Several Problems

Schwendy

I am totally confused. In fact, I only recently learned to walk and chew gum at the same time so I am not electronically inclined.

Prob. 1 - I have a party room with an older Onkyo Integra TX-DS838 recvr. and Polk RTi6 bookshelf speakers, a sub and satellite surounds. I recently had the vol. way up during a party and had an iPod plugged in via phono jacks with a y connector. Now the bookshelf speakers sound very dull like they are blown. Took one of the 6.5" drivers out and tested to my ability with a multimeter. Came up with 4.1ohms (resistance) and also touched a 9volt batter to the terminals and the speaker extended like it's supposed to I guess. Visually, it looks perfect. Does this mean my recvr is blown? Wouldn't there be no sound if that were the case or a channel was blown? Haven't checked the tweeter yet but that seems like it would sound different than a muted sound. Speakers are about 5yrs. old.

Prob. 2- I have a dedicated home theater room I just finished and outfitted with new gear at Christmas time with a Polk Micro sub, RTiA7's for the fronts, FXiA4's for the sides and rear and a LSiC for the center powered by an Onkyo TX-SR876 7.1 Receiver. Problem is I didn't realize the center speaker is 4 ohm while the rest of the speakers are 8 ohm. Different techs at Polk and Onkyo can't seem to agree if this is really bad or that I can leave as is. I love the center but wonder if I should sell it and get the better matching CSiA6 which is 8 ohm. Don't want to damage the speakers or receiver. Onkyo book says "If the impedance of any of the connected speakers is 4 ohms or more but less than 6, be sure to set the speaker impedance to 4 ohms. I have one 4ohm center and rest are 8 ohms so what do I set the recvr to?

Prob. 3 -Sound in the movie room is plenty loud enough when watching movies but not so when listening to music or playing concert dvds. Have to have the vol almost fully cranked and in some drunken instances I inadvertently had the vol. all the way to max. I like listening to music louder than movies. Can I solve this problem by adding an amplifier? Would I get a 2 chan. for the front speakers or a 5 or 7 chan. amp? Seems cheaper to get a couple of 2 chan. amps (Onkyo's is less than $200 on the internet) while most brand's 7 chan. amps were upwards of $2,500! If I powered the two front mains with a separate amp would that free up more power for the rest of my speakers? Is it easy to hook up multiple amps?

I know this is a lot of questions but I'll take any bits of info I can get!

Thanks!

kawizx9r

1. I'd just like to add, that if you were to test a speaker in anyway with a battery, do it only momentarily and with a 1.5v battery ONLY. Holding a speaker to a battery, or using one of high voltage can seriously damage the voice coils within the speaker. As far as being blown or not, is it ALL the speakers that sound dull? Or just a driver or 2 from a cabinet. Try switching the speakers from one channel to the other.

NJPOLKER

You'll fit in well
Welcome to the Club

Schwendy

Uhh oh. I used a 9v battery and held it on the terminals for about 5 sec. It's only the two bookshelf speakers that sound funny. The small satellite and center speaker sounds fine. I'll try hooking them up to the speaker B terminals and to another recvr to make sure. That's my last resort though because it requires the most effort.

kawizx9r

Yea, it's just a test to see if its the speakers or the reciever itself. If it IS the speakers, I can't imagine all drivers going out at once. It's usually common for a tweeter or woofer to go out alone. Let us know what you get

wutadumsn23

Sounds like problem 1 is in work so I will take a shot at 2 and 3, lol. As for mix matching 4 and 8 ohm speakers that is not a good idea IMO. I would ditch the LSiC and get the timber matched CSi A4 or CSi A6, probably the 6 but threw the 4 in there to give more than one option. It would be much cheaper to upgrade one speaker than have to upgrade the rest of your speakers to match your center. Your AVR is pretty much Onkyo's flagship receiver and while it will power 4 ohm speakers, it will not do them justice, not to mention the Onks run hot as it is and will only run hotter powering 4 ohm speakers. As for problem 3, the A7's can handle up to 300W and with the Onk pushing maybe 100W per channel with all channel driven (140W in 2 ch. mode) they would benifit greatly from external amplification. Some say that 2 ch. or music is not Onkyo's strong suit, but with a decent amp I bet it would sound much better than it does now. If you are only going to listen to music in 2 ch. mode I would imagine a 2 ch. amp would do the trick, but IMHO it would be a better option to get a 5 or 7 ch. amp and be done with it. I have heard good things about the Emotiva XPA-5 with 200W RMS into 5 channels it would do a world of good. It retails for about $800 from theire site www.emotiva.com and it is one of the amps I was looking at getting for my system. Lots of people will recommend Sunfire, Adcom and other companies like that and they are also very good options but also a bit spendier. I have no affiliation to any company just trying to offer the best option for the $, IMO. I know the Onkyo amps you are talking about, I was looking at those myself, only problem is they only put out about 100W per channel and they are only 2 ch. amps. Buy 2 or 3 of those and you are pretty much at the same price as the XPA-5 or comparable 5 ch. amp. It is alot easier to hook up one 5 ch. amp than it is two or three 2 ch. amps. If you amp your two mains it won't free up any more power to the rest of your speakers since they get their power from the same amp in the AVR (and even if it did you would never notice a diff, IMO) If anything I would recommend getting a 5 ch. amp, or even a 3 ch. amp and not worrying about pushing more power to your surrounds. The FXiA4 are rated to 125W and the Onk is giving them about as much as they need already. The XPA-3 retails for about $600 on their site, and it would push about 200W to your mains and your center. Again no aff. just using them because that is one of the ones I was looking at as well. Others may have better options from other companies so be flexible, lol. Hope this helps and welcome to Club Polk.

