Elucidating AVR Channels vs Total Channels with an Amplifiers

[Fried Chicken]

I missed that... you are getting overheating faults? That is definitely a bad sign.

As mentioned above, the Polk Speakers are not friendly electrical loads. You could be well on the way to blowing out your AVR.

Do you employ an active cooling solution on your AVR? Something like the AC Infinity Aircom units:

AIRCOM T8, AV Receiver Cooling Fan with LCD Temp Controller, 17" Rear Exhaust

This quiet fan system is designed to provide efficient cooling for receivers, amplifiers, DVRs and more.

www.acinfinity.com

Or more simply just some 120mm fans:

MULTIFAN S2, Quiet USB Centrifugal Cooling Fan 120mm

Direct exhaust air effectively utilizing the Multifan S2. This quiet 120mm USB centrifugal cooling fan pushes hot air safely away from home electronics.

www.acinfinity.com

MULTIFAN S7, Quiet USB Cooling Fan Dual 120mm

Protect your electronics cabinet utilizing the Multifan S7. This quiet dual 120mm USB fan system delivers superior airflow to maintain optimal temperatures.

www.acinfinity.com

(Just examples, but I use an Aircom similar to the first link and it is great!)

Anyway, the other aspect of this is that you may well be overdriving the AVR with multiple Polk Speakers. Getting good amplification that can handle the current loads posed by those speakers is important. Bi-Amping will not help that, though, just to be clear.
The electrical load of those speakers will generate a significant amount of heat in the Amp Stage which then must be dissipated. Heat is the number one killer of electronics.

I have some USB fan I have hooked up to the USB port. Initially I had it on the side of the enclosure, now I just put it on top. I didn’t want to put it right on top initially because air movement can cause issues with electronics (specifically my cable modem). Doesn’t seem to have affected anything.

@Fried Chicken would you be willing to take photos of the insides of the speakers? We would need to see the Tweeters. What is meant by squished? We would also need to see the XO. Knowing the model of the Tweet would be nice, too, as we can look and see it's performance criteria and thus cross reference perhaps to the actual XO transition to the High-Woofer. Seeing the XO itself might tell us if it was modded in addition to the Tweeter replacement.

I’ll see what I can do. The speakers are Paradigm Monitor 9 v4. Like I said I plan on selling them, although I do quite like the sound they produce (except the soundstage is moved to the right).

 

[Pogre]

Some pics of your setup might be helpful too, if you don't mind. I'm curious about the space your receiver is in, it sounds tight. Overheating and shutting down is a problem for sure. Some Polk speakers aren't very friendly to power and you have a full set, 2 of which are questionable at best. Putting different tweeters in there can definitely change the impedance of the speaker and cause even more problems. Speaking of, can you take a pic of the squished tweeter too? Just a clean pic of the front of the speaker is fine, as long as the squishy tweeter is easy to see.

You could also take a pair of one of your surround speakers that you know are working properly and hook them to your main l/r channels and see if you're noticing the same distortions with Audyssey engaged that you're hearing with your current main speakers. I am almost certain those speakers are damaged goods at this point and should be replaced for sure.

 

[ryanosaur]

I’ll see what I can do. The speakers are Paradigm Monitor 9 v4. Like I said I plan on selling them, although I do quite like the sound they produce (except the soundstage is moved to the right).

Again... something is amiss.

I really want you to detail your setup better. I think your earlier posts have clouded the ability for us to clearly understand and help you.
Your messages go back and forth between whether the electronics in the AVR or the Speaker is the problem. (Or both.) You have shied away from the AVR being a potential fault in the chain, but it should not be ruled out.

If the soundstage is pulled to one side, this could be poor setup in room correction, bad room placement of speakers, bad room acoustics, or a fault in the speaker itself.

I hope you can tell we are interested in helping you get to the bottom of your issue.

 

[Pogre]

Again... something is amiss.

I really want you to detail your setup better. I think your earlier posts have clouded the ability for us to clearly understand and help you.
Your messages go back and forth between whether the electronics in the AVR or the Speaker is the problem. (Or both.) You have shied away from the AVR being a potential fault in the chain, but it should not be ruled out.

