HT setup

lomic

First I must say these forums are great, been poking around here for several days and found some very informative threads.

Now my story: My parents got me addicted to home theater, and they recently moved away forcing me out on my own - the consiquence is of course that I must now build my own system

Here is the excess equipment I took from my parents:
-Pioneer Elite VSX-14 Reciever
-2x Acoustic Research 215PS 2-way speakers (mains)
-2x Speco DMS-3p 3-way speakers (rear)
-KLH ASW-80 subwoofer

Most of this stuff isn't very good, with the exception of the Pioneer. While It's getting on in years and has no DTS, the sound is great and at 100w per channel I can't complain.

So on my first trip to Fry's I was trying to hold myself back a back a bit spending-wise. Since the house I'm staying in isn't very large, I thought I'd make my first purchase a small center channel - since I didn't have a center at all. I picked up a cute little Cambridge Soundworks MC150 for $99 and went on my way.

A week later I realized the depth of my mistake and returned the thing, and spent a couple hours in the listening rooms to find something good, no matter the cost or size! As I punched up the Polk CSi3 I messed my pants and fell in love with Polk. I've had it home for a week now and it blows me away, the highs and mids are the clearest and cleanest I've ever heard.

Anyway - the problem at hand is that now the rest of my system is so horrible in comparison to the CSi3 that I'm desperate to upgrade my mains and subwoofer ASAP. After giving all the Polks a listen, I'm fairly confident with getting a pair of RTi6's and a PSW303 or 404.

Here's the living room layout:


I'm fairly sure about the RTi6's, but I'd really like advice on the sub. If I had to describe the kind of bass I want, I'd say it's tight, accurate and strong - as opposed to loud, boomy and bone-shattering. Trying not to disturb the neighbors too much

Any input would be greatly appreciated, any my price range for mains + sub is $600-700.

gatemplin

Welcome to Club Polk,
If I were you, I would get two pairs of RTi4s or RTi6s, and an HSU subwoofer. The HSUs are all very clean and tight sounding subs with excellent build quality.

www.hsuresearch.com

fgr41

Many of the stores will be discontinuing thier Polk RTi line soon to make way for the next model year. Keep an eye out at your local Circuit City stores and here for deals as they pop up, often people will post great buys on the forum. Don't be shy to buy a pair of open box, when bought from an authorized dealer they come with the standard 5 year warrenty.

The best thing to do to make a well enveloped sound is to get all of your speakers from the same line. By this I mean get the rti4 or rti6's, the same model year as the center. This way everything is evenly timber matched.

As far as the sub goes save your $ till you can get what you want. If you don't you will be suffering from the "what if" syndrome and you may not recover. HSU and SVS seem to be the two most popular subs here. Both are online retailers that have great quality at a good price. Sure there are cheaper subs but if you want to be IN the movie instead of watching it don't skimp on the sub.

danger boy

Originally posted by lomic
As I punched up the Polk CSi3 I messed my pants and fell in love with Polk.

it's usually a good idea to take a extra pair of pants when auditioning any Polk speakers.

lomic

The input is much appreciated, I have read up some on the HSU now, and it looks as though the STF-2 is exactly what I'm looking for.

I'm having a little trouble deciding between the RTi6 or RTi4 based on the cost - however after hearing them both the RTi6's do seem to have a noticably fuller sound - or Fry's rigged them to sound better in the showroom. So I guess I'll go with the 6's for the front - rear channels with have to wait a couple paychecks.

Finally, should I add upgrading my reciever to the list? Will my system be begging for DTS, or is DD good enough? And if I stay with 5.1 should i go for a speaker like the FXi3 to fill out the rear more fully?

gatemplin

In my opinion, if you go with FXi3s you should put them on the side walls just behind the couch. As for a receiver fgr41 has one in the flea market, I think it is a good deal. It is a 6.1 receiver with DTS and DD. You could use it just as a 5.1 receiver and then add a rear center later.
http://clubpolk.polkaudio.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&threadid=17054

lomic

Just had to tempt me? That's a darn good price for such a nice reciever

Oh well, going to go with RTi6's and a HSU STF-2 for now, and that should drain me pretty good

lomic

Thanks again for the advice - I found a pair of new RTi6's on ebay, picked them up for $299 shipped, my HSU STF-2 is on the way, and Frank will be sending a Subwoofer interconnect on Friday. Now I'm just dreading the decision of hooking up the STF before the Signal cable gets here.

I have come back with another question as well regarding reciever settings. My Pioneer VSX-14 reciever allows the Crossover Frequency setting to be set at its lowest to 100Hz. Since the STF's response range only goes up to 90Hz will this result in a tangible gap?

There's also an on/off Low Pass Filter on the reciever - now the manual isn't very clear, but this is /not/ the same as the Crossover Frequency, right? Don't want to be messing up the output before it even gets to the sub.

AsSiMiLaTeD

As for the crossover on the receiver being 100 at the lowest, that just can't be right. That would mean that, without a sub, you couldn't get anything lower than 100hz on your mains.

I'm not familiar with that receiver, but I can pretty much guarantee you that's not right...

Give Pioneer a call and see what tey say...

jefft1314

Actually Polkmaniac that's exactly right. The vsx 14 is i believe Pioneer's lowest end elite receiver and shares many things in common with their 900 receivers. The 912k i demoed a while back only allowed the crossover to be set as low as 100hz, didn't bother me since I was running the rm6700's. I would consider running your fronts through the subwoofer and not using the built in crossover on the pioneer. Or, I'd upgrade the pioneer receiver.

jefft1314

I'm probably wrong about the vsx-14, but i do know that the 912's crossover can't be set lower than 100 so it wouldn't surprise me if pioneer did the same thing with some of their other receivers.

jefft1314

Oh, and the rti6's are on sale for 129 a pop at circuit city brand new. I'm pretty sure that's every circuit city across the country and not just specific to my store.

lomic

I was at Circuit City a week ago and the only RTi's they had on sale were the floor models. Not necissarily a bad thing, but they were still over $300 and were fairly scuffed and had several stickers all over the finish. On the other hand they did have the CSi3 on sale for $150, so I went back to Fry's and got a pricematch (that was fun). I am going to be keeping an eye out on their FXi3 stock, hopefully those go on sale in about a week.

As for the VSX-14, I plan on having all the speakers set to Small, and using the Subwoofer Pre-out (have a Signal cable on the way). I'll have the Lowcut Filter turned off on the VSX, and in this configuration the reciever will output to the Pre-out even in 2 channel no-dsp mode.

Here is what it says in the VSX manual regarding the Crossover Frequency Setting: "When the bass range of speakers set at SMALL are divided to other speakers with bass funcions in the SPEAKER setting mode, sets how much sound (below how many Hz) is to be divided to the other speakers during playback. Initially it is set to 100Hz. It is recommended that it be set to 200Hz when only small speakers are used, although this depnds on the efficiency of the speaker."

Well, I guess I'll just see how it sounds and go from there.

lomic

HSU STF-2 came in today and I'm completely amazed. It's exactly what I'm looking for, the most precise bass I've heard - makes the PSW's sound like boom boxes. Without even taking much time to calabrate it, the output has already passed my expectations. Can't imagine what it's going to sound like once my Signal interconnect gets here and I get the configuration done.

I stopped by CC, and indeed they do have the RTi6's for $130 each. Oh well, woulda saved me $10 but the guy said they might only have the floor models left in stock. They did only have the floor models of the FXi3's left, which they'll give me for $299 - so thanks for the heads up on their closeout of the RTi line.