SDA 2 - Very Bright and unimpressive Low End.. What am I doing wrong

kchilaka

Fellow Members,
I recently obtained a pair of Minty SDA 2 (The original version) speakers with the Interconnect cable on CL. After my infatuation with the imaging capabilities wore off (They sound-stage they present IS vast..) the treble is wearing me out.. They sound a little harsh to my ears and for such a large speaker, the low-end is seriously lacking. I suspect a pair of high-end bookshelf speakers like the Polk LSi9 probably will have more bass. Is the SDA 2 more of a delicate speaker or is it supposed to be an authoritative speaker? I am hoping I can get some input on this..

Here is how I have them set up..
I have it paired with a Sony-ES DA30ES receiver. I am using the receiver in two-channel mode. I have setup the receiver to 4 Ohm speaker mode. The speakers are about a foot from the wall behind them, a foot each from the side walls and about 10 feet apart. No toe-in. I am running them both without a sub in direct mode (No sound processing). Now, it is possible the Sony is bright and lacks bass but I have no reference because I replaced my receiver and speakers at the same time (Probably a big no no).

Any inputs or suggestions would be appreciated..

Hawkeye

I can't offer any advice as I'm about to dip my toe into the SDA realm for the first time. I do look forward to seeing what responses you get from the more experinced members.

Does it sound any better/worse if your receiver is set to 8 Ohms?

Gordon

kchilaka

Hawkeye wrote: »

I can't offer any advice as I'm about to dip my toe into the SDA realm for the first time. I do look forward to seeing what responses you get from the more experinced members.

Does it sound any better/worse if your receiver is set to 8 Ohms?

Gordon

I did not try that yet. Didn't want to put the AVR in protection mode or something:)

Toolfan66

I don't know anything about your receiver but I do know couldn't run my SDA's with just a receiver. You could have crossover issues or your receiver is not giving your SDAs enough power.

kchilaka

TOOLFORLIFEFAN wrote: »

I don't know anything about your receiver but I do know couldn't run my SDA's with just a receiver. You could have crossover issues or your receiver is not giving your SDAs enough power.

Howdy to a fellow member from Denver.
About the power bit, I do listen at polite levels of sound (9'o clock on the knob) so I am a little hesitant to think the problem is power. Do you run SDA2s on your rig? What has been your experience with them?
Thanks.

Conradicles

Can we see a picture of the version of SDA's you have? That may help a bit.
Welcome to the forum!

JohnLocke88

Couple of things.

1) For "brightness," some people simply can't stand the older SL1000 / SL2000 polk tweeters. Apparently, somewhere around 12-13 kHz, there's a significant dB spike; This may be what you're hearing. The solution it seems is to replace the stock tweeters with the newer, RDO-194 tweeter. Never heard the 194 in person, so can't speak personally about it's awesomeness.

2) For the bass, because the SDA line, and much of Polk's older offerings are sealed enclosures, and rely on the passive radiator, cabinet pressurization is very important. The best way to check to see if you are losing air somewhere is by pressing down on the center of the passive radiator, watching the midwoofers extend, and counting how long it takes from them to retract back in. Generally speaking, should be ballpark 4-10 seconds, but definitely not "immediately."

Not sure if this would help in either department, but 10 feet is a great distance to have them apart, but it seems you're having to put them awfully close to the corners. I personally would bring them a bit further out from the side walls, maybe to 2 feet off the sides (so, 8 feet apart.)

Hope this helps. The SDA2 is a fine speaker (I owned a pair as my second set of SDA's), but I think many here will tell you the later revisions of the SDA line were quite superior.

All said, you have some nice speakers, and if for what ever reason you end up not being happy with them, I think you'd have no problem selling them on CL/eBay.

F1nut

Your first problem is the Sony AVR. Get rid of it and get a really good integrated or separates.

Second, your set up needs help. Move them closer together, about 6 feet apart and therefore, further away from the side walls. Move them closer to the back wall, starting at 5 or 6 inches away. This will increase the bass response. A half inch can make or break the bass.

kchilaka

Conradicles wrote: »

Can we see a picture of the version of SDA's you have? That may help a bit.
Welcome to the forum!

This is what I have

comfortablycurt

F1nut wrote: »

Your first problem is the Sony AVR. Get rid of it and get a really good integrated or separates.

Second, your set up needs help. Move them closer together, about 6 feet apart and therefore, further away from the side walls. Move them closer to the back wall, starting at 5 or 6 inches away. This will increase the bass response. A half inch can make or break the bass.

+1


Placement can make or break a speaker. It can take a while sometimes to find the sweet spot...it takes some experimentation.

