bi amp bi wire

[esoterick]

I am building my integrated theater system and assembling my parts now. My goal is amazing imaging,sound stage and great clarity with dynamic transients. I have always been impressed with preciseness of concentric drivers (KEF and Tannoy.) I have acquired quite an array of Kef drivers and in the smaller versions like the Kef better than the Tannoys for voice and Movies.
My Kef speakers are set up for bi amp / bi wire. I understand the bi wire option....its said that i will hear a notable clarity difference. Is that true?
If i bi amp ..will there be another level of improvement in the accuracy, transients and clarity if i do this?
I'm confused about the bi amp set up....if the preamp sends low level signal to the amp...does is get filters (crossover) first then amplified then sent to the driver? does this option require electronic crossovers?
or can the preamp send signal to the manufacturers passive crossover filters then amplify that low level filtered signal to the amplifier then to the driver? Although there is a significant cost increase in All the amplifiers required (6...I will only bi amp LCR) I'm ok with that as long as i can hear the difference at normal listening levels. I don't listen to movies at Loud levels but the crashes and explosions must be loud and quick.
thank you for time it will take to reply and help this old guy out.

[DoubleTap]

Re: bi amp bi wire

Your first post here is likely to be met with serious negative vibes ... fair warning.

Reason being, for the most part bi-amp/bi-wire is just marketing BS with no real world benefit. Of course that's the high level answer, the truth is there might potentially be benefits to bi-amping in some cases. For instance using a Class D amp on the bass section and a Class A on the mid/tweet. However that benefit would be FAR outweighed by a speaker upgrade in most cases ... or also far outweighed by proper room treatments.

I suppose I'm opposite your opinion, that vast majority of KEF's I've heard have been poorly voiced and in most respects unimpressive. For example, at RMAF 2008 we had KEF right across the hall from us with their MUON setup, and it was one of the worst sounding rooms at the show. The Ref 207/2's I heard weren't bad though. Which ones specifically do you have?

[billfitzmaurice]

Re: bi amp bi wire

My Kef speakers are set up for bi amp / bi wire. I understand the bi wire option....its said that i will hear a notable clarity difference. Is that true?

No. Snake-oil

If i bi amp ..will there be another level of improvement in the accuracy, transients and clarity if i do this?

Probably. But to do it properly you need to bypass the passive crossover components.

does this option require electronic crossovers?

Yes.

[curt_c]

Re: bi amp bi wire

Your first post here is likely to be met with serious negative vibes ... fair warning.

Or he just may receive conflicting opinions… :D

IMO, while I do not bi-wire, there is certainly no downside of doing so, and if you hear a subtle difference, then it works for you. If you don’t hear any difference, that’s no surprise either.

Bi-Amping on the other hand, can be advantageous, but generally requires the crossovers to be active for the most benefit. You can obtain better woofer control, and a few dB more headroom for a given amplifier power. –But the cost of the extra amplification and the implementation of active crossover make this a bit difficult for those without the knowledge, measurement hardware, and equipment capabilities to implement it.

IMO, imaging, soundstage, clarity and dynamic transients are not a function of the number of amplifier channels, nor whether it is actively or passively crossed. These are more to do with amplifier headroom, driver quality, crossover design, enclosure design, and room placement/design.

With HT, I suggest the extra channels make issues like soundstage and imaging rather moot points compared to conventional stereo music reproduction...

Rod Elliott has a nice article on bi-amping

http://sound.westhost.com/articles.htm

C

[xavier]

Re: bi amp bi wire

Yes, bi-amping and/or bi-wiring make a difference in the sound. Is it money well spent? Unless you've got everything else "maxxed out" I wouldn't bother. Room acoustics, better speakers, better etc. would make a bigger difference.

Good Luck.

[mgrabow]

Re: bi amp bi wire

Bi Amp can allow you to use an amp of higher power on the bass and thus add more bottom end if that is your thing. This is useful when ones spouse does not want all sorts of room treatments around the living room. In this case one must rely on the electronics...

Bi Wire... Voo Doo with one exception. Some cables have better bass and some have better highs. Example my MIT cables sound much better on the hi pass side of all my speakers than my audioquest cables do.