@jasonbourne71: Hello! Been lurking on here a long time and your name comes up frequently. This post is kind of a "Long time listener, first time caller!" situation. I appreciate your insight regarding the R8. How crazy of an idea would it be to bi amp the Heresys with the X2 running the woofers and the R8 running the mids and tweeters? Not sure how they would behave, I mean, they have to crossover somewhere.
Willsenton R8 gets muddy When Too Much Sub Bass is Present
I just got a pair of Klipsch Heresy 4s after hearing them a few times and really liking the way they sound. Got them home, paired them with a Monoprice X2 power amplifier and enjoyed them tremendously. Even my wife enjoyed them enough to not be super pissed about the space they take up in our living room. Took the Willsenton R8 out of my office and connected it to the Heresys. When playing music that has a lot of sub bass my speakers take me back to being in my friend’s 95 Cavalier in high school. The bass drops in a song and the audio simulates an aneurysm. I have a Willsenton R8 set to amp mode connected to a Pioneer Elite SC-85 receiver as a preamp. Regardless of whether it is set to ultralinear or triode it sounds terrible in this scenario. The receiver’s settings regarding crossover have little to no effect also. This is all paired with a passive sub. With the sub off and the speakers paired with the R8 they sound like muddy crap. Paired with the Monoprice X2 they sound amazing. This is definitely the amp and nothing else. I have tried using different sources of the same song, from record albums to FLAC, the X2 sounds great and the R8 massively underperforms. What could be the cause of this?
Showing 3 responses by drgenerico
@dekay : Thanks for the reply! According to the manual that comes with the Heresys they are 8 ohm, so I am running them in that. I tried using the R8 as an integrated and was disappointed in the sound compared to running it with the preamp in my receiver. I have a few other receivers, Marantz 6006, and a 5012, and I actually prefer the old Pioneer elite, not only in function but form and ease of use. I ended up buying a few as spares. If you have any advice on a good preamp for a 2.1 setup I would like to hear it. Searching on my own has been daunting. In my office I have a pair of DIY speakers that are 4 ohm, and a pair of HTD Level Three towers that are 8. (I know they’re not well received, but they are magical in a mid-field setup with the right amount of toe-in.) |
@pindac: This is interesting! I had no idea that isolating the R8 from vibration would have such a noticeable effect on it's sound. I agree with you regarding bass. Ironically I built an 18 inch sealed subwoofer that is part of the 2.1 setup with the Heresys. My thought was that if the sub was large enough it would need to move very little to produce sound and that would keep the distortion low. After having placing it in the living room for about a year I believe that to be true. Prior to that I had built a sealed 12 that would hit points of distortion trying to keep up with certain tracks. The sub is adjusted to the point that it is unnoticeable even at high volumes, and it has a very wide sweet spot. The R8 is near it, placed on a veneered MDF stand, where it likely is subject to vibration. For my record player I built a butcher block isolation platform with spike feet and it has helped to dramatically reduce vibration. Maybe it's time to build another one for the R8 and move it further away from the sub... Do you have any recommendation regarding which tubes to replace the stock ones with? |