If the soundstage is pulled to one side, this could be poor setup in room correction, bad room placement of speakers, bad room acoustics, or a fault in the speaker itself.

I hope you can tell we are interested in helping you get to the bottom of your issue.

Yes, some more detail for sure. We're all over the place with different potential issues and problems that have a wide range of possible causes.

 

[ryanosaur]

You could also take a pair of one of your surround speakers that you know are working properly and hook them to your main l/r channels and see if you're noticing the same distortions with Audyssey engaged that you're hearing with your current main speakers.

I like this and meant to suggest something to this end!

I would suggest taking it a step further, disconnect all speakers and do a full 2-channel set up with your Surrounds moved to Main. This includes running room correction. Do not apply and PEQ other than what your Room Correction does.
Then you can alternate between with-RC and Direct to see if you hear any differences.
You can also see if there is still a lopsided soundstage.

 

[Fried Chicken]

Again... something is amiss.

I really want you to detail your setup better. I think your earlier posts have clouded the ability for us to clearly understand and help you.
Your messages go back and forth between whether the electronics in the AVR or the Speaker is the problem. (Or both.) You have shied away from the AVR being a potential fault in the chain, but it should not be ruled out.

If the soundstage is pulled to one side, this could be poor setup in room correction, bad room placement of speakers, bad room acoustics, or a fault in the speaker itself.

I hope you can tell we are interested in helping you get to the bottom of your issue.

I’m honestly overwhelmed but in a good way. I’m very sure the soundstage of the room is not the issue. I did not have this issue with my prior setup.

So here we go:
Room dimensions: Upstairs game room - 17ft x 23ft rectangle with archways to windows on the left side. Carpet and Drywall with cloth furniture.
Receiver: Yamaha Aventage RX-A810
TV: Pioneer Kuro Elite (8th gen) 60” ISF Calibrated (yes, it’s that good)
Source Material (audio): Apple TV streaming ALAC uncompressed and various compressed music incl. spotify
Source Material (video): WD TV box, Apple TV, Samsung Blu-Ray Player, Digital Cable Box
Front Speakers: Paradigm Monitor 9 v4 (FB Marketplace - prev. owner modified Tweeters from Titanium to Silk)
Center Speaker: Polk Audio CSI A6 (Just Purchased scratch/dent from Crutchfield)
Surrounds: Polk Audio RTI A3
Rear Surrounds: Older gen Polk Audio Bookshelf Speakers
Subwoofer: Alison AL10
Wires: 14 AWG Mixed CCA and Pure Copper speaker wire hooked up with banana plugs on each end. Surround speakers routed through walls/attic.

Pictures (I’m having trouble with pictures - coming soon).

 

[Fried Chicken]

Room pictures:

 

[Fried Chicken]

YPAO setup information and front tweeters

 

[Fried Chicken]

Individual Speaker PEQ

 

[lovinthehd]

The same between the two. The previous owner stated they replaced the titanium tweeters with silk tweeters. Idk why, I'm generally against modification.

Regardless, it should not cause a tonal difference between the two, if indeed the replacement tweeters are identical.

Gotcha, you mean the same tweeter in each speaker, not that they're the same as the original tweeter. If all things are equal the two speakers should sound the same....did you test by using a mono mode and switching from speaker to speaker so they had identical content? I'd probably move them to the center of the room side by side to take out the room influence to do this.

 

[Grandzoltar]

Ypao set all your speakers to large even your surrounds. Typically people who use subwoofers set all speakers to small routing signals below desired crossover to the sub. This especially taxes your yamaha a810. Set them all to small and let the power go to where the speakers are frequency capable.
Unless those silk tweeters had the same Thiel parameters, with out modifying the crossover, swapping drivers or tweeters can mess up the frequency response.

 

[lovinthehd]

Ypao set all your speakers to large even your surrounds. Typically people who use subwoofers set all speakers to small routing signals below desired crossover to the sub. This especially taxes your yamaha a810. Set them all to small and let the power go to where the speakers are frequency capable.
Unless those silk tweeters had the same Thiel parameters, with out modifying the crossover, swapping drivers or tweeters can mess up the frequency response.

