Bi-Amping on multichannel receiver with no crossover (Pioneer VSX-816)
wizzy
Posts: 867
So, I was digging around the storage shed and found an old Pioneer VSX-816 receiver. According to the manual, you can bi-amp using the surround-back and setting the menu to "bi-amp"
But... there's no crossover in this mode. 20hz-20khz comes out each set of speaker terminals in the back of the amp.
Is there any point here? If the receiver is going to make the amp powering the high end still crank out everything down to 20Hz before hitting your speakers crossover, what's the point? You're not going to get any more power. If you single amp'd, your fronts would hit the wall when they hit the wall.
If you bi-amp and the receiver is still amplifying all frequencies on the amp dedicated to the mid/tweeter, well, won't it just hit the wall at the same time as if you didn't even bother bi-amping?
I just don't see how this will do anything other than use more electricity, and generate more heat. Or maybe I am missing something.
But... there's no crossover in this mode. 20hz-20khz comes out each set of speaker terminals in the back of the amp.
Is there any point here? If the receiver is going to make the amp powering the high end still crank out everything down to 20Hz before hitting your speakers crossover, what's the point? You're not going to get any more power. If you single amp'd, your fronts would hit the wall when they hit the wall.
If you bi-amp and the receiver is still amplifying all frequencies on the amp dedicated to the mid/tweeter, well, won't it just hit the wall at the same time as if you didn't even bother bi-amping?
I just don't see how this will do anything other than use more electricity, and generate more heat. Or maybe I am missing something.
Post edited by wizzy on
Comments
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Correct, that receiver doesn't give you a true bi-amp.
Does the manual say whether using an active crossover of your own will allow true bi-amping? You could send the low-pass to the 'front' input and the high-pass to the 'surround' input. -
The only thing I could think of after posting was changes in impedance.
Impedance varies over the frequency range, so it's possible that say one amp might have less impedance variances to deal with over the range of frequency cut out by the crossover network.
On the low end, there should be little impedance variance from say 20-125Hz, and on the mid/high crossover, same deal from 125-20k -
On the low end, there should be little impedance variance from say 20-125Hz, and on the mid/high crossover, same deal from 125-20k
That's where you'll find the biggest change in impedance.
It basically adds power to the system to compensate for the juice being lost in the crossover.
A friend just donated a 5.1 receiver that I was hoping to use for biamping, but it only has stereo inputs. I guess once I finish designing and building a 2-way active crossover, I'll use me stereo amps to make it happen. I might end up building a new speaker just for this purpose. You see how quickly adding a crossover and 50 watts gets involved?
