How to use a amplifier???

jaritta

OK, so i know that i am a noob with home audio, but have found a 5ch amplifier (harmon signature series 2.1) for fairly cheap. Each channel input looks like a single rca connection on the amplifier. I have a H&k avr 510 and the pre amp outs on the avr are a red and white rca for each channel...i think. so how would i hook these up, would i use a Y adapter to a single input to the amp? is it possible to do with this reciever?? Would it hurt anything if i did this.

would i still beable to deliever 5.1 dolby digital and dts to the speakers if i added the amp.

Also i have a pair of RTia5 that i am a little leary about running on the avr 510 for fear of underpowering them. I have never done bi-amping to speakers and i just dont want to screw them up. Is it simple? Would the 100wpc from the amplifier power these plus my csi3 without problems?

Ugh.. i am just confused on what to do??

The links for the avr 510 specs
http://www.amazon.com/Harman-Kardon-Audio-Video-Receiver/dp/B000051SDP
The pre outs have the black plugs in them but when removed are white and red rca-looking outputs.


The link for the hk signature2.1
http://www.amazon.com/Harman-Kardon-Signature-2-1-Multichannel/dp/B0000300CS

There should be a pic of the hookups on the back of the amp.

geebolt

Don't hold me to this, but it looks like your pre outs are those five pairs on the bottom jumped with black jumpers. Their job is to connect the pre-outs to the internal amps. You would have to remove those jumpers and connect your external amp to the "outs" in that bank.

EndersShadow

From page 10 of the manual it states " When the jumper pins that link the Amplifier Inputs⁄with these outputs are removed, these jacks may be connected to an external power amplifier". So you take the jumpers out and use the bottom of the connections to send the signal to your amp, if your only planning on using the amp's signal. How to bi-amp them or if its worth it I will leave to others to explain.

Regarding your 5.1 Dolby question, what happens is the source signal is sent to your reciever. Your reciever decodes the signal and sends the correct data to each speaker. All you are doing is adding something between the reciever and the speaker (amp). As such you wont lose anything by adding the amp.

Regarding your concern of underpowering your speakers with the amp, you actually will be giving them more power w/ just the amp by itself. Your reciever is rated for 70 Watts per channel, and that is not with all channels driven. Your amp is rated for 100 watts per channel with all channels driven.

I personally would think you want to just use your amp's connections only to power the speakers and forget bi-amping them (with perhaps one exception listed below). Your amp will have more than enough power for your fronts and center.

If you are asking if you use a y adaptor to send the signal from one pre-out, like your front right for example, and split it to use two channels on the amplifier and then run two sets of wires to the front right, you may get more power. Will it be worth it....I will let others answer that question.

jaritta

The "jumpers" are the black male connections for each channel. I get that. so I would just remove the jumpers and conncet the rca to the bottom one of the pre outs and run it to the amplifier. This might be a stupid question but why would they design the avr to have the red and white for each channel if most hookups for amps are just a single rca input?? So you guys are saying that it would work...from what i am gathering.

EndersShadow

From what the manual states on page 17 its due to the way you hookup a equalizer/sound processor

"When an external amplifier is used, connect the Preamp Out jacks (bottom set) to the inputs on the amplifier.When an equalizer or speaker processor is used, connect the Preamp Out jacks (bottom set) to the inputs of the processor, and connect the outputs of the processor back to the Amplifier In jacks (top set) on the AVR 510. Note that when external amplifiers or devices are used, the volume control is still controlled by the AVR 510, although additional volume controls on the external device may impact the volume settings and output levels from the AVR 510.

geebolt

Thise red and white jacks are not pre outs. They look to be various inputs with a few that are video's audio inputs and outputs. You could hookup a VCR for example to the composite video in, and the audio outputs of the VCR to the corresponding video's audio inputs. The outputs are there in case you want to then send those audio signals out to a television's audio inputs.
You can got to Harman's website and download a manual if you don't have one. I think that would clear it up for you.

George

jaritta

EndersShadow wrote: »

From page 10 of the manual it states " When the jumper pins that link the Amplifier Inputs⁄with these outputs are removed, these jacks may be connected to an external power amplifier". So you take the jumpers out and use the bottom of the connections to send the signal to your amp, if your only planning on using the amp's signal. How to bi-amp them or if its worth it I will leave to others to explain.

