Advice on powering a pair of Polk rt 2000i speakers

Beta

I am very limited in my knowledge of audio equipment and technology. I'd be grateful to receive a bit of help and some recomendations.

Several years ago I purchased a pair of the Polk rt 2000i speakers. I only use them for listening to music, not as part of a video system. My thing is music, not video.

I am powering them with a Denon AVR 3802 reciever. My CD player is the Denon DCM 380.

I have had this system for a number years and have always thought the sound was average, at best.

I have an I Pod 80 gig classic hooked up to the receiver. The sound here is quite poor. I also have a portable XM device hooked up to the reciever and the sound with this is even worse.

It just doesn't appear to me that my Denon AVR 3802 receiver is powerful enough for the speakers. I thought this to be the case from day one.

Now enough time has passed that I won't feel as guilty about spending money to upgrade my listening experience. I would like have more powerful clean and crisp sound.

I am not sure if I should keep the receiver and change speakers, or keep the speakers and upgrade to a high end power amp.

I am toying with the idea of purchasing a quality 2 channel amp. However, I am absolutely clueless as to where to start. A bit of help with this subject matter would be most appreciated.

Thanks in advance!

cfrizz

Welcome Beta.

I had a 3802 powering my speakers and thought it was good, then I hooked up a Parasound 1500A 2 channel amp and was blown away by the difference.

Put some real power to those speakers via your preouts & enjoy!

Here are a couple of options.

http://www.polkaudio.com/forums/showthread.php?t=66898
http://cls.audiogon.com/cgi-bin/cls.pl?ampstran&1213947890

beardog03

I have a pair of 2000i`s and beleive it or not....get a Jolida 1301, and a Jolida CDP and it will blow your mind !

Hawkeye

Hi Beta,

The 2000i was the first Polk speaker I bought, a long time ago! At the time I thought the BOOMING bass was cool. I don't think I could ever really get it dialed in. Although now that I think about it, I probably did not know what I was doing then. Not that I'm doing much better now!!

My son in law has them now. He uses them strictly for his gaming room and when we visit they still sound the same to me as they did when they were in my living room. He is driving them with a B&K Ref 220 amp which sounds much better than the AVR I was using but still not my cup of tea.

Considering your a music type, you may want to consider updating the whole thing. The LSI gets some good press and there are some good amp choices to go along with them for a musical system.

mantis

Beta,
Sounds like you outgrown them. Sounds like you like 2 channel music and could care less about theater. I say ditch the entire system and rebuild.

Now if rebuilding the entire system isn't in for yeah then lets start with the Denon receiver and swap it out for a Cambridge intergraded. If you have a tweeter near you, you can bring your speakers or listen to polks that they have in stock and try out the Cambridge. they also have a very nice cd player.

As far as your Ipod, you might want to start by recording at a higher bit rate or using Losssless. You can setup your recording in itunes. This will help your sound quality. Having built in ipod control also sounds better but I believe only the surround sound receivers and pre's have this ability.

While your at Tweeter, check out the Lsi line as suggested above. Hear how much better for music they are( in my opnion anyway) they are over the rt series polks. You could come home with a new system. Also look into Audioquest cables while your there. You can build a really nice budget system.

Good luck man,

Dan

Beta

Thank you all kindly for your input.

Quite frankly, my wife would like nothing more than for me to replace the 2000s' with something much smaller. I bought them before we met. I just read one of your posts to her and she laughed and responded "you can buy anything you want as long as you get rid of those giant speakers in our living room". I have to agree with her, they are huge.

It's just a little hard to give them up because they are in perfect condition. Then again, so is the Denon 3802. I tend to really, really take care of things. Also, I have a bit of a guilt complex going on in my head with the idea of scraping the whole system given the how much money (relatively speaking) the stuff originally cost.

Notwithstanding the above, the simple fact is that I was disappointed from day one and never thought the system sounded very good. I use it strictly for music. Nothing else. Not cinema. I have a seperate system for cinema which is in a different room in my house

I was just kind of hoping there might be a way to salvage a portion of what I have now to obtain better sound (i.e. an upgade to a high quality 2 channel amp or replacing the 2000s).

Thanks again. Your feedback was really appreciated!

cfrizz

I think that you will be surprised by the sound of your speakers if you give them more power. By that I mean the unique sound of them won't change but there will certainly be MORE to it.

I think it would be the first most cost conscience improvement to add. If that didn't work, then start looking to replace them.

del44

I was using a Rotel RB-1070 to power my RT-2000P speakers. I know it only puts out 130 wpc, but the 2000's do have the powered subs. I thought it was a big improvement over the amp section in my Sony AVR. It's such a good dependable amp, that I now use it bridged to power my center.

Beta

Thanks everyone for the tips.....

ben62670

Beta wrote: »

I just read one of your posts to her and she laughed and responded "you can buy anything you want as long as you get rid of those giant speakers in our living room".

Does she have a sister?

