RTi150 Anyone seen this newbie?

organ

I understand that they will need very good amps to really shine, but let's not forget they are 8ohms each with 91db/1watt. This is very efficient unlike the LSi being 4ohms/88db which I believe should "only" be powered by good amps to prevent dynamic compression. This means that the RTi150 can be powered by good receivers(though I will upgrade to sepereates a while after I get them). My RT800i are 8ohms/90db/watt which means with one watt of power, the RTi150 should play 1db louder. Is this right? Wesmo heard them at CC and he seems very impresed with them being powered by an Onkyo700 which means this speakers are quite easy to drive, but will greatly benefit with a lot of power(amps). Before I get them, I'll be sure to demo them at the store with my receiver(Onkyo TXDS575) just to see if my theory is correct.

Jason, I agree that the LSi15 is suited more for a 2 channel music system. The home theater type speakers always have more slam though but sacrifices clarity, smoothness, etc. The really dynamic sound is what I want. I'm sure the LSi will give a sweeter sound. This is kinda like comparing Klipsch to B&W. Some people prefer the dynamics of te Klipsch over the more netural sound of the B&W's and others love the sound of the B&W. For some reason I lean towards the Klipsch side because it sounds more "live" to me. Metal concerts really made me think about speakers with a big powerful sound even though they're usually less accurate. I'm willing to sacrifice clarity for now. When you do upgrade to the LSi, will you be using them in a seperate 2 chanel rig? I think they look awsome in a music system(simple and elegant looking) and would make snobby audiophiles drool. I saw a pair of LSi15 at my dealer in a 2chanel demo room but was too afraid to demo them. I was purchasing new speaker cables and didn't want to go home feeling like my 800i's will sound like crap, and why did I waste money on cables anyways. Oh yeah, they weere connected to a carver amp, rotel CD player but can't remember the pre.

Maurice

mantis

organ,
nice post.Waste money on cables????how unless you down graded yourself.Cables complete the system, without good sounding cables your nice system suffers.

Dr. Spec

Originally posted by scottvamp
(IMO)Using them for HT to eliminate a lfe subwoofer - I don't think so. Not even close to compensating for the bass in my HT.

Scott:

Aren't you running a PSW1200 (or two)? Have you destroyed anything in your house yet?

I don't think for a second the RTi150 could best a PSW1200 in a head-to-head bass contest, but with nearly 200 square inches of high excursion woofer surface area, I'm thinking these speaks could belt some some very impressive bass in both SPL and extension.

My guess without hearing them (as Mantis justifiably points out) is that they'd easily match or even comfortably exceed a PSW650 in the bass department. They might be all the sane HT enthusiast needs in a moderate sized room for mains and a sub.

Of course, this all amounts to bench racing - until someones demo's them, we can only make educated guesses. I'll see if my local CC has a pair in stock.

Doc

Janusch

Went to CC for lunch and they had Days of Thunder playing with RTI150's. The Bass was good, but I think you still need a subwoofer to really make things rummble.
Also got a chance to playe some other music CD's they had in there DVD player (Michael Jackson, some Jazz guy, and some pop record. Drums were great, but seem to over power the horns, voice, and other instuments.
For my taste I like the LSI 7 with a subwoofer better.

scottvamp

Scott: Aren't you running a PSW1200 (or two)? Have you destroyed anything in your house yet?

I have a PSW1200 in the front and I also have a Boston Acoustic VR500 towards the rear of the theater.
I have been drooling over the rti150 though. I have been wanting a reason to get rid of my rt1000's (A) because of the powered subs just add to the interconnect monstosity of my HT (B)they are the oldest speakers in my setup and (C) they will intergrate well with my rt line.
Within the next year I will sell off my rt1000's and pick these up. I think that the sheer power of the (mid-bass) and frontstage volume over all is what excites me. Did the measurements compared to my rt1000's - these freaking things are monsters and 81 pounds each WOW!

Dr. Spec

I also stopped by CC last night to demo them.

You are correct Scott, they are very large (deep) in person, and interestingly have identical woofer surface area as the RT3000p, which I don't think was a coincidence on Polk's part.

I had to convince the salesman to set the speaks to "large" and the sub to "no" just so I could evaluate the low bass capabilities of these puppies.

We played LOTR - FOTR with an Infinity center and FX500i surrounds. The receiver was a Harman/Kardon unit - not terribly powerful on paper (less than 100WPC) but rated as high current capability.

We played some bassy parts of FOTR - I was pretty impressed with the low end of these speakers - clean, tight, and deep - at reasonable volumes.

I wanted to push them more to see how much slam they could really kick out before bottoming, but the H/K clearly had all it could handle and I couldn't bear to clip the amp on these new speaks.

The CC salesman, on the other hand, seemed deaf to the sound of a clipping amp and seemed more than willing to push the volume past the clean limits of the receiver.

We had the grills off, and the woofs never bottomed out and had decently long excursion.

Final analysis - familiar RT family sound for mids and highs (no surprises here), with clean, tight, deep bass, but a much stronger amp was needed to evaluate bass slam capabilties.

Doc

scottvamp

Thanks for the evaluation! It will be a little while before I can get them - hopefully the price will go down a little.:)