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  1. #1
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    is this receiver underpowered?!!!.....suggestions...

    Hi all;

    Over Christmas, my father picked up a sony (STR-DE595) receiver and tiny sub/sattelite speaker set (sa-ve335). The receiver is rated at 100 watts X5 and is small (15 pounds) and fairly simple and straight forward to use. The speaker set consisted of 4 "full range" 3x5" speakers (like you'd find in your tv or clock radio) and a center. It sounded okay at best, and kind of thin. It sounded okay enough for movies, but for music, it was not much better than a boom box with a bass boost.

    My father decided to get some bigger speakers for the mains and a friend of his gave him two Yamaha towers that he had in storage. I stopped by, hooked them up and they sounded awful. That is, way too much treble that was harsh and hard to tame, and no bass at all. Now the spec sheet says these speakers should be able to run 35-20,000 hz so their should be some bass. I believe they are rated at 89db sensitivity.

    To complicate this, the room is a sonic nightmare (it is 14' by 33' feet; with a brick fireplace angled in the left front corner; a 14 inch dropped section in the center of the room to cover the main heating vent; low 6.5' ceilings; and a 6 foot wide entry on the right mid room going to an open stairway and hallway.) I figured it was the room acoustics and began to try to position these speakers to improve the sound.

    With the right in the right corner (12" inches from both walls) and slightly toed in the bass improved somewhat. With the left next to the fireplace (about 3 feet from the left wall) this also improved things and the treble was not so harsh. After about 2 hours of adjusting, using an spl meter and just screwing around, it was to the point it was almost ok, but honestly it was not any better than the cheesy clock radio wannabe speakers that he had.

    On a fluke, thinking the speakers were messed up, I brought them to my house and set them in as fronts to test them. They instantly came alive and sounded nice. The treble was a bit harsh, but was controlled by my yamaha amp and some minor placement adjustments. I left them on for a number of hours, on the oft chance that they had been sitting awhile and maybe needed to be broken in.

    I brought them back to my father's house, set them up and they sounded like trash again. They sounded underpowered, anemic, lame.......

    I know the room acoustics are awful, but even so, I began to wonder if this amp had enough power to drive these. So, I went back to my house, got my yamaha receiver and brought it over. Sure enough, it sounded much better. Subjectively, it did not sound as good as they had at my house. So, in the end, my father returned the yamaha towers back to his friend since this receiver doesn't seem sound right with them. I gave him an old pair of KLH 900's bookshelf speakers that I used to use as surrounds (until I could afford better) and placed them as fronts and that improved the sound considerably and he is now happy with the sound in stereo so I guess problem solved (until he decides to replace the KLH's and get some nicer bookshelf speakers!!!).

    And so, to my question. (And yes I know that my Yamaha receiver is steps above this entry-ish Sony). Is is possible that this receiver just doesn't have the power to run these? The receiver is ultra light (15 pounds) and the power supply and capacitors look tiny in comparison to the Yamaha.

    Thanks for any suggestions!!

    Vinny

  2. #2
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    Cyberstoic; The one thing you did not mention is whether you altered the bass management for the left and right towers. It is very possible the receiver was set for all speakers to run small. It is possible that the main left/right speakers for the Yamahas needed to be set to LARGE while the center and surrounds would remain at the small setting. I own the KLH 900Bs which I use on a DPL receiver from JVC and perform very well. Those should be set to LARGE as well. The second thing that you come to is whether to leave the sub on or off when deploying large main speakers with-in the receivers menu. I have not had the opportunity of a set-up to experiment to determine what is best to do. If the sub is left off in the receivers menu, all low bass goes to the mains. If the sub is left on in the menu, the mains and the sub receive low bass. It is this latter setting that you need to fool around with to get listening pleasure. I believe that for this type of set-up, I would only use the sub to reproduce only the lowest frequencys below the main left and right large speakers. It is funny that I have scene the satellite speakers you mention on this Sony system and the fact that a manufacturer went to a 3X5 oval speaker as a speaker to disburse sound in a 5.1 system. Whether this is the right speaker design to use in a 5.1 system is questionable because of the dispersion of sound that an oval gives verses a circular woofer and tweeter set-up. In the 60s, for stereo there were oval speakers that were used and I thought they worked very well in the home. The largest woofer I heard in a stereo console was an 11X14 and it was great. One of the nicest oval bookshelfs in those days were the Lafayette Electronics Minuette series. It either had a 4x6 or 5x7 inch woofer.

  3. #3
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    kelsci,

    thanks for the reply.

    I did try setting both the L/R speakers to "large". If anything, they sounded better for HT use when the receiver setting was on small with the bass redirected to the sub.

    In 2 channel stereo, they were weak no matter what. On that particular model sony, even when the option of "sub on" is set, you can hit the 2 channel button for stereo using the two fronts as your mains. When that is done, and the setting is on large, the bass is not redirected to the sub and there is negligable bass coming from those Yamaha speakers.

    As for your comment on the the KLH 900's, I was amazed at how they functioned as surrounds, and to be honest, they sound pretty good as the mains with the sub handing the bass. The specs say they go down to 80hz, so I set them to "small". That partucular sub that came with the sony save335 set doesn't have a crossover setting so I am it's mercy but it sounds ok. I believe that the receiver crosses over at 120hz when the speakers are set to small.

