Large or small?

aaburto99

I have RT1000i's for mains, CS245i for center, and fx300i's for surrounds (no stand-alone sub). Right now, the mains are set to "large" and the center to "small" --- which should be a given. For the surrounds, the manual recommends setting them to "small."

Correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't it recommended not to send all the bass to the subwoofer because it loads it down, or something? If this is true, isn't that what the recommended configuration would be doing? Since all the speakers but the mains would be set to "small" (and the subwoofer set to "off"), then the mains would get all the bass, correct? Then, since the mains have the built-in subwoofer, doesn't this subwoofer get most of the bass? Since the subwoofers are small, is this recommended?

I'm pretty new at this home theater stuff, so I could be way off-base on this. Would it be bad to set the surrounds to large?

OrangeToupee

The recommendation for your setup is, in my opinion, correct. Set your RT100i's to 'large,' your CS245i to 'small,' and your F/X 300i's to 'small.' Set your subwoofer(stand alone) to 'No.' This would funnel all of your real bass signals to your mains; with your speakers, that's what you would want to do.

I don't know what you mean by loading down the subwoofer. That's what it's there for, to be loaded down with bass.

If you get a stand alone subwoofer, then set that to 'yes.'

Ron-P

Correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't it recommended not to send all the bass to the subwoofer because it loads it down, or something?

Mains to 'large' center and surrounds to 'small'. The subs are designed to take all the bass.

Would it be bad to set the surrounds to large?

Depends. If your not planning to run them hard, they would be fine set to 'large'. I use the RT25i's for surrounds and have them set to 'large' and they do fine. But, I am only feeding them about 60 watts of high-current. When I upgrade my receiver to an out-board amp, I will set them to 'small'.


Peace Out~:D

RuSsMaN

Mains large, agreed.....

Use your ears for the rest.....

Cheers,
Russ

aaburto99

I found this on the Polk Audio FAQ page under bass management:

"The downside is that the more speakers you select as 'Small' the greater the workload on the subwoofer, increasing the odds that you will overtax it."

I assumed with a stand-alone subwoofer, this wouldn't be much of a problem, but since the RT1000i's have little 6.5" subs, I thought this might come into play.

Oh well, they go on to recommend the standard configuration (mains large, rest small) anyway, despite saying this. I guess my real question was whether it was okay to set the surrounds to large, given that the recommended setting was small. I'll decide based on what sounds best.

mantis

I APPLAUD YOU.
Thats the spirit.
Don't worry about over running a sub...if you do that by running everything in small, get it out and buy a better one, your wasting your time and money on a sub that does that.
The rt1000i's are made to run large.speaker level, and bi wired(:p to all who disagree with that)if you will.
Small is a good choice for the rest of the system.
You really should consider a seperate sub with your system.Id start with the psw450 or 650, it would go nice with your speakers.