Infinity Beta 50's

[eng201]

First time, long time...


I am in a bit of a situation. I recently purchased a Rotel RA-1062 (Integ. Amp). I have it connected to a pair of Infinity Beta 50's, and after about 20 minutes or so it cuts out (power protect?) The top also gets VERY hot, much more than warm (tempetaure).

What can I do?!? In 2 parts...

I was thinking about moving the Infinity's out to the Living Room. I have no home theater set up at all, and I would consider setting up a 2.1 (with future plans to expand to 5.1/7.1) If I do this what A/V receiver would be suggested to complement the Beta 50's?

Also, if I keep the Rotel- what speakers would be a better fit for it? It is a 60w amp.

Thanks for your input.

 

[Highbar]

My first question is what is the room environment like? That Rotel shouldn't be getting that hot, I can run my RX-1052 and Monitor 11's all day at room shaking volumes and it doesn't get above warm.

I can't see your Beta 50's being an issue for the Rotel at all. I'm by no means an expert but something doesn't seem right, how do you have it all wired up?

I love the Rotel Paradigm combination, if you keep the 1062 I'd say give some Digm's a look.

T

 

[eng201]

everything is in my bedroom...normal temp in room around 65-70. I have it wired with monster speaker cable and monster m-series rca connectors.

I spoke with the rotel dealer today and he said that: "RA1062 might not have enough power to drive those speakers-especially if you have a larger room and you like to play loud. The thing that hurts speakers is when you have too little power not too much- when you turn the volume up too much to where your amp is going to run out of power you will get clipping distortion and that will ruin your speakers- the rotels protection circuit is turning on to prevent this from happening. This would also explain why the unit is running hot. I would recommend the B&W 685's ($650) as they are an excellent match with the Rotel.

 

[MUDSHARK]

Highbar is right! Something is very wrong here. Infinity Beta 50 is not a difficult load for a receiver (none of the most affordable Infinity lines are). These speakers run well on HK, Pioneer, and Onkyo (that I have personally heard) let alone a good quality company like Rotel.

Try troubleshooting the problem by connecting different speakers to the Rotel. If you don't have any others perhaps the Rotel dealer can help. If this reveals no problems in the Rotel then connect the Infinity speakers to a different receiver. One way or another you will determine the source of the problem.

Also, check that the speaker wire at the receiver terminals are not touching on another. This can also activate the receiver protection.

Good luck.

 

[no. 5]

I agree with Mudshark and Highbar, the Beta series is built for use with typical home theater receivers, that is, they are meant to be easy for almost any amplifier to drive.

I'd also like to point out that what the dealer said; "The thing that hurts speakers is when you have too little power not too much", is a bit wrong.
The thing that hurts speakers (or the voice coils at least) is too much power, clipping can damage speakers because an amplifier will produce more wattage when it's clipping than when it isn't clipping.

If a speaker is rated for 300 Watts, 50 Watts will not hurt it - even if the amp is severely clipping, conversely, even an unclipped 1,500 Watts will damage the speaker.

 

[Seth=L]

Double check your connections. Make sure there are no shorts. Every once in a while the speaker cables themselves can be faulty (I had this happen once). The Betas are not hard to drive, so either the cables are bad, or improperly wired. Other less likely scenarios are the Rotel is faulty in some way or the Betas are faulty in some way. Be sure that you are running only one set of speakers at a time with the Rotel, running an A and B set simultaneously would be stressful for it.

 

[3db]

Double check your connections. Make sure there are no shorts. Every once in a while the speaker cables themselves can be faulty (I had this happen once). The Betas are not hard to drive, so either the cables are bad, or improperly wired. Other less likely scenarios are the Rotel is faulty in some way or the Betas are faulty in some way. Be sure that you are running only one set of speakers at a time with the Rotel, running an A and B set simultaneously would be stressful for it.

I disagree with the underpowered amp statement. I blew a tweeter out of my PSB using only a 25Watt/channel stereo Radio Shack integrated amp.

 

[Seth=L]

I disagree with the underpowered amp statement. I blew a tweeter out of my PSB using only a 25Watt/channel stereo Radio Shack integrated amp.

I didn't mean to imply that the amplifier was under powered. I am saying that running 4 speakers off of a small integrated amplifier is no easy task, and could cause it to overheat and shut down.

Just because you blew your PSB tweeters with the Radioshack amplifier doesn't mean you over powered them, more than likely the tweeters blew because they where being underpowered while the amplifier was clipping, that or the speakers where old or faulty.

 

[3db]

I didn't mean to imply that the amplifier was under powered. I am saying that running 4 speakers off of a small integrated amplifier is no easy task, and could cause it to overheat and shut down.

Just because you blew your PSB tweeters with the Radioshack amplifier doesn't mean you over powered them, more than likely the tweeters blew because they where being underpowered while the amplifier was clipping, that or the speakers where old or faulty.

You're confusing me. I fully agree with your bottom para in this post but that's not what I understood from your previous post.

 

[no. 5]

I disagree with the underpowered amp statement. I blew a tweeter out of my PSB using only a 25Watt/channel stereo Radio Shack integrated amp.

I guarantee you didn't blow the tweeter because it got to little power.

Intersting information on the subject, and more information from Rane.
Too little power for preferred listening level, or for EQ/tone control settings sure, but home audio speakers spend most of their life getting less than a Watt. If it can handle 100 Watts, and usually gets less than 1, 25 won't hurt it.