    I was just baffled regarding those yamaha towers because try as I might for hours, I could not get them to sound anything remotely like good. I know they were their value line or whatever (low end) but even so, there should have been some bass. In contrast, I got those klh bookshelves set in minutes and they sounded fine for my father

    Oh well, another mystery for the file

    Take care and thanks

  4. #4
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    generally, systems sound better when they are places pointing toward the short end rather the long end. So in your room, the 2 speakers would be along the long wall. If its 100watts RMS, then it should be fine to drive those speakers. In fact, 100watts RMS should be good enough to drive almost ANY speaker. Maybe, instead of the power, it is just the receiver itself. It could be a junky receiver that amplifies the inputs in an ugly way.

  5. #5
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    Quote Originally Posted by 92135011
    Maybe, instead of the power, it is just the receiver itself. It could be a junky receiver that amplifies the inputs in an ugly way.

    I seriously doubt that.
    mtrycrafts

  6. #6
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    Quote Originally Posted by 92135011
    generally, systems sound better when they are places pointing toward the short end rather the long end. So in your room, the 2 speakers would be along the long wall. If its 100watts RMS, then it should be fine to drive those speakers. In fact, 100watts RMS should be good enough to drive almost ANY speaker. Maybe, instead of the power, it is just the receiver itself. It could be a junky receiver that amplifies the inputs in an ugly way.


    Hi 92135011 ,

    about placing them along the short end..... well since it is not my house and is parent's house of 40+ years, I don't think I would have much success convincing my mother to move her decor, hahahah but I have enough problems with my wife and my equiptment so perhaps that "fight" should be my father's if he were so inclined.... but he is no fool after 52 years of marriage so somehow I doubt it


    As for the wattage ratings, I looked up that receiver on Sony's website which rather than the 100watts X 5 that it says on BestBuy's website, it says:

    ".... with 8 ohm loads, both channels driven, from 40 to 20,000 hz; rated 90 watts per channel minimum RMS power, with no more than .9% total harmonic distortion from 250 milliwatts rated output...."

    But I note that it says "both channels driven", not *all* channels driven.... don't know if that makes a difference or not. I also note that it only goes down to 40 hz, not 20 and that definitely makes a big difference losing the lowest octave.

    But last night while watching tv I was websurfing for information regarding this and found this:

    "What Matters?

    Power Supply

    "... In order for the receiver to be a winner, it has to deliver quality power for your speakers in the room size you are in and listening levels you are accustomed too. Pick speakers in the showroom as close to the ones you own or plan on buying. Put on a bass heavy CD. Listen to the bass notes for strain, boominess and lack of impact. If the receiver shares these characteristics, it is attributed to a weak power supply. This will be a problem for those with large tower speakers who demand bass output without the use of a powered subwoofer. Next listen to the midrange and high frequency spectrum. The midrange should have good balance throughout the 200Hz - 4KHz bandwidth free from excessive boosting or attenuation within the frequency spectrum. The high frequency spectrum above 4 KHz should sound airy, natural and not overly bright. Receivers which tend to sound bright must be carefully mated with speakers with a subtle nature in the high frequency spectrum."
    (In full compliance with copyright law and fair use provisions, the previous excerpt was written by Gene DellaSala and is available at http://www.audioholics.com/techtips/.../receivers.php, and a definite should read).

    And that is what I was thinking when I was asking if the receiver was underpowered. Not necessarily that it was lacking watts, but perhaps the ability to deliver those.... or something along the lines that this implies, namely, a weak power supply.

    Considering that my father bought the receiver because it was A) Cheap, and B) only 15 inches deep and would fit in the Entertainment stand shelf, it probably serves it's function sufficiently for his needs.

    But I wouldn't call it a junky receiver, it actually does sound ok driving small speakers in HT and ok in stereo.

    Thanks for the suggestions. I have enjoyed playing "Columbo" trying to understand this and have learned a few things.

    Take care.......

  7. #7
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    My money's on the amp.

    Hello Cyber.

    I owned a inexpensive Sony HT receiver a while back, and I can tell you that it was not the last word in amplification.

    You've already kinda answered your own question by using the Yammie.

    Good luck!

    Pete
    I fear explanations explanatory of things explained.
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  8. #8
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    As for the wattage ratings, I looked up that receiver on Sony's website which rather than the 100watts X 5 that it says on BestBuy's website, it says:

    ".... with 8 ohm loads, both channels driven, from 40 to 20,000 hz; rated 90 watts per channel minimum RMS power, with no more than .9% total harmonic distortion from 250 milliwatts rated output...."

    But I note that it says "both channels driven", not *all* channels driven.... don't know if that makes a difference or not. I also note that it only goes down to 40 hz, not 20 and that definitely makes a big difference losing the lowest octave.


    I doubt you will find an amp that has 5/6 channels and can deliver full power to all channels simultaneously. Besides, you don't need it. Certainly not in music and only 1 or 2 movies would need close to full power to all speakers simultaneously. Don't worry.
    You are not missing the lowers octave, especially if you send the LFE signal to a powered amp. If you don't have a sub, you need to get one. 90 watts will not do.



    And that is what I was thinking when I was asking if the receiver was underpowered. Not necessarily that it was lacking watts, but perhaps the ability to deliver those.... or something along the lines that this implies, namely, a weak power supply.

    If it is rated 90/100 watts RMS it means it can deliver that power continuously.
    mtrycrafts

  9. #9
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    Maybe the power was delivered to the wrong address.

    I guess I never usually try to find the simple answers in life. Thanks for the insight.
    Space

    The preceding comments have not been subjected to double blind testing, and so must just be taken as casual observations and not given the weight of actual scientific data to be used to prove a case in a court of law or scientific journal. The comments represent my humble opinion which will range in the readers perspective to vary from Gospel to heresy. So let it be.

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