Weird Issue...

Driver_King

Recently, I've been having some issues with my speakers. After listening at high volume levels for awhile, the tweeters on my speakers will fade out like they are being turned down all the way. Does anyone have an idea as to why my speakers are doing this? I have the Onkyo TX-SR805 powering my speakers (the SDA II's, the Monitor 5Jr.'s, and the Monitor 4's).

xsmi

You may be activating the polyswitches, which is the protection circuit polk built in to keep your amp from blowing them up. Turn the volume down a little and they should be OK.

Driver_King

So, am I pushing them too hard, am I sending clipped signals, is my receiver running out of juice?

nooshinjohn

+1 on the poly switches. I would recommend replacing them. Polk will even send them to you for free if they happen to have them in stock. There is nothing wrong with the Onkyo, but if you were running better power to them, the polys can be removed and bypassed withoiut to much risk of damaging the tweeters.

nooshinjohn

Driver_King wrote: »

So, am I pushing them too hard, am I sending clipped signals, is my receiver running out of juice?

Your receiver is most definately running out of gas. I had the same troubles with my Yamaha RX-v861.

Driver_King

nooshinjohn wrote: »

+1 on the poly switches. I would recommend replacing them. Polk will even send them to you for free if they happen to have them in stock. There is nothing wrong with the Onkyo, but if you were running better power to them, the polys can be removed and bypassed withoiut to much risk of damaging the tweeters.

Do they need to be replaced or something?

Driver_King

nooshinjohn wrote: »

Your receiver is most definately running out of gas. I had the same troubles with my Yamaha RX-v861.

I believe it. It's not always the volume that gets it. It's the material. When I save up some money (and can stop spending money on subwoofers), an amplifier will be one of the first things I will take care of.

madmax

Driver_King wrote: »

Do they need to be replaced or something?

They tend to go bad after many years. The failure mode is seen as tripping sooner and sooner. Replace them.

rocket

madmax wrote: »

They tend to go bad after many years. The failure mode is seen as tripping sooner and sooner. Replace them.

get rid of them as soon as you get a more powerful amp

Driver_King

I called them up and they didn't have any in stock. Where is the next best place to get replacements? Thanks in advance!:D

Driver_King

madmax wrote: »

They tend to go bad after many years. The failure mode is seen as tripping sooner and sooner. Replace them.

By the way, are there any specific Polyswitches that are better than others?

rocket

just get rid of them-been without mine now for 2 yrs., no problems. just don't go crazy with the underpowered amp

Driver_King

Sometimes I have friends over who are half deaf and keep wanting to go louder. I really have no idea at what point I am overdriving my amp (rated at 240 watts per channel at 4ohms) or I am just going too close to damaging my speakers. I'd rather have the piece of mind of having them versus being sorry for not. I'll get rid of them once I get another amplifier and new tweeters.;)

concealer404

That receiver won't put out 240wpc at 4ohms, especially with all the speakers you have hooked up to it currently. It's distorting and tripping your polyswitches.

rocket

i think the amp will blow before the speakers do-usually the case with too little power. now, if you had too much, than your speaks would take the hit-

concealer404

rocket wrote: »

i think the amp will blow before the speakers do-usually the case with too little power. now, if you had too much, than your speaks would take the hit-

You've got that backwards.

Driver_King

concealer404 wrote: »

That receiver won't put out 240wpc at 4ohms, especially with all the speakers you have hooked up to it currently. It's distorting and tripping your polyswitches.

I'm talking about in two channel only. It doesn't stay at 240 either. It hangs around 180 to 200 but can do 240 peaks or higher otherwise. I'm pretty sure my 805 isn't the problem. It is only the tweeters. The tweeters will just all of a sudden get a lot quieter while everything else is still going perfectly fine.

concealer404

Driver_King wrote: »

I'm talking about in two channel only. It doesn't stay at 240 either. It hangs around 180 to 200 but can do 240 peaks or higher otherwise. I'm pretty sure my 805 isn't the problem. It is only the tweeters. The tweeters will just all of a sudden get a lot quieter while everything else is still going perfectly fine.

Well, remove or replace the polyswitches.

vc69

Polk announced a while back that they were running out of polyswitches and were not going to stock them again.

You need to bypass the polyswitches and get an amp ASAP. That Onk will not ever drive a set of 4 ohm speakers. It's not rated or designed to do that. You will damage your equipment if you continue.

bigaudiofanatic

concealer404 wrote: »

You've got that backwards.