Also, you might want to check all of the screws for tightness. As mentioned above, air could be leaking out, which would decrease the performance of the passive radiator.



That being said, an AVR isn't really the ideal setup to drive SDA's. I've got a pair of SDA 2A's, and they are FAR from lacking in the bass department. However, I ran them off of an Onkyo 606 for a short time, and they didn't sound anywhere near as good as they do in my 2 channel rig. It's a night and day difference...seriously.

Regarding the brightness issues...what tweeters do they have? If they're the stock SL-1000/SL2000's, you should definitely upgrade them to the RD0-194's.

kchilaka

JohnLocke88 wrote: »

Couple of things.

1) For "brightness," some people simply can't stand the older SL1000 / SL2000 polk tweeters. Apparently, somewhere around 12-13 kHz, there's a significant dB spike; This may be what you're hearing. The solution it seems is to replace the stock tweeters with the newer, RDO-194 tweeter. Never heard the 194 in person, so can't speak personally about it's awesomeness.

I will look into the RDO-194 tweeters.. They are definitely stock tweeters currently.. Sigh. 4 Tweeters to replace if I choose to go that route:)

JohnLocke88 wrote: »

2) For the bass, because the SDA line, and much of Polk's older offerings are sealed enclosures, and rely on the passive radiator, cabinet pressurization is very important. The best way to check to see if you are losing air somewhere is by pressing down on the center of the passive radiator, watching the midwoofers extend, and counting how long it takes from them to retract back in. Generally speaking, should be ballpark 4-10 seconds, but definitely not "immediately."

I did not think about the sealed enclosure. I will definitely do the passive driver push test. In a perfectly sealed enclosure, I would imagine that the midwoofer would stay extended till I let the passive driver out again..

JohnLocke88 wrote: »

Not sure if this would help in either department, but 10 feet is a great distance to have them apart, but it seems you're having to put them awfully close to the corners. I personally would bring them a bit further out from the side walls, maybe to 2 feet off the sides (so, 8 feet apart.)

Hope this helps. The SDA2 is a fine speaker (I owned a pair as my second set of SDA's), but I think many here will tell you the later revisions of the SDA line were quite superior.

All said, you have some nice speakers, and if for what ever reason you end up not being happy with them, I think you'd have no problem selling them on CL/eBay.

The imaging, vocals and mid to upper bass freqs are very articulate on the SDA-2. Does sound beautiful with the right music. If I cant get the bass up with better amplification, I will look into a sub.. Just seems wrong to use a sub with a full size speaker like the SDA...

JohnLocke88

kchilaka wrote: »

I will look into the RDO-194 tweeters.. They are definitely stock tweeters currently.. Sigh. 4 Tweeters to replace if I choose to go that route:)

Again, I'm a mega "bang for the buck-er" so I've never gotten around to replacing any of my SL2000 tweeters. I do prefer the SL3000 tweeters on the few speakers I have that use them.

kchilaka wrote: »

I did not think about the sealed enclosure. I will definitely do the passive driver push test. In a perfectly sealed enclosure, I would imagine that the midwoofer would stay extended till I let the passive driver out again..

Well, I don't think you'll ever get a perfect result. (Especially considering the dust caps are not completely sealed, nor are the gaskets between the MW frames and the front of the speaker cabinet. I think Jesse's (F1Nut's) assessment of your "from the rear wall" placement is going to be pretty important too.

kchilaka wrote: »

The imaging, vocals and mid to upper bass freqs are very articulate on the SDA-2. Does sound beautiful with the right music. If I cant get the bass up with better amplification, I will look into a sub.. Just seems wrong to use a sub with a full size speaker like the SDA...

Nah, no sub... Do the other stuff mentioned for bass first.
EDIT: Fixed multi quote shenanigans.

kchilaka

comfortablycurt wrote: »

+1


Placement can make or break a speaker. It can take a while sometimes to find the sweet spot...it takes some experimentation.

Also, you might want to check all of the screws for tightness. As mentioned above, air could be leaking out, which would decrease the performance of the passive radiator.



That being said, an AVR isn't really the ideal setup to drive SDA's. I've got a pair of SDA 2A's, and they are FAR from lacking in the bass department. However, I ran them off of an Onkyo 606 for a short time, and they didn't sound anywhere near as good as they do in my 2 channel rig. It's a night and day difference...seriously.

Regarding the brightness issues...what tweeters do they have? If they're the stock SL-1000/SL2000's, you should definitely upgrade them to the RD0-194's.

