SDA 2B's and CRS+'s side by side (Loving it)

tophatjohnny

Man O Man. Talk about knocking my but in the dirt! The CRS+ set arrived today and I hooked them up to the Onkyo SR805 as Left/Right surround channels, set the speaker calibration the same as on the 2B's and talk about a quality life like sound. They absolutely compliment one another. I have another member coming over soon to hear the impact the CRS+'s bring to the party, as he already has the 2B's in action. Can't wait to hear his take!!! It may not be everyone's cup of tea, but it is mine and I'm drinking it all up. The combo is all that and 2.....yes 2 bags of your favorite chips.

teekay0007

Didn't know you found a suitable pair of CRS+s. What/where did you find? Did you post any pics?

If you like it - and it doesn't make your S.O. want to throw you out of the house - is all that really matters! :loneranger:

Enjoy!

Oldfatdogs

Hey Johnny,I'm glad your lovin the setup.If it sounds good to you that's all that matters.
Dan

PolkieMan

Pictures needed for full effect of Sda madness

F1nut

That's a whole lot of bad sound, I don't care what you think you're hearing it flat out does not work.

TennMan

I want a photo of how it sounds so I can decide for myself if I like it sounds or not.

tophatjohnny

F1nut wrote: »

That's a whole lot of bad sound, I don't care what you think you're hearing it flat out does not work.

I know you think you have that golden ear?? Sooo funny F1nut. Just keep on telling yourself that it does not work, it's working here beautifully. Now run along and try to tell someone else that their new set up sucks. My ears are hearing HPG........for you F1nut..that stands for Holy Polkie Goodness. Don't hate...appreciate!!

tophatjohnny

TennMan wrote: »

I want a photo of how it sounds so I can decide for myself if I like it sounds or not.

Bedroom is quite big and that old school ibe just comes to life with this set up. So real and live sounding. I will have the quality cables installed tomorrow and it will be clean looking to go along with the clean sounds. Wife must have bad ears too, as well as my neighbor and 25 year old son, as thy all were blowen away. Don't listen to any nut jobs, try it for yourself. Here to tell ya, it is awesome. I'm sure you'll hear from another Ohio member to the same effect here soon!! Loving it!!! Oh yeah, welcome to my bedroom!!

ambiophonics

So the crs+ is running as a surround but positioned up front?

F1nut

tophatjohnny wrote: »

I know you think you have that golden ear?? Sooo funny F1nut. Just keep on telling yourself that it does not work, it's working here beautifully. Now run along and try to tell someone else that their new set up sucks. My ears are hearing HPG........for you F1nut..that stands for Holy Polkie Goodness. Don't hate...appreciate!!

Golden ear, maybe. I can say that I've been around the block enough times to know what doesn't work. If your 2B's aren't doing it for you consider the TL upgrade along with proper placement and room treatments. Also, upgrading the other pieces in your rig will net very positive results. I own a pair of 2BTL's and have heard others. Driving them with an AVR and/or other consumer grade gear will never do them justice.

ambiophonics wrote:

So the crs+ is running as a surround but positioned up front?

That's the gist of it.

tophatjohnny

ambiophonics wrote: »

So the crs+ is running as a surround but positioned up front?

Running as a surround.??.I guess that's right if you are referring to where the speakers are plugged into the back of the AVR, but calibrated the same as the fronts and talk about a mini concert effect, SDA style in the bedroom!! That's what I have going on. Consumer grade?? Maybe, but loving it just the same. Can't remember the last concert I attended that had speakers positioned behind the audience, and as good as this combo is performing, it sounds like music is coming from the whole room. I guess I just may have got lucky with the positioning thing??? Plus, the room is pretty darn big. Again, don't listen to the BS, listen the GS...that's the great sound that hails from this set up. not to say I won;t someday add a bad **** amp to this mediocre (consumer grade) Onkyo TX SR805, but I am not a rich man and still have 2 sons to help through life, so budget wise....this set up flat out kicks but!! There I said it....BUDGET!! :razz:

heiney9

After looking at the pics, this has to be some kind of joke? Surround speakers up front, two sets of SDA's run off a receiver, neither pair close to being positioned properly for proper SDA playback and the OP thinks it's the seconds coming??? Where's the PUNK'D crew?