Seriously if you have a green light some LSI9's, and a decent amp would be a great start. Go used on the amp.
Ben

marker

beardog03 wrote: »

I have a pair of 2000i`s and beleive it or not....get a Jolida 1301, and a Jolida CDP and it will blow your mind !

I concur. Since you only have to drive the tweeter and the 6.5" mid driver high passed at 100 Hz, just get a sweet little integrated with relatively high current.

Beta

Any thoghts on the amp (NAD C372) articulated in the link below?

This would be a replacment of the Denon 3802 currently being used to power my rt 2000i's. Wondering if I would see a appreciable inprovement in power and sound quality?

http://nadelectronics.com/products/hifi-amplifiers/C372-Stereo-Integrated-Amplifier

Thanks again for sharing your knowledge with me!

cfrizz

Yes I think you would see a very good improvement over the Denon.

reeltrouble1

You have a wonderful pair of speakers which are quite small in comparison to others.

thank your wife for letting you keep them.

enjoy.

RT1

Beta

A guy in my office just offer to sell me his Bedini 100/100 MK II Class A amp for $500.00. This guy takes care of stuff like I do, so it should be in excellent shape. Is this a fair price?

Will this AMP power my rt 2000i speakers better than my Denon 3802? Would I see substantial improvement in sound (2 channel music only)?

See link below. Any comments would be appreciated.....

http://www.bedini.com/oldamps.htm

Thanks

cfrizz

I know that most guy here will flip over it because it's class A. But it is also at least 20yrs old!

You can get a much newer NAD c372 for the same amount of money and not have to worry about "it should be in excellent shape."

But that's just me.

amulford

Sure it will power them. Class A amplification is a whole different animal than what your using now. Just to be on the safe side I would send it to Bedini for a thorough check up and spec out. Like Cathy says, it is over 20 years old.

Beta

okay.....

I think I made a final decision on what to power these rt 2000i's with. I wanted to run this idea by this forum as I value the opinions here. At this juncture I plan on going with the following....

Parasound 2250 2 channel amp
Parasound 2100 2 channel pre amp

http://www.parasound.com/nc/

Parasound's web page says Audio Advisor is the only online retailer where their warrenty will remain intact. Anyone had any experience with this company?

As always, Thank you for your thoughts.

amulford

Very good choice. Plenty of power and coherence. You should enjoy that very much.

cfrizz

OH YEAH!!! That will get the job done all the way around!

I bought my Bstock 2 channel Parasound 1500A from AA. Buy with confidence.

Beta

Very cool!

Thanks you guys!!!!!!

beardog03

Parasound was my next suggestion..

I have a 3500, and a 2205A...both work very well with those speaks IMO

I have a ParasoundDQ 1600 tuner if you are interested......great sounding unit



Can`t go wrong with Parasound gear !

Beta

Wow....this stuff just gets more complicated, but interesting

I called a local "boutique" store (a Parasound retailer) and talked to a really nice gentleman. I decided to make a visit to this showroom to look at the Parasound Newclassic 2250 AMP and 2100 pre amp.

Then...I saw the Parasound Halo A-21 amp and P-3 preamp. Wow! This was after laughing at how absolutely amazing the Mcintosh stuff they had is.

http://www.parasound.com/halo/

I really liked the person I met with. Very low key and didn't try to push anything on me. He actually asked me many specific questions and then really listened to how I responded.

I prefer a really bright and crisp sound from my music. The highs out of my 2000i's sound muted to my ears (not crisp/bright). Forgive my reference to a speaker other than Polk in this forum, but in the past I have really liked the crisp/bright sound of high end Klipsch speakers.

Anyways, the salesman actually said he wasn't convienced the addition of an AMP and Preamp was going to solve my issue. I found this to be rather honest as he was essentially talking me out of a sale from which he would have benefited.

We actually headed in the direction of possibly thinking about new speakers.

So, as of today, I have not done anything yet. It appears I am still going around in circles.

As I have said before, the feedback I receive from this forum really helps. Unfortunately, none of my friends, family or co-workers have any knowledge of high end audio.

Thanks again for any thoughts you may have.

Best regards,
Beta

Hawkeye

Beta,

Consider yourself a lucky person to have met an audio salesman like this! He sounds like my dealer. When I was auditioning new speakers, he hooked up everything I wanted to listen to the equipment I have. Then he turned around and left us alone to listen. This went on for about 5 hours. I ended up buying my speaks from someone else because I could not the get the sound I wanted from what he had to offer. Now to be honest, I have spent a lot of money there before and after the speaker shopping. He was very gracious and understanding about our speaker choice. I don't swap components a lot. Most pieces stay in my system about 3 years.

I believe several people here have suggested you may have outgrown your present system and your audio taste may have changed over time. If the K-Horns are what you think sounds good, take some of your favorite cds to the dealer and get a listen on. If it floats your boat, see if he offers an in home trial period. Some of this stuff sounds great at the dealer and terrible at home and vice versa.

It seems like your taking your time in this decision and I think it is wise. It is very easy to get caught up in the shopping and take something home you may regret later.

Gordon