RTi150 Questions

Skywalker

I recently stumbled upon a pair of RTi150s at CC for 500 bucks for the pair - brand new - don't ask me how. I brought them home and set them up bi-amped to my denon 3802. They literally rattled pictures off my wall and I was completely satisfied with the high and low response even without an external amp. Then I recently moved into a new house. The room that I originally tested the 150s in was about 13' by 11' and this new room that I am assigning for my Home Theater is about 21' x 16. Now I am having trouble getting the 150s to fill this new room. Of course the room is very open and empty so I get more echo and the speakers sound overall more bright and less (very much less) bass responsive. The speakers are definately hitting, but the room acoustics are giving me hell. Am I going to have to get some M-blocks or something to pull more performance out of the 150s in order to fill the room or is there some other trick I can try. I have been messing with speaker placement, but I've been unsuccessful thus far. Can someone please shine a light my way. Thanks fellas.

Denon 3802
Front RTi150 Bi Amped
Center CSi40 Bi Amped
Surround RTi55 Bi Amped
Rear Center CSi30
PSW 350 (Yes I know it's the weak spot)
Monster Reference Power Center HTS 3500
Speaker Cable-Monster XPHP-Cl

AsSiMiLaTeD

What are you bi-amping the 150s with? I assume you're using the receiver for the highs and the amp in question for the lows?

gmorris

Skywalker,

Do you mean to say you are bi-wiring your speakers? I see in your signature you are bi-amping your Front L&R's, center & surrounds, but only have your Denon receiver listed. I don't see how this is possible. I suspect you have them bi-wired.

As far as getting more Bass, I think you need to keep messing with placement. It sounds to me like accoustics of the room are indeed your problem. I doubt adding an amp (to add more power) will fix anything. It may be time to add a subwoofer.

Snoopdog

My room is 20x14 with a 10' opening on the right to a 12x12 room. Ceiling is 9'. I get plenty of bass response without a subwoofer at higher (normal listening) volume levels. But at lower listening levels, a good sub goes a long way.

The 150s love power, though. If you're driving them with a 100 watt/channel receiver, you haven't heard 'em yet.

disneyjoe7

I have RTi150's with a room like 20x20 with 10ft ceilings, with large door openings to other rooms. The RTi150 fills the room just fine Great Speakers love them. They Love POWER, I drive them with Onkyo 898 110w per channel, and I think that is just scratching the surface. I will be Bi-amping this in the future with a HK 2000 amp soon. Just a cheap up grade for now. I think a serious SUB would be needed compete with these speakers. I use a Paradigm Servo-15 sub for HT only. The 150's are used for HT but also in 2-channel mode.

Skywalker

To correct myself from earlier, I do have all of my speakers bi-wired not amped. I also have a large opening on the left of the room which my main speakers and television sit adjacent to. The opening is ~12 ft long. I also have 9ft ceilings and carpet floor. There seem to be many nodes in the room where the low end frequencies cancel out and then in other areas there is a bass hot spot. I'm not really a newbie to home theater, but I just can't get the speakers to sound like they should. Thanks for the support guys, it is much appreciated.

Emlyn

Originally posted by Skywalker
The speakers are definately hitting, but the room acoustics are giving me hell. Am I going to have to get some M-blocks or something to pull more performance out of the 150s in order to fill the room or is there some other trick I can try. I have been messing with speaker placement, but I've been unsuccessful thus far. Can someone please shine a light my way. Thanks fellas.

There seems to be more than one problem. The volume of the new room with its open area is probably three times that of the other room (1287 cubic feet vs 3024+ cubic feet). Other things could be related to flooring construction material, furniture placement, floor covering (even including differences in carpet padding), room reflections, wall structure, etc. The most cost effective resolution is probably to add a larger subwoofer that hits well below the RTi150s capabilities. Biamping the 150s in that large a room would help the speakers sound better by themselves (I found a better improvement in midrange clarity rather than bass output when biamping), but probably wouldn't get you back to the point you were at in the smaller room.

disneyjoe7

Skywalker,


Hate to ask but can you post some pictures, that can help 1000%. Your current setup seems very hard, with this wall opening as you state. Or yes you will need to Bi-amp these babies.

Originally posted by Skywalker
To correct myself from earlier, I do have all of my speakers bi-wired not amped. I also have a large opening on the left of the room which my main speakers and television sit adjacent to. The opening is ~12 ft long. I also have 9ft ceilings and carpet floor. There seem to be many nodes in the room where the low end frequencies cancel out and then in other areas there is a bass hot spot. I'm not really a newbie to home theater, but I just can't get the speakers to sound like they should. Thanks for the support guys, it is much appreciated.

AsSiMiLaTeD

Originally posted by disneyjoe7
Skywalker,


Hate to ask but can you post some pictures, that can help 1000%. Your current setup seems very hard, with this wall opening as you state. Or yes you will need to Bi-amp these babies.

Aside from layout experimenting...a good 'cheap' idea to try is to bi-amp the RTi150s, putting at least 100 WPC on the lows...even if this doesn't increase your bass response, it will no doubt help the mids and highs sound MUCH better since they will have more power also...

As for adding a sub, that may work as well, but it will be difficult to do that cheaply...you can't just throw a 202 or 303 in a room with those 150s, anything that small will simply de outdone by the 150s and just won't sound all that great, IMO...

Any sub that you add that will make a big difference will likely cost you a little $$$...

Skywalker

If you guys can stay tuned for one more day, I'll try to get some pictures and put them up by tomorrow afternoon.