He didn't list a sub, was wondering the same thing....

 

[Fried Chicken]

He didn't list a sub, was wondering the same thing....

Oops, updated. It’s an Alison AL10.

 

[lovinthehd]

Oops, updated. It’s an Alison AL10.

So you like to use it only for LFE content or do you use a double bass setting or ? (due to your speakers being set to large) I'd definitely update that sub.

 

[Pogre]

I think we're kind of at a standstill with this until you get some known to be working correctly speakers hooked up. It could be that those speakers alone are the issue. Do you have any way to find out exactly what was done to them? You really need to know what you're doing when you put a different drivers into a cabinet. You need to know Thiele small parameters and unless they match perfectly with the original a complete crossover redesign needs to be done. And that's all assuming that new tweeter even plays well with the other drivers.

Folks are right about large/small setting. If all of your speakers are set to large then your sub wouldn't be getting a signal. Do you manually change them to small? I have to with my Marantz. A lot of receivers do that.

 

[Fried Chicken]

So what's the recommendation exactly regarding setting the speakers to small vs large? I want to maximize my speaker's capabilities obviously. Or is that dictated by the bass crossover frequency?

 

[ryanosaur]

Somewhere between 1/2 octave and full octave above the speakers F3 (where it is -3dB on the low end).
An octave is a doubling of the frequency. So if your speaker is F3 at 55Hz, 1 octave would be 110Hz.
I have two sets of speakers that I cross at 80, even though they are rated at 34 and 25 Hz respectively. For me, the clarity I get in the mids and highs trumps what happens if I cross them at 60.
I spent a lot of time wrestling with that decision, but my ears told the story. I am a trained musician; I could hear the difference. Cymbals sounded sharper, for example, with the higher XO.
I also have very capable subs that perform quite well.

 

[lovinthehd]

Small vs large simply means use bass management vs do not use bass management (setting crossovers between speakers and subs). I find it kind of annoying to call it small vs large, like the marketing department doesn't want to insult the size of your package or something. Nothing wrong with taking a little low end work from the speakers, even towers, and handing it off to subs.

 

[Fried Chicken]

Small vs large simply means use bass management vs do not use bass management (setting crossovers between speakers and subs). I find it kind of annoying to call it small vs large, like the marketing department doesn't want to insult the size of your package or something. Nothing wrong with taking a little low end work from the speakers, even towers, and handing it off to subs.

Does the crossover frequency refer then to the "small" vs "large" configuration? Or is that simply for the "Extra bass" setting of the receiver?

I've previously tried setting the speakers to small, and I noticed a significant drop in bass. In fact audibly I felt it was better, however the surround speakers are set primarily for movie watching, and I feel if the original mixer had wanted only treble frequencies for the surround they would have set it.

Actually the most mind-blowing thing I've heard on the upstairs speakers is Blu-Ray concerts. Specifically Muse live at the Rome Colosseum. It is a leap in music listening akin to stereo --> mono.

 

[lovinthehd]

If you use bass management via the small speaker setting you can set a crossover between speaker/sub for a given speaker/channel. If you want to use the extra bass setting while your speakers are set to large then the crossover setting is used to judge where to limit the duplicating of the bass in the speaker and sub (think that goes for Yamaha, don't have Yamaha myself, my Denons call it LFE+Main, my Onkyo Double Bass). Some prefer that duplication, others don't. I don't myself. An alternate is sometimes simply to kick up the sub level a few dB when not using the double bass type modes. Could also depend how well you integrated the sub into your system/room to an extent as to whether you're doing as well as you can with bass.

Yes, there's less bass but that's because you're not duplicating a portion of it. The surrounds won't have a lot of bass content generally though compared to L/R/C.

I have a good collection of multich music in various media (SACD, DVD, Bluray), I do enjoy that a lot. Not particularly familiar with Muse, tho....might have to check them out.

In the end its simply preference.