Regarding your 5.1 Dolby question, what happens is the source signal is sent to your reciever. Your reciever decodes the signal and sends the correct data to each speaker. All you are doing is adding something between the reciever and the speaker (amp). As such you wont lose anything by adding the amp.

Regarding your concern of underpowering your speakers with the amp, you actually will be giving them more power w/ just the amp by itself. Your reciever is rated for 70 Watts per channel, and that is not with all channels driven. Your amp is rated for 100 watts per channel with all channels driven.

I personally would think you want to just use your amp's connections only to power the speakers and forget bi-amping them (with perhaps one exception listed below). Your amp will have more than enough power for your fronts and center.

If you are asking if you use a y adaptor to send the signal from one pre-out, like your front right for example, and split it to use two channels on the amplifier and then run two sets of wires to the front right, you may get more power. Will it be worth it....I will let others answer that question.

Ok, My concern on underpowering the speakers was just if i was using the avr510 to power the speakers. I had planned on (if i get it) useing the amp alone to power the speakers and useing the avr510 as a pre amp to send signal to the amp via the preamp out to the amp on rca cables

As for the Y question i think you anwsered it but let me explain what i ment. The pre outs on the avr (lets say the center channel) has 2 rca jacks a red and a white (female) labled Pre out. There are 5 sets of these, one for each ch. my original question was should I Y the red and white for the center channel down to one rca and then run that to the input (female) on the amp. But from what i am gathering it sounds like I should just use the bottom rca preamp out from the reciever(red) to the amp

EndersShadow

jaritta wrote: »

This might be a stupid question but why would they design the avr to have the red and white for each channel if most hookups for amps are just a single rca input??

As stated in the post above this one, this is because this reciever came out before HDMI (which is both audio and video in one cable). As such each of those red and white correspondes to a yellow jack on the other side as well. Those three jackas are used together to connect your components (DVD, VCR, etc) to the reciever. For example the original Xbox used these type of connections and lots of stuff still does.

EndersShadow

jaritta wrote: »

Ok, My concern on underpowering the speakers was just if i was using the avr510 to power the speakers. I had planned on (if i get it) useing the amp alone to power the speakers and useing the avr510 as a pre amp to send signal to the amp via the preamp out to the amp on rca cables

That is how I would set it up

jaritta wrote: »

But from what i am gathering it sounds like I should just use the bottom rca preamp out from the reciever(red) to the amp

Yes, I cannot comment on color as I can only refer to the manual (which doesnt show or reference that). As long as you use a single RCA from the bottom of the two pre-outs into the corresponding jack on the amplifier you will be set.

jaritta

geebolt wrote: »

Thise red and white jacks are not pre outs. They look to be various inputs with a few that are video's audio inputs and outputs. You could hookup a VCR for example to the composite video in, and the audio outputs of the VCR to the corresponding video's audio inputs. The outputs are there in case you want to then send those audio signals out to a television's audio inputs.
You can got to Harman's website and download a manual if you don't have one. I think that would clear it up for you.

George

I could be wrong but they are labled pre out and under each set of red and white female inputs are lables for each 5 channels

EndersShadow

Jaritta I would highly recommend downloading the manual. As I stated both geebolt and I dont know the color of those pre-out connections as the pictures and manual dont list them. If you go here you can download the manual, it is listed under documentation. I have used it to answer all your questions up to this point and it would be a very useful reference.

I personally have all my manuals in paper copy as well as in PDF format on my computer. It has saved me lots of trouble over the years

jaritta

Hey thanks for all of your help, I just downloaded the manual and am printing it out now, as for the preamp outs each channel has a white female rca on top and red female rca on bottom. The amplifier is a five channel so (i swear this is the last time I will ask) I would run a single rca from the bottom of each preamp out on the reciever to each of the 5 channels rca inputs on the ampflier. Again i understand your frustration with me and i promise i will read the manual tonight.

Again thanks for all you help and If i can get the amp for the right price i just might do it.

EndersShadow

jaritta wrote: »

Hey thanks for all of your help, I just downloaded the manual and am printing it out now, as for the preamp outs each channel has a white female rca on top and red female rca on bottom. The amplifier is a five channel so (i swear this is the last time I will ask) I would run a single rca from the bottom of each preamp out on the reciever to each of the 5 channels rca inputs on the ampflier. Again i understand your frustration with me and i promise i will read the manual tonight.