I did notice more low-end when I loved them closer to the wall. I will play around with the positioning and report back.
About the amplification, I have a little Panasonic XR-55 digital amp in the mail (I really wanted to see what the fuss was about with this class-D amp) and I will plug it in to see if the sound is different. Although I do suspect you were suggesting something with more muscle. CL is filled with two channel integrateds and receivers. I don't know if an Adcom is in my future but if the panny (In dual-amp mode) does not work out I will look into experimenting with a two-channel integrated..

JohnLocke88

kchilaka wrote: »

I did notice more low-end when I loved them closer to the wall. I will play around with the positioning and report back.
About the amplification, I have a little Panasonic XR-55 digital amp in the mail (I really wanted to see what the fuss was about with this class-D amp) and I will plug it in to see if the sound is different. Although I do suspect you were suggesting something with more muscle. CL is filled with two channel integrateds and receivers. I don't know if an Adcom is in my future but if the panny (In dual-amp mode) does not work out I will look into experimenting with a two-channel integrated..

Some of the guys here swear by Adcoms, notably the GFA-555/II. They seem to be a pretty decent budget amp that runs a common ground design.

helipilotdoug

+1 on the recommendations made here by F1Nut and others. The tweeters are pretty harsh, and can be replaced for a few bucks. You might also consider a crossover upgrade. Those speakers can put out some fantastic sound with some mods, and a good amount of power. I have stock SDA2B's (that will be tl'd soon) and just going from a pioneer VSX 84TXSi receiver to a Carver C-11 preamp and a Carver TFM-45 made a world of difference in the overall sound. They do like lots of power! And as you have found out, placement can make a world of difference in the bass output.

cnh

+1, good advice above!

SDA 2s of any kind should be able to put out pretty amazing bass in a small to mid-size room....shake your walls with the right amplification...I'm not sure if the Panasonic is going to be able to handle it but you can try. I used a similar Panasonic on a monster pair of JBL 22 year old towers and it actually could put out some sound but the SDAs are a 'different' kind of beast and there was a limit to what the class D Pannie could do...

It puts out 100 watts RMS into 6 ohms, and 80 into 8 ohms. Those wattage figures are real...they've been bench tested (though even as I write this I expect a certain member to show up and tell us how 'meaningless' those bench tests are)--beat you to it my man!

In reality you'd be better off with the Adcom, a 545 or a 555 or even a 5802 depending on room size and what you want to output db wise?

As for the SL2000 tweeters, replace them or GROW OLD....so that your hearing is NOT that sensitive in that range and you can't hear above 14Khz or so? lol
Good luck and ENJOY!

cnh

kchilaka

Wall shaking bass would be nice. Your comment on the room size is interesting. I have an open living area that is one long room along with the kitchen. It is probably a large area if you consider both spaces are really one big box. It is probably 14ft x 30ft x 8ft.

cnh wrote: »

+1, good advice above!

SDA 2s of any kind should be able to put out pretty amazing bass in a small to mid-size room....shake your walls with the right amplification...I'm not sure if the Panasonic is going to be able to handle it but you can try. I used a similar Panasonic on a monster pair of JBL 22 year old towers and it actually could put out some sound but the SDAs are a 'different' kind of beast and there was a limit to what the class D Pannie could do...

It puts out 100 watts RMS into 6 ohms, and 80 into 8 ohms. Those wattage figures are real...they've been bench tested (though even as I write this I expect a certain member to show up and tell us how 'meaningless' those bench tests are)--beat you to it my man!

In reality you'd be better off with the Adcom, a 545 or a 555 or even a 5802 depending on room size and what you want to output db wise?

As for the SL2000 tweeters, replace them or GROW OLD....so that your hearing is NOT that sensitive in that range and you can't hear above 14Khz or so? lol
Good luck and ENJOY!

cnh

cnh

In that case you might need some REAL power....at least the Adcom GFA-555? Or larger SDAs? Like the SDA-SRS series?

Let's see what the SDA boys have to say about this!

cnh

Toolfan66

kchilaka wrote: »

Howdy to a fellow member from Denver.
About the power bit, I do listen at polite levels of sound (9'o clock on the knob) so I am a little hesitant to think the problem is power. Do you run SDA2s on your rig? What has been your experience with them?
Thanks.

Experience with the SDA 2B's, SDA SRS 1.2tl's, SDA 1C's. The 2B's I sold.

Where are you located? in Denver?? I think the problem is power, Like I said I wouldn't run my SDA's with just a Receiver. Also as said above placement is a big deal with the SDA's.