That said, if for some twisted reason you think this sounds good................that is all that matters, but you have no idea what you are missing, and stop trying to convince those of us who know that set-up is less than ideal it's some kind of aural nirvana.........I don't think so.

H9

ambiophonics

Since you have the space try adding some stock SDA-1C's as side surrounds, be sure to use the IC and run them off the 805 also, it should provide plenty of power...

tophatjohnny

Lasareath wrote: »

CRS+'s Toed in at an angle?, Attic room with 45 degree ceiling. All bad sound there. It sounds better because you're finally using good speakers.

The SDAs need to be set up a certain way.

Too bad you're not closer or you could come and listen to mine:

(any distortion you hear is because my 12 cent mic in my iphone cannot handle the sound pressure from 600 watts per channel)

[video=youtube_share;rHHLKERU0wo]http://youtu.be/rHHLKERU0wo[/video]

[video=youtube_share;AqCf6tHrQIk]http://youtu.be/AqCf6tHrQIk[/video]

[video=youtube_share;1x1Qa-G3ZaY]http://youtu.be/1x1Qa-G3ZaY[/video]

[video=youtube_share;SNs6-cpE42g]http://youtu.be/SNs6-cpE42g[/video]

[video=youtube_share;_JdA4349VEQ]http://youtu.be/_JdA4349VEQ[/video]

sweet set up you have there and yes, I am now using good speakers. I am not fooling myself, there are much higher end speakers out there, and I could go broke chasing my tail, like so many people do, guess what, I caught my tail. I love it. Listening to the system right now, and wow is all I have to say. I'd love to hear that crazy cool set up you have there.

nspindel

Glad you're enjoying what you're hearing, but there is simply no way that having a dimensional driver to the outside of a stereo driver, which is what you're doing with two SDA's side-by-side, could produce a proper SDA sound. There's a reason why Polk designed the speakers as they did, with stereo drivers on the outside and dimensional drivers on the inside. And as you move up the SDA line, you always see two drivers side by side, but the bigger the speaker, the taller it gets, with columns of dimensional and columns of stereo drivers. More power to you in your search for better and better sound, that's what this hobby is all about. But you need to get a basic understanding of the science behind these speakers, and then you'd understand why what you're doing doesn't make sense. If you want better sound, you would be so much better off with a bigger pair of SDA's, than trying to run two pairs side by side.

Mystery

tophatjohnny wrote: »

Bedroom is quite big and that old school ibe just comes to life with this set up. So real and live sounding. I will have the quality cables installed tomorrow and it will be clean looking to go along with the clean sounds. Wife must have bad ears too, as well as my neighbor and 25 year old son, as thy all were blowen away. Don't listen to any nut jobs, try it for yourself. Here to tell ya, it is awesome. I'm sure you'll hear from another Ohio member to the same effect here soon!! Loving it!!! Oh yeah, welcome to my bedroom!!

Initially, I was thinking CRS+ were used as surrounds without IC cable that may work quite well.
If it sounds good, then it's good.
I didn't post this to comment on the setup but the pictures; man those awful cellphone pictures gave me headache.
No offense but just horrible pictures.

teekay0007

Johnny - why isn't your TV centered between your 2Bs? :question:

Lasareath - "sampling" your VERY IMPRESSIVE SDA systems that were recorded on a 12-cent mic and iphone camera vs. in-person is much akin to experiencing a lunar eclipse through one of those homemade pinhole-in-the-cardboard-box telescopes vs. through a Hubble! :razz:

tophatjohnny

F1nut wrote: »

That's a whole lot of bad sound, I don't care what you think you're hearing it flat out does not work.

