help with purchase of new fronts

[dennisd]

hey experts!!

I have a yamaha htr-5760 receiver with polk r-50 fronts. I am looking to upgrade my fronts. I listen to alot of music, and need much better sound. my receiver cuts out at higher volume. I am looking to spend under $1000.00 for the fronts. What do you guys reccomend? I have a friend with some higher end klipsch that blow my doors off! Need to compete!

 

[zieglj01]

hey experts!!

I have a yamaha htr-5760 receiver with polk r-50 fronts. I am looking to upgrade my fronts. I listen to alot of music, and need much better sound. my receiver cuts out at higher volume. I am looking to spend under $1000.00 for the fronts. What do you guys reccomend? I have a friend with some higher end klipsch that blow my doors off! Need to compete!

Just to save some money - so that you can get your hearing checked
out. Go to onecall.com and get the Boston VR3 tower speakers. Then
turn them up and see how your receiver responds. Make sure every
thing is wired correctly. By the way - the midrange and treble is good
on the Boston's also.

 

[fredk]

... my receiver cuts out at higher volume. ...

The receiver puts out 110 w into 8 ohms and the speakers are 90db @ 1 watt @ 1 meter. Those speakers should get stupid loud without the receiver shutting down.

What exactly is happening that your receiver is cutting out? How far are you from the speakers? How big is the room. How loud is loud?

 

[dennisd]

The receiver puts out 110 w into 8 ohms and the speakers are 90db @ 1 watt @ 1 meter. Those speakers should get stupid loud without the receiver shutting down.

What exactly is happening that your receiver is cutting out? How far are you from the speakers? How big is the room. How loud is loud?

The room is 12X22. I am at the back of the room. Loud is louder than it is.Would it have anything to do with the smaller sattelite speakers?

 

[zieglj01]

What sats do you have and how are they hooked up to the receiver.
Are they hooked up to a B terminal or surround terminal?

 

[dennisd]

What sats do you have and how are they hooked up to the receiver.
Are they hooked up to a B terminal or surround terminal?

The backs are from an older kenwood surround system-ks-306ht. Hooked up to surround terminals. I also have a klipsch synergy c-1 center and a velodyne cht 350 watt sub.

 

[zieglj01]

The backs are from an older kenwood surround system-ks-306ht. Hooked up to surround terminals. I also have a klipsch synergy c-1 center and a velodyne cht 350 watt sub.

I may be wrong - however, from what I remember, the Kenwwod
receivers lose a lot of power in surround mode. You are playing
this system quite loud and the receiver is getting hot. This may
be the reason your system is shutting down. There also, may be
a problem with impedence dips in the frequency range of your
speakers - your 5.0 speakers are different. I think this receiver
was made more for your Kenwood speakers. This is more like a
receiver that is rated at 100 watts from 1000 khz up in surround
mode. This is an older receiver.

 

[dennisd]

I may be wrong - however, from what I remember, the Kenwwod
receivers lose a lot of power in surround mode. You are playing
this system quite loud and the receiver is getting hot. This may
be the reason your system is shutting down. There also, may be
a problem with impedence dips in the frequency range of your
speakers - your 5.0 speakers are different. I think this receiver
was made more for your Kenwood speakers. This is more like a
receiver that is rated at 100 watts from 1000 khz up in surround
mode. This is an older receiver.

So I should probably start looking to upgrade the receiver before speakers? Any recommendations?
Appreciate the assistance!

 

[zieglj01]

So I should probably start looking to upgrade the receiver before speakers? Any recommendations?
Appreciate the assistance!

You may want to think about it - I would get a stronger receiver,
before I upgraded the speakers. Go to www.ac4l.com and look
at the Marantz refurbish receivers. Good deals and good receivers.

 

[GranteedEV]

So I should probably start looking to upgrade the receiver before speakers? Any recommendations?