 

[eng201]

I did check my connections, and all seems good. As a sort of an aside, the Betas are BIG size-wise. I think it might be best to bring them out of the bedroom and then build a Home Theater around them. I have a 52" Samsung Dlp that is currently not hooked up to anything at all. I would buy an A/V amp for the TV and Betas; and then buy the B&W 685's for the Rotel. I am using the Rotel only for 2-channel audio. It might just make more sense for my situation.


I am interested in your thoughts on the man from Rotel's opinion, as I too feel the Beta's shouldnot be trouble for the Rotel.

Thanks.....and Happy New year to all.

I contacted Rotel, and this is what they said:

"I am sorry to inform you that the RA-1062 (60 Watts per chan) is
extremely underpowered for your Beta 50's (250 Watts). I would recommend
a more powerful
amplifier for your speakers some where in the range of 150 watts to 200
watts per channel.

I would think that if you played the RA-1062 for an extended period of
time it will go into thermal protect. At 91db efficiency your speakers
are very demanding and
are causing the power amp inside the RA-1062 to overheat."

 

[DavidG]

Hmm, speakers with a 91db efficiency rating are inefficient. Sounds like Rotel really wants to sell another amp. With 32 watts these speakers would put out 106db of sound, more than enough for the average person's needs. I agree with them that a more powerful amp can't hurt, and would help more that it would hurt. However, the amp you currently use should be able to power those speakers.

 

[mike c]

just how big is your room?

do you have an SPL meter?

do you use a sub?


685 vs. the beta 50? it is not true that rotel and b&w will sound better because they're from the same manufacturer. that's a bookshelf vs. a full tower, you'll lose some serious bass.

i've used the beta 50's full range myself with a 85wpc receiver. i highly doubt that the rotel (with it's 4 ohm stable) integrated amp can't handle the beta 50's.

 

[MUDSHARK]

The reply from Rotel is really unacceptable. That company has now fallen in my esteem. I have a Bryston 60 watt amplifier driving the much more inefficient Kappa 400 speakers with excellent results. I doubt I have ever exceeded 95 db but the amp drives the speakers for hours on end with no problems whatsoever. 150 watt amp for 91 efficiency speakers? Give me a break.

I'm sorry but you deserved much better from Rotel.

 

[Seth=L]

I guarantee you didn't blow the tweeter because it got to little power.

Intersting information on the subject, and more information from Rane.
Too little power for preferred listening level, or for EQ/tone control settings sure, but home audio speakers spend most of their life getting less than a Watt. If it can handle 100 Watts, and usually gets less than 1, 25 won't hurt it.

Underpowering meaning an amplifier driven into clipping. Most tweeters can't handle a 50 watt square wave.

 

[Seth=L]

"I am sorry to inform you that the RA-1062 (60 Watts per chan) is
extremely underpowered for your Beta 50's (250 Watts). I would recommend
a more powerful
amplifier for your speakers some where in the range of 150 watts to 200
watts per channel.

I would think that if you played the RA-1062 for an extended period of
time it will go into thermal protect. At 91db efficiency your speakers
are very demanding and
are causing the power amp inside the RA-1062 to overheat."

What a load of garbage, whoever sent you that or said that is a moron or wants to suck you dry.

 

[no. 5]

"I am sorry to inform you that the RA-1062 (60 Watts per chan) is extremely underpowered for your Beta 50's (250 Watts)."

Extremely underpowered for what? A live performance of The Who?

"At 91db efficiency your speakers are very demanding and are causing the power amp inside the RA-1062 to overheat."

And yet the dealer recommended a set of B&W 685's which are 3dB less sensitive.

 

[Seth=L]

Extremely underpowered for what? A live performance of The Who?


And yet the dealer recommended a set of B&W 685's which are 3dB less sensitive.

Naturally, B&W and Rotel go together, duh.

 

[no. 5]

Underpowering meaning an amplifier driven into clipping.

Right, that's usually bad.

But even if an amplifier is clipping heavily, if the amount of Wattage the amp is producing is below what the speaker can handle, they won't be damaged. If a speaker can actually take 200 Watts, a 100 Watt square wave won't hurt it.

Mind you, their are some big "if"s in that statment...

Most tweeters can't handle a 50 watt square wave.

True... most tweeters will choke on 15 watts of sine wave.

 

[B3Nut]

If that amplifier driving those reasonably-efficient easy-to-drive speakers is overheating and going into protect, there is either a short or almost-short in the cabling, in the speakers themselves, or there is something seriously wrong with the amplifier. The responses that you've gotten from both your dealer and from Rotel themselves worry me, I would seek out an independent hi-fi technician to bench-test your amplifier if an ohm-meter test of your cables and speakers looks normal.

Do you have an ohm-meter you can test your speakers and cables with? An 8-ohm speaker will typically show around 5 ohms or so DC resistance. That rotel should have no trouble whatsoever with speakers with a DC resistance of 2.8 ohms or so (the low end on average of a 4-ohm-nominal speaker, which the 1062 is more than capable of driving.)

How loudly are you playing this system? How is the audio quality at reasonable levels? The Rotel rep is dizzy...91dB speakers demanding of a 60-watt amplfier? What in heaven's name are they smoking?

Todd in Cheesecurdistan