Okay.......this F1nut knows his stuff, and after unhooking the 2B's and listening to just the CRS+'s I am a believer. Sorry that it took me a while to get it, but I am not the best at it. Sure the combo was cool, but nowhere near as cool as listening to the CRS+'s by themselves. My deepest apology to F1nut and to all that I may have offended. I am not here to pass judgements nor offend anyone in a public manor. I'll end with.. it is good as a combo, but better as singles!! Love it either way.......speaker config that is!!

gudnoyez

Congrats on getting a pair of CRS+s. I thought you were fore warned by some of us on that thread you had about throwing them into the mix. At least you tried them out they sound much better by themselves. I think you will like the sound of them even better hooked up to a amp, the difference is night and day compared to an avr. These guys here know what they are talking about take thier advice and, listen to thier responses as they are here to help. have fun that's what it is all about.

nspindel

I've just finished restoring a set of CRS+'s and converting them to 4.1TL's, and as I've said in other threads, they are without a doubt the "pound for pound" best SDA you can get. It is possible to get better sound, but not without going much, much bigger. Properly restored, they are a speaker to be absolutely loved.

That said, they are also virtually identical to your 2B's. They use the same crossover, the same drivers, and the same tweeter. The differences are purely non-electrical. They have a larger cabinet, and a larger, front-firing passive radiator. As Jesse told you, if you do a nice TL mod to those 2B's they should sound just as good as the CRS+, with a bit more bottom end due to the larger cabinet and PR.

So don't walk away from this experience thinking the CRS+ is a better sounding speaker than the 2B, I believe you're just in a position where you have a better level of mods in the CRS+ than in the 2B.

In the future, if you're ever looking for a "bigger" sounding speaker, the last thing you want to do is put two of them together. Get bigger SDA's. And by all means, get bigger/better power. Power makes all the difference in the world.

And yes, this F1nut knows his stuff, and spends a lot of time on these forums sharing that knowledge with people, and I don't understand why so many people keep trying to challenge that. There are a lot of people who have some great speakers to enjoy thanks to the advice they've gotten from him and the other experts around here, and it's unfortunate that this seems to go unappreciated so often.

Toolfan66

nspindel wrote: »

I've just finished restoring a set of CRS+'s and converting them to 4.1TL's, and as I've said in other threads, they are without a doubt the "pound for pound" best SDA you can get. It is possible to get better sound, but not without going much, much bigger. Properly restored, they are a speaker to be absolutely loved.

That said, they are also virtually identical to your 2B's. They use the same crossover, the same drivers, and the same tweeter. The differences are purely non-electrical. They have a larger cabinet, and a larger, front-firing passive radiator. As Jesse told you, if you do a nice TL mod to those 2B's they should sound just as good as the CRS+, with a bit more bottom end due to the larger cabinet and PR.

So don't walk away from this experience thinking the CRS+ is a better sounding speaker than the 2B, I believe you're just in a position where you have a better level of mods in the CRS+ than in the 2B.

In the future, if you're ever looking for a "bigger" sounding speaker, the last thing you want to do is put two of them together. Get bigger SDA's. And by all means, get bigger/better power. Power makes all the difference in the world.

And yes, this F1nut knows his stuff, and spends a lot of time on these forums sharing that knowledge with people, and I don't understand why so many people keep trying to challenge that. There are a lot of people who have some great speakers to enjoy thanks to the advice they've gotten from him and the other experts around here, and it's unfortunate that this seems to go unappreciated so often.

Agreed!! And very well said..

nspindel

Ah! Another of the experts to whom a lot of us are grateful for is heard from....

Toolfan66

nspindel wrote: »

Ah! Another of the experts to whom a lot of us are grateful for is heard from....

You should see what I have in the shop that is headed to the paint shop tomorrow:loneranger:

Mystery

Toolfan66 wrote: »

You should see what I have in the shop that is headed to the paint shop tomorrow:loneranger:

Must be real good.
I need to come over there to see your goodies.