Well let's consider a few things

1)The yamaha supports 7.1 BUT - doesn't have HDMI. How important is that to you?
2) The back panel of it says it's rated 370 watts, which is somewhat anemic for a 7 channel receiver.
3) THe Polk R50s are rated 90db sensitivity / 8 ohm nominal impedance. With 110wpc amp in 2 channel, they should be purty darn loud before they even start stressing the amp. They can take up to 150watts RMS.

So with all of the above said, here's my guess: The R60s may have a nominal impedance at 8 ohms, but they probably behave more like a 4 ohm speaker in terms of low impedance dips. The extra current of low impedance dips is probably what's causing your yamaha to shut down at high volumes, unless these volumes are really damn loud. Either way, it's amp related.

You have to ask yourself what you want - to be louder or to be better-sounding.

You can get louder two ways:
a) Add a 2 channel amp like the Emotiva UPA-5 (which is actually a 5 channel amp but it's on sale right now so go get it!) and hook it up to the front pre-outs on the yamaha.
2) Get more sensitive speakers. Whether these speakers will be better depends on the speaker, not the sensitivity, though. For example a klipsch might get louder than your polks but you have to ask if you like the general sonic character of it (and if that's accurate). On that note, a lot of the better speakers in the price range you're looking at have comparable sensitivities to the polks. IIRC Paradigm Monitor 11s are rather sensitive though...they might be a decent one to look into.

A new receiver won't hurt either, especially since your current receiver doesn't support HDMI audio but if that's not a priority I'd definitely look into a new amp first. I'm not sure however how much voltage yamaha pre-outs can do unclipped. Does anyone know if yamahas make good prepros?

Also, if you're listening to your music in surround IE pro logic II or multi-ch 5.1, you're making your receiver work a lot harder than it would in plain old 2 channel stereo mode.

 

[dennisd]

Well let's consider a few things

1)The yamaha supports 7.1 BUT - doesn't have HDMI. How important is that to you?
2) The back panel of it says it's rated 370 watts, which is somewhat anemic for a 7 channel receiver.
3) THe Polk R50s are rated 90db sensitivity / 8 ohm nominal impedance. With 110wpc amp in 2 channel, they should be purty darn loud before they even start stressing the amp. They can take up to 150watts RMS.

So with all of the above said, here's my guess: The R60s may have a nominal impedance at 8 ohms, but they probably behave more like a 4 ohm speaker in terms of low impedance dips. The extra current of low impedance dips is probably what's causing your yamaha to shut down at high volumes, unless these volumes are really damn loud. Either way, it's amp related.

You have to ask yourself what you want - to be louder or to be better-sounding.

You can get louder two ways:
a) Add a 2 channel amp like the Emotiva UPA-5 (which is actually a 5 channel amp but it's on sale right now so go get it!) and hook it up to the front pre-outs on the yamaha.
2) Get more sensitive speakers. Whether these speakers will be better depends on the speaker, not the sensitivity, though. For example a klipsch might get louder than your polks but you have to ask if you like the general sonic character of it (and if that's accurate). On that note, a lot of the better speakers in the price range you're looking at have comparable sensitivities to the polks. IIRC Paradigm Monitor 11s are rather sensitive though...they might be a decent one to look into.

A new receiver won't hurt either, especially since your current receiver doesn't support HDMI audio but if that's not a priority I'd definitely look into a new amp first. I'm not sure however how much voltage yamaha pre-outs can do unclipped. Does anyone know if yamahas make good prepros?

Also, if you're listening to your music in surround IE pro logic II or multi-ch 5.1, you're making your receiver work a lot harder than it would in plain old 2 channel stereo mode.

Thanks for the breakdown. This definitely makes everything much cleares. I looked at the Emotiva. It would solve the initial issue. I do need to look at a complete receiver though. The newer receivers with hdmi capability would help in several ways. Elimination of some spagetti behind my system is big. I didn't realize that my polks could take up to 150 watts. A new receiver it is! Thanks for the assistance.