New LSi7's, questions

brijenjas

The Wife and I went to Tweeter on Sunday to audition the RTI8's, came home with cherry LSi7's.
I hadn't planned on buying anything,as a matter of fact we weren't even going to listen to the lsi's as we both prefer floorstanders,and the 15's and 25's are out of our price range.
I'm glad we decided to listen to the lsi's.
I was suprised at the amount of sound that comes out of these small speakers, the clarity I expected after reading the reviews here and elsewhere.
The Wife liked the sound of the 7's better than any of the rti floorstanders and said go ahead and buy them now. I almost fell on the floor,as we weren't planning on buying for another month or two.
(Sorry about the ramble, just had to share)
On to my questions.
1. Of course the speakers don't sound as good when I got them home, only moderately better than my R50's, I assume they need to be broken in?
2. They were being driven with a Denon 3806 at Tweeter, I'm driving them with Panny SAXR55, biwired, the panny switches to biamp in two channel mode, maybe I need more power? The Panny has a 6 ohm rating.
3. Speaker stands, you don't actually attach the speakers to stands do you?
You just set the speakers on the stands with some kind of anti-slip?
Are these stands any good? http://shop.polkaudio.com/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/ProductDisplay?catalogId=13352&storeId=12352&productId=111364&langId=-1
Considering purchasing them.
4. The LSi9's didn't sound as good as the 7's at Tweeter, do they require even more power than the 7's because of the additional driver?

okiepolkie

1. Of course the speakers don't sound as good when I got them home, only moderately better than my R50's, I assume they need to be broken in?
Congratulations on a nice set of speakers. I am on my second set and enjoy them every time I turn them on. They do require a amount of break in time. A general rule is around 50 hours, but they can still improve as long as 100 hrs
2. They were being driven with a Denon 3806 at Tweeter, I'm driving them with Panny SAXR55, biwired, the panny switches to biamp in two channel mode, maybe I need more power? The Panny has a 6 ohm rating.
The Panny should be decent for these speakers, however, you can do much better. I would suggest between 150-300 high quality watts to really do them justice
3. Speaker stands, you don't actually attach the speakers to stands do you?
You just set the speakers on the stands with some kind of anti-slip?
Are these stands any good? http://shop.polkaudio.com/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/ProductDisplay?catalogId=13352&storeId=12352&productId=111364&langId=-1
Considering purchasing them.
You do not have to attach the speakers to the stands, however, it can help. A good alternative to attaching without damage would be sticky tack. I would take a look at different stands, such as these at Parts Express: http://www.partsexpress.com/pe/showdetl.cfm?&DID=7&Partnumber=240-744 Anything that can be mass loaded-filled with sand or lead shot, would be good.
4. The LSi9's didn't sound as good as the 7's at Tweeter, do they require even more power than the 7's because of the additional driver?
The extra driver is the main reason for it being harder to drive. I tend to like the 7's because they are easier to drive and typical receivers tend to drive them adequately

Hope you enjoy them.

Early B.

Generally, A/V receivers are not designed to power 4 ohm speakers. You're gonna need a separate amp to power them, and your Panny would need to have pre-outs to do so.

brijenjas

Thanks for the input guys, I aprreciate it.
okiepolkie,I don't think my wife will go for those stands too "functional" as she calls it. It looks like there is room under the bottom plates to attach some heavy metal plates on the Sanus i linked to.
How heavy should I make the stands?

Where can I purchase "sticky tack"?

I figured I was going to need more power, although the Panny seems to be doing ok for now, I will have to upgrade that later, no pre-outs, it's a digital path receiver.

brijenjas

I just won an Adcom GFA-6000 on the bay, will this power the lsi7's sufficiently?
Appears to be rated at 150 watts @ 4 ohms across the 3 front channels.

organ

brijenjas wrote:

I just won an Adcom GFA-6000 on the bay, will this power the lsi7's sufficiently?
Appears to be rated at 150 watts @ 4 ohms across the 3 front channels.

Hell yeah! Congrats. Better start thinking of excuses to tell your wife;). Your Panny have pre outs, right? You'll need them to run the amp.

brijenjas

organ wrote:

Better start thinking of excuses to tell your wife;). Your Panny have pre outs, right?

Got any suggestions? I going to need some.:eek:
No pre outs on Panny, I'll have to take my Pioneer 814 out of the bedroom and put it back in the main system until I can afford a better receiver, it has preouts. My audio budget is definitely depleted for a while after buying the lsi's and the Adcom.

Refefer

You could always check out www.audiogon.com for preamps, do some research and you can find decent deals, if you don't mind buying used. I myself just dropped $140 shipped on a used Parasound PH/P 850... it got great reviews (for entry-level preamps) and the same preamp is going for $250 on ebay. I'm sure with a little looking you can find a decent preamp for around what I paid for it.

Besides, you can always upgrade later.

Andrew

lomic

Where can I purchase "sticky tack"?

I got it at Target, after every Office Max/Depot in the area was sold out for some reason.

The Adcom will help the sound, I'm sure, but they'll probably never sound as good as they seemed to sound at Tweeter unless you're going to be doing some work on the room you're listening in. Their rooms are designed for demoing speakers, and it's an amazing difference listening to it in a demo room vs. most living rooms.

madmax

Walmart usually has sticky tac too.
madmax

McLoki

Just an FYI - sticky tack is marketed as the stuff you can hang posters with without making a hole in your wall. it kind of looks like strips of silly putty with a tacky feel (although you will not know that until you pull it out of the package). White or blue are common colors, but it can be any color.

Just wanted you to look in the office supplies section, not the audio section.

Michael

michael_w

Try playing around with placement. They can be fairly picky when it comes to where they are sitting in the room.

I too was a little dissapointed when I first pulled my 7's out of the box, but at the time I was also running a panasonic receiver and the speakers had no break in time (brand new). I gave them about 100 hours and got myself a nad integrated amp and now they sound like a totally different speaker.

Congrats on the new amp and speakers!