Paradigms not producing enough lows ????


I have a set of Paradigm 60's being driven by a Pioneer Elite 110W x 7.1 receiver. The speaker are bi-amped. I do not have a sub nor center channel yet.

When playing music or movies there are NO lows at all!! I have reset the Pioneer so that all EQ setting are at default levels. Yesterday, I tried using the speakers along with the internal speakers on the TV and the TV actually filled in the sound that was lacking on the Paradigms. Obviously the Paradigms produce a much cleaner more appealing sound, but no lows.

Am I destined to buy a sub to fill things in? I'm not talking about the ultra lows, but even the lower tones of voices seemed missing.

Any help would be appreciated.
Thanks.
Boris
bkaushansky

Showing 4 responses by mdhoover

I had Studio 100 V3s. With those, weak bass was not an issue, and I think that's true with the Paradigm line in general. I agree with all of the above posts. Something must be set wrong. In addition to the above ideas....Have you checked to make sure the speaker wires are in the correct phase? Does the receiver have a crossover setting? If so, where is that set? Are the settings on the receiver such that it's sending the lows to the subwoofer output even though there's no subwoofer? And as Bob Reynolds asked, how is the biamping set up?
Is there a setting on the Pioneer for "subwoofer present" or "subwoofer absent?" If so, then if set to "subwoofer present," it may be shunting all frequencies below 50 hertz to the subwoofer output, which has nothing connected to it. Also, why is there a crossover in operation at ALL if you're not running a subwoofer? Have you tried disengaging the crossover altogether? Maybe whenever the crossover's engaged, the unit is set (by the factory, as a default) to operate as though a subwoofer were in place, and shunting the 20-50 hertz to that output.
"Oh, when running setup, the receiver does note that I only have left and right channels connected. But it still appears that the crossover is always on and clipping at 50hz."
-Boris
If that turned out to be true, as an owner of that receiver, I'd be really upset. Perhaps a phone call to the Pioneer product support center is in order to determine whether they've really incorporated such a "mandatory clipping" feature into its design, and if so, whether it can be disengaged, and if not, then why the hell not?