Did you replace the SL1000's with the SL2000's?

kchilaka

TOOLFORLIFEFAN wrote: »

Experience with the SDA 2B's, SDA SRS 1.2tl's, SDA 1C's. The 2B's I sold.

Where are you located? in Denver?? I think the problem is power, Like I said I wouldn't run my SDA's with just a Receiver. Also as said above placement is a big deal with the SDA's.


Did you replace the SL1000's with the SL2000's?

The consensus does seem to be the amplification. I don't know what tweeters I have. They are the stock ones from the original sda. Oh, I am in the broomfield area.

kchilaka

I did the push test on the passive driver and the mid drivers do recede very slowly. They start receding immeadiatly but take their time. Stopped waiting after 6-7 seconds. Another observation. More than lack of low end, I think the problem might actually be tonal balance. The highs and mids are much louder than the lows. It sounds like an efficiency mismatch between the woofer and mids. This might suggest that it is the forwardness of the receiver I am hearing.. Hmm

JohnLocke88 wrote: »

Again, I'm a mega "bang for the buck-er" so I've never gotten around to replacing any of my SL2000 tweeters. I do prefer the SL3000 tweeters on the few speakers I have that use them.



Well, I don't think you'll ever get a perfect result. (Especially considering the dust caps are not completely sealed, nor are the gaskets between the MW frames and the front of the speaker cabinet. I think Jesse's (F1Nut's) assessment of your "from the rear wall" placement is going to be pretty important too.



Nah, no sub... Do the other stuff mentioned for bass first.
EDIT: Fixed multi quote shenanigans.

JPSmario

I run my SDA2A's with a Rotel RC995/RB980BX combination with Kimber 8TC speaker cables and bass is NOT an issue. I can shake my apt walls way too easily:D These SDA's extend so low and do it so accurately that I will never consider a sub.

The stock SL2000 tweeters were another story. I just couldn't stand listening to them for more than an hour at a time. The RDO194's have been a perfect fix for me. Club Polk members get a discount and shipping perk when you order these direct from Polk.

The consensus seems to be high current low impedance-stable power is best for all SDA's, but expecially the older models.

One other thought- since my system lacks tone controls, I hear more of the original recording style and less 'system sound'. Some recordings just don't have much bass while others seriously rock with tons of thumpage. I don't know what you listen to, but it's possibly another consideration.

Good luck with you journey, because tuning up the system is half the fun!

mmadden28

F1nut wrote: »

... Move them closer to the back wall, starting at 5 or 6 inches away. This will increase the bass response. A half inch can make or break the bass.

Why is that? They're not ported or anything so I'm having a little trouble grasping the concept.

LessisNevermore

mmadden28 wrote: »

Why is that? They're not ported or anything so I'm having a little trouble grasping the concept.

This is a LOT of reading, and it primarily deals with subwoofers, but will give you a good idea about room modes and the like.

http://www.harman.com/EN-US/OurCompany/Technologyleadership/Documents/White%20Papers/LoudspeakersandRoomsPt3.pdf

Fractions of an inch can make very noticeable differences. Could be the difference between bloated bass, and tight, coherent sounding bass.

Schurkey

And now for something completely different.

FIRST, check the MW drivers to assure they're ALL functioning.

SECOND, verify that the two speakers are wired in-phase. If one speaker is out of phase with the other...all the bass goes away.

kchilaka

Schurkey wrote: »

And now for something completely different.

FIRST, check the MW drivers to assure they're ALL functioning.

SECOND, verify that the two speakers are wired in-phase. If one speaker is out of phase with the other...all the bass goes away.

The speakers are wired corrrectly, I checked and the Mw driver do seem to work but I did check only one side. Will check the other side this week. I am begining to think this may be a case of expecting sub-woofer like bass from these speakers. I compared them against my bookshelf speakers (Sony SS-TX7S) and the SDAs do go much lower. These bookshelfs themselves are rated down to 50hz. I downloaded a test-tone sweep program and I ran the 20hz, 30hz, 40hz, 50hz and 60hz tones on the SDAs. The levels of the 20,30,40 are substantially lower than the 50 and 60hz tones. I am guessing that although the speakers go down low, the frequency response of the speakers start curving down around the 40-50hz mark. Perhaps this is how the SDAs sound. To get a sanity check, I will be plugging these into a Panny XR55 later this week. Will know more about the sound then. Also, there are a few Adcom 535 amps available locally on Craigslist. If the Xr55 does not do the trick I will consider getting one of those to try it out. Not going to let these SDAs go till I make sure the problem is not the electronics..

