Actuall "Rap", there's a RATHER LARGE difference between the Cantata's and the SCIII's(which is, first, what I was refering to in regards to setting as "small"). The Cantata's, I beilive, have a much bigger bass driver on the bottom of the speaker, and it's PORTED!!!!!...making it a very very different design than what I'm talking about. Second, the SCIII only has 2 6" bass drivers in a sealed enclosure, WHICH IS NOT CAPABLE OF PROPERLY(NOT EVEN CLOSE!) handling FULL RANGE DD/DTS bass!!!!....NO WAY! I know FROM FIRST HAND EXPERIENCE that if you run those SCIII's full range for movies(or even heavy rock,techno, rap, etc), you'll distort the bejesus out of them, it will sound mushed, "bottomed out", strained, and begging for relief!!! I have sold the Dunlay's since 1996, have been to the factory and talked with John personally on a number of occasions! Infact, let alone movies, I can EASILY run the much much bigger SCIV's and SCV's into AUDIBLE distress full range with Rock music!!!!(not even as demanding as DD/dts soundtracks!). If you doubt this, just come over to my house and I'll show you! Also, I know that the SCIII's drivers are EVEN EASIER to blow if you're not careful. I can attest to it from experience, trust me.
Yes, the Dunlavy's handle power pretty well, largely due to the construction of design, and dual drivers helping to audibly cancel out distortion differences between themselves. That's why this design sounds so "fast" and "acccurate sounding" largely(that and coherent point source, time alignement, etc).
And infact, my experience has been that the vast majority of speakers(and the SCIII"s aren't full range...just a big monitor really) is that they can't handle full range DD/DTS full range anyway. THX speaker systems recommend 80hz crossover points for a reason...it works! Unless you're running powered speakers or something, passive designs should assist the help of an active bass woofer(s) bellow 80hz usually, which makes something like the SCIII sound WAY MORE DYNAMIC, POWERFUL, CONTROLED, and EFFORTLESS!
Yes!...I would indeed cross overy your SCIII's at 80hz, and place them well with the sub filling in the bottom.
like anthing else however, you should tinker for best results. Maybe you're pre/pro crosses over at different points, and it's worth a try. But, Still, an easy sollution is always the 80hz crossover if you can get both the sub and mains coupled to the room at that frequency well...then you're doing very well indeed! Even though the SCIII's are adept performers down to 40hz on their own(as are many many other speakers), for the much less demanding music material largely, you will be coming to a point of dimminishing potential REALLLLLLL quick with what movies are now pumping out bellow 80hz! And besides, you're still using all of the SCIII's 6" woofers when crossing em at 80hz, and you'll lose none of the speed and impact in that critical 63hz-100hz reigion! Yes, you can argue that you'll be losing(potentially...if you can't set up your subs properly) potential bass articulation capabilities between 40hz and 80hz with the SCIII's cut off at 80hz(slopping down 10db at 60hz or so). But the trade off benefit is WAYYY WORTH IT!
I can't tell you HOW MANY TIMES I've heard audiphiles on THIS AUDIOGON forum say they are BLOWING DRIVERS in their much large full range speakers with some of the DD/DTS DVD's out there now!...and they aren't even listening loud!
So, you tell me you think you can do full range properly with 6" monitor drivers for bass out of the SCIII's!?!...I think not.
Maybe if you're going to listen at very very low levels all the time, you might not sweat it any. Still, the dynamic ability will be limited that way.
But, if you do want to try doing full range with the SCIII's(or any passive speaker) for movies, be prepared to possibly replace a driver if you try anything close to THX levels! 6" bass drivers CANNOT handle 20hz dynamic information at higher levels...so be careful.
If you doubt, maybe you can "poll" all people who own/owned SCIII's and ask em if they ever replaced drivers on em?...it couldn't hurt.
Still, the SCIII is a nice speaker, and excellent for HT IMO if you set it up right, and don't ask too much demanding bass from the bottom end...CAREFUL!
Yes, the Dunlavy's handle power pretty well, largely due to the construction of design, and dual drivers helping to audibly cancel out distortion differences between themselves. That's why this design sounds so "fast" and "acccurate sounding" largely(that and coherent point source, time alignement, etc).
And infact, my experience has been that the vast majority of speakers(and the SCIII"s aren't full range...just a big monitor really) is that they can't handle full range DD/DTS full range anyway. THX speaker systems recommend 80hz crossover points for a reason...it works! Unless you're running powered speakers or something, passive designs should assist the help of an active bass woofer(s) bellow 80hz usually, which makes something like the SCIII sound WAY MORE DYNAMIC, POWERFUL, CONTROLED, and EFFORTLESS!
Yes!...I would indeed cross overy your SCIII's at 80hz, and place them well with the sub filling in the bottom.
like anthing else however, you should tinker for best results. Maybe you're pre/pro crosses over at different points, and it's worth a try. But, Still, an easy sollution is always the 80hz crossover if you can get both the sub and mains coupled to the room at that frequency well...then you're doing very well indeed! Even though the SCIII's are adept performers down to 40hz on their own(as are many many other speakers), for the much less demanding music material largely, you will be coming to a point of dimminishing potential REALLLLLLL quick with what movies are now pumping out bellow 80hz! And besides, you're still using all of the SCIII's 6" woofers when crossing em at 80hz, and you'll lose none of the speed and impact in that critical 63hz-100hz reigion! Yes, you can argue that you'll be losing(potentially...if you can't set up your subs properly) potential bass articulation capabilities between 40hz and 80hz with the SCIII's cut off at 80hz(slopping down 10db at 60hz or so). But the trade off benefit is WAYYY WORTH IT!
I can't tell you HOW MANY TIMES I've heard audiphiles on THIS AUDIOGON forum say they are BLOWING DRIVERS in their much large full range speakers with some of the DD/DTS DVD's out there now!...and they aren't even listening loud!
So, you tell me you think you can do full range properly with 6" monitor drivers for bass out of the SCIII's!?!...I think not.
Maybe if you're going to listen at very very low levels all the time, you might not sweat it any. Still, the dynamic ability will be limited that way.
But, if you do want to try doing full range with the SCIII's(or any passive speaker) for movies, be prepared to possibly replace a driver if you try anything close to THX levels! 6" bass drivers CANNOT handle 20hz dynamic information at higher levels...so be careful.
If you doubt, maybe you can "poll" all people who own/owned SCIII's and ask em if they ever replaced drivers on em?...it couldn't hurt.
Still, the SCIII is a nice speaker, and excellent for HT IMO if you set it up right, and don't ask too much demanding bass from the bottom end...CAREFUL!