Schwendy

Thank you wutadumsn23! I will definitely check out the Emotiva's. Still a lot of money for me but I've spent too much already to not get things right. My wife can do without food and clothes anyway. If I get the 3 chan. or even the 5 chan. won't my surrounds be drowned out? Do I just up the volume levels on those? I like listening to music with all the speakers on but if the trade off is volume/sound qual. I'll listen in stereo. I am going to HATE parting with my LSiC center. I love that speaker! I'll probably be posting it here soon when I have the means to get the CSiA6 so if someone's interested let me know. I only want enough money for it to buy the CSi, even refurb. on the ebay site. The LSiC doesn't have a scratch on it, only 6 months old and been on for maybe 10 hours total! I don't have the box though because I ordered all my equip. at once and only kept my recvr box because of garage space.

hearingimpared

Welcome to Club Polk Schwendy!

cnh

Your Onkyo 876 has an IntelliVolume menu which allows you to adjust differences in SOUND levels between different AUDIO sources. Check your manual and adjust those levels so that the different sources DO NOT differ radically in their VOLUME.

On the 875 manual this was in the Advanced Setup...page 93...not sure what page the 876 is?

cnh

Schwendy

Thanks for all the advice and welcomes. This forum is great! I am aware of the section on IntelliVolume. I'll read it again and try and understand it. So, I should keep the levels the same and the recvr will send the appropriate vol to my surrounds? Am I understanding that correctly. I ran the Audyssey set up several times when hooking up the system and it sounds great so I won't mess with it if I don't have too.

Dawgfish

Schwendy,

I concur with wutadumsn23s answers for problems 2 & 3. I will add that running a three or five channel amp will not overpower the surround and/or rear surrounds that are still being driving from the reciever. The audyssey calibration on your 876 will adjust and level out the speaker level so everything will sound just fine. I've done this before in the past before eventually going to seperate amplifiers for all 7 channels and it sounded great. I would re-run the audyssey calibration anytime you have added a new amp, new speaker, or changed placement of the apeakers. The surrounds and rear surrounds do not need near as much power to drive efficiently as the A7s do. I own some RTi 10s and can tell you with certainty that they respond well to amplification. The Emotiva XPA-3 and 5 are excellent recommendations. I am powering my RTi-10s with an XPA-3 and it sounds fantastic. I've also driven them with an Adcom GFA-555 and they sounded great with those also. Emotiva is a great choice for a new amp, but you can find plenty of good deals on used amps from Adcom, Rotell, Parasound, Nad, Carver, Sunfire, etc for excellent prices here in the For Sale section of this board and on your local Craigs Lists.

Regarding question 1, it sounds to me as if you have blown your tweeters. This will cause precisely the dull sound you are describing.

cnh

Hi Schwendy,

That's basically it....the feature allows you to adust the volumes loudness peaks...it allows you to boost or decrease your volume levels by -12db to + 12db on each source--in 1 db increments. I don't know if that would be sufficient to deal with your problem but it would 'help'.

cnh

dpowell

You might also look for used Adcom 5 channel amps. You can usually get them for less than what you'll pay for a new Emotiva and they make Polk RT speakers sing.

wutadumsn23

Looks like the guys filled in the cracks for me while I was asleep, lol. I knew they would, this forum rocks!! Like Dawg said if the new amps are too much you can always dig around in the For Sale section of this forum or even your local Craigslist for better prices on used amps. I forgot all about the IntelliVolume that cnh mentioned, that is another way of helping to correct your problem too. I wouldn't worry about the surrounds getting drowned out, and if it sounds like they are lacking you can use the IntelliVolume to boost their volume as well. Good luck and keep us posted.

F1nut

1. You fried the tweeters, turn it down or you'll do it again.