Joe08867

I have the same model SDA2's. They are power hungry. Especially with the third driver. Later SDA2's aren't quite so hungry.

That being said does your Receiver have a speaker size setup? My Panasonic does and it makes a huge difference in bass and mid response.

Also Do you have the original interconnect cable? or did you make your own? If you have them wired out of phase they will sound supper tinny and loose most of there bass response. Also check connections to Receiver also. i have oops on this one in the past.

Schurkey

kchilaka wrote: »

I checked and the Mw driver do seem to work but I did check only one side. Will check the other side this week.

The way to do that is to remove each driver from the cabinet while playing music. If if vibrates IN the cabinet, you may think it's working when it's actually reacting to the pressure waves created by another driver. If it vibrates OUT of the cabinet...it's working.

kchilaka wrote: »

I downloaded a test-tone sweep program and I ran the 20hz, 30hz, 40hz, 50hz and 60hz tones on the SDAs. The levels of the 20,30,40 are substantially lower than the 50 and 60hz tones. I am guessing that although the speakers go down low, the frequency response of the speakers start curving down around the 40-50hz mark.

That's not what I'd expect, at least with nearfield listening. I'm thinking that most of the SDAs have a fairly flat frequency response to near the "tuned" lower limit, then a very slight bump right at the limit, and then the response drops dramatically. If you're hearing a gradual tapering of the bass response...SOMETHING is off, we just haven't figured out "what" yet.

inspiredsports

Welcome to CP, kchilaka.

First, many disconnect the dimensional tweeter on this model. No later model Polk has a dimensional tweeter as it was found to be unnecessary. You must carefully insulate the wires once removed, and need to leave the tweeter in place to maintain the cabinet's seal. A big benefit here is that you only need to spend 2 X $50 with Polk Customer Service to replace the stereo tweeters with RDO194-1's. The RDO-194's alone will calm them down.

The alignment of all SDA's is critical.

--- at least 3 feet from sidewall.
--- absolutely parallel to the rear wall with both cabinets in exact same plane.
--- probably no more than 6" away from rear wall as mentioned above.
--- speakers straight up (0 degrees of forward or backward lean).

Also as mentioned, all SDA's love at least 150w rms of high-current clean power. Older NAD's and Adcom's have proven to be pathways to getting the most out of your SDA's for a very reasonable amount of money.

Obviously, you need to be sure speakers are wired to your amp in phase and a proper set of speaker cables are needed to insure the signal gets there.

No one has yet mentioned rebuilding the crossovers and this does add another layer of expense to an old speaker, but Sonicap capacitors and Mills resistors have a proven track record here to yield a great bang for the buck.

nduitch

inspiredsports wrote: »

Welcome to CP, kchilaka.

First, many disconnect the dimensional tweeter on this model. No later model Polk has a dimensional tweeter as it was found to be unnecessary. You must carefully insulate the wires once removed, and need to leave the tweeter in place to maintain the cabinet's seal. A big benefit here is that you only need to spend 2 X $50 with Polk Customer Service to replace the stereo tweeters with RDO194-1's. The RDO-194's alone will calm them down.

I would suggest against that because I have been there before. I have 1A's which are basically the same speaker as yours minus one mid-range. If you disconnect that tweeter you will have about half as much sound stage. They were designed that way, they work better than way. They just sound like regular speakers with those tweeters disconnected. Don't take my word for it, disconnect them and listen for yourself.

inspiredsports

inspiredsports wrote: »

Welcome to CP, kchilaka.

First, many disconnect the dimensional tweeter on this model. No later model Polk has a dimensional tweeter as it was found to be unnecessary. You must carefully insulate the wires once removed, and need to leave the tweeter in place to maintain the cabinet's seal. A big benefit here is that you only need to spend 2 X $50 with Polk Customer Service to replace the stereo tweeters with RDO194-1's. The RDO-194's alone will calm them down.

nduitch wrote: »

I would suggest against that because I have been there before. I have 1A's which are basically the same speaker as yours minus one mid-range. If you disconnect that tweeter you will have about half as much sound stage. They were designed that way, they work better than way. They just sound like regular speakers with those tweeters disconnected. Don't take my word for it, disconnect them and listen for yourself.

Am I missing something? If the dimensional tweeter is only signal canceling, I'm not conceptualizing how that could narrow the soundstage.

I'm wondering if you noticed a volume or soundstage decrease. There may be a reason to bypass/remove the dimensional tweeters circuitry which might increase the volume of the stereo tweeter, but are you sure you mean "soundstage" ??

I wish Ben felt good enough to join in as I know he has deep experience with exactly this issue.