Again thanks for all you help and If i can get the amp for the right price i just might do it.

Yes, on the manual look at page 9 & 10. You will run 5 individual RCA's from the bottom row of the section labeled pre-out (after removing the jumpers) to the 5 channels of the amplifier.

geebolt

And let us know how it works out for you. I think you'll be happy with the end result.

George

jaritta

Thanks again, i looked at the manual and it clearly has labled the out to amp as the bottom of the pre outs. Again guys thanks you have been extremely helpfull, and also helped me learn quite a bit about home theater.

jaritta

Thanks for all your help, got out bid on ebay. I will keep looking though, i gues if i am persistant enough i will eventually get one. Would you guys recomend going with 2 2ch amps for a little less, or should I hold out until i get a 5 ch. I am not so concerned with powering the rear surrounds but mainly the front 3 channels. I am just wondering if i can get a 2ch amp easier than a 5ch...i guess i should say for less money.

EndersShadow

jaritta wrote: »

Thanks for all your help, got out bid on ebay. I will keep looking though, i gues if i am persistant enough i will eventually get one. Would you guys recomend going with 2 2ch amps for a little less, or should I hold out until i get a 5 ch. I am not so concerned with powering the rear surrounds but mainly the front 3 channels. I am just wondering if i can get a 2ch amp easier than a 5ch...i guess i should say for less money.

Just get a 3 channel for the fronts and add a two channel later if you feel the need. Dont know your price point but Emotiva has a nice 3 channel amp you might be able to find a used one of....

http://emotivalounge.proboards.com/index.cgi?board=emporium&action=display&thread=12861

geebolt

I have an Emotiva XPA-5 and I'm very pleased with it. Also available is a UPA-5 with 125wpc.
And as EndersShadow mentioned the XPA-3 is very nice to just drive the front 3 (200wpc)

jaritta

Should i look into getting more than 100wpc to drive the a5s and csi3, also would you guys be concerned with useing the avr510 to drive the a5's.

Another question on the avr510, i beleive it is rated at about 75 wpc in 2 ch mode. i notice a big difference in volume between the 5 ch and 2 ch modes. I seem to have to have the volume up more just to hear the dialog when the reciever is in 5ch mode than when i am just playing music on the 2ch mode.....i guess my question is-is this normal or do i have somethin configured/adjusted wrong????

jaritta

I guess i should mention tha i was concidering the Harmon Kardon signature series amp at 100 wpc

EndersShadow

jaritta wrote: »

Should i look into getting more than 100wpc to drive the a5s and csi3, also would you guys be concerned with useing the avr510 to drive the a5's.

Another question on the avr510, i beleive it is rated at about 75 wpc in 2 ch mode. i notice a big difference in volume between the 5 ch and 2 ch modes. I seem to have to have the volume up more just to hear the dialog when the reciever is in 5ch mode than when i am just playing music on the 2ch mode.....i guess my question is-is this normal or do i have somethin configured/adjusted wrong????

I would not be concerned with using your AVR510 to drive them. You just might need to turn it up louder than you would with a dedicated amp. As far as wattage you need to "really" drive the speakers I wouldnt know.

I have the Polk T90e's which are rated for 20-200 watts per channel and a CS2 rated for 2-125 watts. I am running them off a Carver AV-705x amplifier which provides around 125 watts per channel (with all channels driven). To my ears that is more than enough as I havent even been able to turn up my recievers volume all the way without my neighbors baning something awful on my walls....so I would think you are fine.

With that said, you always want to buy the most power you can. If you buy a amp that lasts you 10 years, then spending 1,000 on it only equates to a 100 dollar a year cost (not that bad). So buy the biggest you can but dont buy more power than your speakers can use either....

Maybe that helps, maybe it doesnt. My brain is mush today.

Regarding the volume thing, I think this is due to the fact that when in 2 channel mode you have two speakers using X amount of power. When in 5 channel mode you now have 5 speakers fighting for that same X amount of power...as such you need to turn it up higher to provide the same power to each speaker you were providing in 2 channel mode (because X/2 is bigger than X/5)....God, I just used math and variables.....I need to go home now

jaritta wrote: »

I guess i should mention tha i was concidering the Harmon Kardon signature series amp at 100 wpc

That amp should do fine.

geebolt

I would think a UPA-5 @ 125wpc would do quite nicely. $549.00

http://emotiva.com/upa5.shtm