Adjustable SDA?

TennMan

I'm sure Polk spent countless hours on getting the perfect balance of sound from our SDA speakers. But as some of you might know, I like to think outside the box sometimes.

The dimensional drivers on the outside that produce the SDA seem to play at a lower volume than the stereo drivers when the interconnect cable is hooked up. That leads me to ask the following question.

Could the width of the SDA sound be increased by reducing the volume of only the stereo drivers in each speaker so you would hear more from the dimensional drivers? What are your thoughts?

(Yes, I know I'm going to catch hell for asking this but that is OK.)

F1nut

The SDA drivers play at a reduced volume in order to make the interaural crosstalk cancellation work.

delkal

I played with hooking up 2 pairs of speakers with two amps (one integrated) with one pair of speakers wired like they did with the SDA's. With the "dimensional drivers" off my system sounded like it always did. But as you turned up the "dimensional" speakers you could hear the sound stage clearly widening. IIRC if you turned the SDA speakers up too much it started sounding unnatural but they could have been playing louder than the mains.

This is not hard to do. Get some surrounds and place them next to your speakers wired like the SDA's and drive them from one preamp. Then turn up the SDA effect as much as you want. It sounded great when you hit the sweet spot.

And i don't mine catching hell either.........

machone

Adjusting speaker location such as width between the pair can make significant changes in imaging.

TennMan

Thanks for the comments. I didn't think there would be much interest in this.

westmassguy

TennMan wrote: »

I'm sure Polk spent countless hours on getting the perfect balance of sound from our SDA speakers. But as some of you might know, I like to think outside the box sometimes.

The dimensional drivers on the outside that produce the SDA seem to play at a lower volume than the stereo drivers when the interconnect cable is hooked up. That leads me to ask the following question.

Could the width of the SDA sound be increased by reducing the volume of only the stereo drivers in each speaker so you would hear more from the dimensional drivers? What are your thoughts?

(Yes, I know I'm going to catch hell for asking this but that is OK.)

The dimensional woofers only real purpose is to cancel the crosstalk from the opposite channel. I doubt increasing their level would do anything other than bring attention to themselves, which you don't want. The stereo woofers and tweeters create the soundstage, along with proper positioning and room treatment if needed. I would think going up the SDA ladder to multiple stereo drivers, say 2.3tl or 1.2tl would do a better job of expanding the soundstage.

delkal

westmassguy wrote: »

TennMan wrote: »

I'm sure Polk spent countless hours on getting the perfect balance of sound from our SDA speakers. But as some of you might know, I like to think outside the box sometimes.

The dimensional drivers on the outside that produce the SDA seem to play at a lower volume than the stereo drivers when the interconnect cable is hooked up. That leads me to ask the following question.

Could the width of the SDA sound be increased by reducing the volume of only the stereo drivers in each speaker so you would hear more from the dimensional drivers? What are your thoughts?

(Yes, I know I'm going to catch hell for asking this but that is OK.)

The dimensional woofers only real purpose is to cancel the crosstalk from the opposite channel. I doubt increasing their level would do anything other than bring attention to themselves, which you don't want.

If you listen to just the dimensional woofers with the mains off they have a strange "spacey" sound with zero imaging. The sound seems to come from everywhere and you can not get any directional clues. It is a very strange experience.