Yes he does.

Driver_King

vc69 wrote: »

Polk announced a while back that they were running out of polyswitches and were not going to stock them again.

You need to bypass the polyswitches and get an amp ASAP. That Onk will not ever drive a set of 4 ohm speakers. It's not rated or designed to do that. You will damage your equipment if you continue.

It is rated at 4ohms and is 4ohms stable. It is one of the very few Onkyo amps that are...

That being said, I have been looking for months for a ridiculous deal on an amplifier or two for my 4ohm speakers. Any (affordable) suggestions for high sound quality and proper power for my fronts and surrounds?

vc69

Driver_King wrote: »

It is rated at 4ohms and is 4ohms stable. It is one of the very few Onkyo amps that are...

Dude you are woefully mistaken.

http://www.us.onkyo.com/model.cfm?m=TX-SR805&class=Receiver&p=s

Driver_King

What are you talking about? It says 4ohms a few times there. Here are some bench results.

Face

You wouldn't have these problems with an external amp.

vc69

You are dreaming if you think it will drive a 4 ohm speaker load reliably.

You are experiencing EXACTLY the symptoms you should expect from an amp that is underpowered/overloaded. Same goes for the polyswitches. If you bypass them, your receiver will blow smoke soon.

It's up to you, it's your gear. You can choose to take my suggestion, or not. I am not going to blow MY equipment up. You are going to blow YOUR equipment up.

Driver_King

What the hell are you talking about? Did you not read what I said? I said only certain material (like heavy metal) at ridiculous levels will trip the tweeters. It's not my all my receiver's fault. Only recently have I had issues. I've had my receiver since May of 2008...

concealer404

Driver_King wrote: »

What the hell are you talking about? Did you not read what I said? I said only certain material (like heavy metal) at ridiculous levels will trip the tweeters. It's not my all my receiver's fault. Only recently have I had issues. I've had my receiver since May of 2008...

Yeah, that's classic underpowered, distorting speakers.

Your receiver is not strong enough for what you're trying to do.

vc69

Ok... I'm not arguing. I'm a big fan of Onkyo products. I own one myself.

I'm also a big fan of Polk products, and though I don't own any SDA's... I have read a little about them. They present a challenging load to an amp. Period.

I'm sure the poly's need to be replaced/bypassed. But if you bypass them and continue to "rock out" with the 805. It's going to smoke... or the SDA's tweeters will blow.

Face said it... get an external amp for the SDA's. You can get a used carver or adcom pretty cheap. Your ears and your SDA's will love you for it.

Good luck.

Driver_King

I understand that the SDA's are hard on the amps, but they are very efficient speakers (92dB). My receiver does a great job at powering my SDA's. I did say times before that an external amplifier would be my next upgrade. I called Polk today and I was told that the Polyswitches needed to be replaced. I got the same response here and found this happens after time. The only other time I tripped my tweeters, I was listening MUCH louder. It tripped much earlier this time and I'm sure I need to replace them. If I replace the Polyswitches and it happens again, I'll take them out and get a new amplifier.

Ron Temple

Driver_King wrote: »

I understand that the SDA's are hard on the amps, but they are very efficient speakers (92dB). My receiver does a great job at powering my SDA's. I did say times before that an external amplifier would be my next upgrade. I called Polk today and I was told that the Polyswitches needed to be replaced. I got the same response here and found this happens after time. The only other time I tripped my tweeters, I was listening MUCH louder. It tripped much earlier this time and I'm sure I need to replace them. If I replace the Polyswitches and it happens again, I'll take them out and get a new amplifier.

That's fine, but the point is the poly's are seeing a clipped signal. They are getting more sensitive and going into protect earlier, but they are still seeing it. SDAs dip below 4 ohms and while that Onk is supposedly 4 ohm stable, that's probably under tech bench conditions.

Driver_King

Ron Temple wrote: »

That's fine, but the point is the poly's are seeing a clipped signal. They are getting more sensitive and going into protect earlier, but they are still seeing it. SDAs dip below 4 ohms and while that Onk is supposedly 4 ohm stable, that's probably under tech bench conditions.

Well, it doesn't help that the two times I've had issues, the songs were poorly compressed MP3's. That and they have many instruments playing at the same time at loud levels... But I didn't really think about the dips either. That's a good point. I'm not saying my Onkyo is perfect or anything but I was just thinking that it can't only be my receiver causing the tweeters to trip.