lot of base and volume/gain knob on the sub, is at 9 o'clock, just right, for movies too.

My equipment list is below, in my signature.

 

[TLS Guy]

I recently replaced my mains with Klipsch RP-500M II 's in my 5.1 system. Speakers were set to small and performed the Audyssey speaker calibration. Mains are 6 feet apart with tweeters at ear level, speakers are pointed straight out into the room, and my listening distance is 6.5 feet, and AVR is set to Stereo. Using the Audyssey calibration, Piano, Classical, Soft Rock, and Oldies music, sounded so perfect. Perhaps the crossovers in the RP-500M II, made the quality sound difference?

I did change the speaker crossovers to 80Hz, but the music sounded horrible, in my case. I could not bear it, in my situation. The sub setting stays at 120Hz. I know we read/hear to set the crossovers to 80Hz. Am I an exception with my Denon AVR?? I don't like a lot of base and volume/gain knob on the sub, is at 9 o'clock, just right, for movies too.

My equipment list is below, in my signature.

There is no hard and fast rule, but sensible guidance. If speakers are capable I am a great believer in LFE + Main, as this blends the best as phase shift is reduced. However that is probably not a good idea for most situations. There is a good rule of thumb to set crossover to F3 plus 50% So for your mains the F3 is 50 Hz, and 80 Hz crossover is appropriate. Your center has an F3 of 65 and the surrounds 62. So, a 100 Hz crossover is appropriate for those. They have small drivers though, so you might want to try 120 Hz. A lot depends on listening tests here, but that rule of thumb is pretty good.

Your mains are only 6' apart and I think that is a problem. That puts your front three all only 3' apart. That is going to have adverse frequency response errors due to phase cancellations and reinforcements from comb filtering. From pictures posted by members here, I have to say the commonest error I see is speakers far too close together. You want to space speakers 6' to 8' feet apart. That means placing your mains 12' or more apart.