5.1 HT with 1 pair of speakers.

[dingus]

yesterday i finished putting together my (new to me) 5.1 HT rig, the centerpiece of which is the AR MGC-1 speaker. as you can see, the speakers are actually comprised of 2 speakers systems per cabinet, with a front and side firing arrays. these were designed by Ken Kantor when he was head of R&D at AR in the mid '80's. in fact, he was the previous owner of this pair... he even signed the back label for me.

technically the system is 4.0 as the fronts also handle the center and sub signals. the receiver is a Pioneer VSX 47TX (130x7), an Oppo BDP-83 supplies video and multi-channel playback, and a Squeezebox v.3 connected to a Vortexbox music server handles the 2-channel stereo duties.

the sound from this system is nothing short of spectacular. so much so that it has displaced my dedicated stereo rig as my primary listening system.

[pixelthis]

Nice.
Need to spread those spectacular fronts out a tad, and get a center. YOU NEED a sub
like the USS Abraham Lincoln needs jet fighters.
Again, very nice.

[blackraven]

Nice looking speakers. I bet they sound great.

[dingus]

Nice.
Need to spread those spectacular fronts out a tad, and get a center. YOU NEED a sub
like the USS Abraham Lincoln needs jet fighters.
Again, very nice.

due to WAF, the system will be confined to these close quarters for now... a dedicated center would be cool, but the fronts do a more than adequate job without one. as for a sub, the knock on the MGC-1 is its relatively "modest" low end, but in this config i'm not finding it lacking at all. its very authoritative and realistic.

...I bet they sound great.

yes indeed. they've sent my AR9's into retirement. the presentation is very airy, extremely detailed and rich. these project a huge soundstage, and while there is a "sweet spot" i find that any seat in the room sounds wonderful.

[SlumpBuster]

WAF left your house and boarded a bus to Phoenix a long long time ago.

[bobsticks]

WAF left your house and boarded a bus to Phoenix a long long time ago.

LOL...I'm sayin'...

But, that it was king-hella set up and with the speaks that close to the wall I'd imagine that low end isn't an issue. Nice work.

[dingus]

thanks. the speakers are designed to be placed up against the wall. my primary task now is to get them on a longer wall and have more distance between them... thats where the WAF comes in.

[kelsci]

Perhaps in some way you could use the tv sets amp and speakers as a center channel by outputing a wire out of the receiver if there is a center channel output to an audio input of the tv set although I am not too sure this is possible because of HDMI cable involvment.

Those main speakers have an odd D'Appolito design; looks like a tweeter and a midrange thingy in the middle. Intersteing side firing set-up of which I think you are using that for your two surround channels. Might work good, even great. The whole set-up is quite interesting.

[dingus]

Perhaps in some way you could use the tv sets amp and speakers as a center channel by outputing a wire out of the receiver if there is a center channel output to an audio input of the tv set although I am not too sure this is possible because of HDMI cable involvment.

great idea, thanks! the receiver has an analog out for the center channel, but i dont know about the Vizio. if i can get it to work i'll try it out.

Those main speakers have an odd D'Appolito design; looks like a tweeter and a midrange thingy in the middle. Intersteing side firing set-up of which I think you are using that for your two surround channels. Might work good, even great. The whole set-up is quite interesting.

yes, side firing system is the surround channels, it does work quite well. the driver in the middle is a tweeter and a mid mounted together on a single plate and weighs about 20 lbs. i dont know what part of the design does it, but these things image like a mofo, very wide, but also very deep.

[kelsci]

Dingus; I believe that some current Pioneer receivers have some kind of frontal thingy that gives some kind of 5 channel sound. I do not remember what they actually call it but I almost wonder if that particular item that they have might be quite good for your current set-up or for that matter, anybody else(if they exist) have such a similar set-up.

I just read somewhere that I believe it is Polk that has come out with a soundbar plus a wireless surround module(an all in one module thingy) that can sit in back of a couch. The photo of this module had it under a table and I am wondering if it too fires from the sides. I just found a link to this item though it seems a few people who reviewed it are not satisfied with it. I hope this link works

http://www.crutchfield.com/p_107FXWS...nd.html?tp=190

[dingus]

for multichannel input i just use 5.1 output setting on the receiver. for 2-channel stereo input i use the 5 channel stereo output setting. there are a slew of ht settings on the receiver, but i'm finding that the vanilla settings sound the best.

never heard that Polk speaker or any like it. i dont have any idea if there are similarities in the design.

[kelsci]

Dingus; I do not think that the polk speaker has a similar design to your speakers but it is an attempt of somekind to make surround sound more convenient. However reviews by people on this thingy have not been good.

[thekid]

Congrats!!
Very cool looking speakers and I would love to see how they sound.
Having the designer sign them makes some of the most unique speakers out there.

Are these Bi or even tri-ampable?

[pixelthis]

WAF left your house and boarded a bus to Phoenix a long long time ago.

For that kind of setup...BYE.
But seriously, you still have a little room to "spread em", even a little bit would help.
And everybody needs a center of some kind, IMHO.

[dingus]

Congrats!!
Very cool looking speakers and I would love to see how they sound.
Having the designer sign them makes some of the most unique speakers out there.

Are these Bi or even tri-ampable?

thanks.

as you can see there are 2 separate connections, so technically you could say that they are bi-ampable, but there are actually two separate speaker systems per cabinet.

[dingus]

... you still have a little room to "spread em", even a little bit would help.
And everybody needs a center of some kind, IMHO.

for the meantime they are about as far apart as i can manage. i'm going to try the Vizio as a center speaker, but i need to get a patch cord and adapter.

[pixelthis]

thanks.

as you can see there are 2 separate connections, so technically you could say that they are bi-ampable, but there are actually two separate speaker systems per cabinet.

Thats the same connection. One RCA and the other balanced.
Hook an amp up to each, be sure to turn em on with a remote...
IN THE NEXT ROOM.FYI.

[dingus]

the RCA connection is for the front array, the DIN connection is for the side array, they are independent of each other. i have the Pioneer VSX 47TX driving both using the front and surround taps.

[pixelthis]

the RCA connection is for the front array, the DIN connection is for the side array, they are independent of each other. i have the Pioneer VSX 47TX driving both using the front and surround taps.

are they labeled? SEEMS KINDA WEIRD, but then again DIN connections have
always seemed flaky to me..

[dingus]

are they labeled? SEEMS KINDA WEIRD, but then again DIN connections have
always seemed flaky to me..

no labels, but there is no other way to hook them up. the DIN connection was used to connect to the MGC-1e amp, which powered the side array and provided them with adjustable delay and ambient effects. by todays standards (these were produced in 1985) the MGC-1e is pretty much made obsolete by dsp technology commonly available with HT receivers.