Hi Bill;
I finally got moved into the new "listening room" and am starting system re-assembly; I have also finally hooked up the nOrh amps. They seem great. The blue power light is so bright that it is distracting, so I taped over them. Amps are heavy and build quality, especially for the money, seems very good. I have three of them, (they let me grab them at MAF for $160 each!!! Blowout retail on their site is $299....) powering center, right and left rear surrounds. I am using two center channel speakers, the nOrh 4.0 on top of the big screen and an Infinity on the floor. CS3115's for mains and stereo listening. I get so much more out of four CS3115's that I took the system down after a day and stacked two more on top, almost back to working..........one scenario is that pro amps and home amps have a 14db difference in gain, so I have to back the QSC's down quite a bit to match levels. This means that when rocking in stereo-only mode I have to turn the gains back up. No biggie. I put on one of my favorite test DVD's for sound, the animated kids movie "Iron Giant"........PLENTY of headroom and impact even with the gains set down. As you pointed out, the fan noise is really annoying, but I am stuck with it, so I am trying to isolate the pro amps in a cabinet beneath the rest of the equipment. Tweak tweak tweak.............
Anyway, spkrmn57 (Ron Semega) may be in town Wed for lunch, so I'm trying to have the system halfway worked out so he can hear it sound decent.
You asked about the subs........I shipped the builder one of the 2245's for tuning and here is last nights email......."Well, I got the initial tuning done.
Two 6" diameter ports each having a 13.25" duct for an Fb of 30.15 Hz with no fiberglass fill.
Gross physical enclosure volume not including the bracing, 2245H, or ducts, is 8.99 cubic feet.
Physical enclosure volume subtracting bracing, 2245H, and ducts is 7.42 cubic feet.
Net effective volume, again without any fiberglass fill, is 8.63 cubic feet according to D.B. Keele's formula.
Net effective volume, again without any fiberglass fill, is 8.89 cubic feet according to Bass Box Pro 6's formula.
Net effective volume, again without any fiberglass fill, is 9.37 cubic feet according to WinISD's formula.
Principle internal standing waves are at 218, 271, and 339 Hz due to the enclosure being so large. They would have been even lower if the enclosure wasn't squat, so that's a good thing.
I may have asked before but what crossover were you going to use? 18dB/octave? 80 Hz?
Now for the listening tests, last night and this morning. This thing goes seriously deep. It sounds SO much better tuned to 30 Hz than it did at 24, 26, and 28 Hz. The math doesn't lie! I don't have any fiberglass fill in the enclosure and I would recommend an 18 dB/octave filter and not use any fiberglass fill at all. The 80-90-100 Hz, 12 dB/octave filter in my H/K AVR 7000 blows. I will probably dig out one of my Crown VFX2A's in the next day or two and hook that up instead. Anyway, I'm extremely please with the sound. Very effortless and well defined even at 0.002 watts output from my Citation 22. It's nice to listen at such low levels and still "Get it All". "What she really wants" by Russ Freeman is playing right now, the 0.002 watt light is lit and man does it crank out the bass! Nothing bumpy or overpowering at all, just deep, tight, and well matched to the 4430's. I'll play a few DVD's tonight when I get home and see how that THX stuff sounds :-) I'm going to finish up the bracing in the second enclosure this afternoon."
I'm ready!! I still have to get some more XLR cables to use the new JBL amp from the tent sale; it has barrier strip INPUTS, which is new to me, but it apparently designed to be more tamper-proof for permanent installs. Few more weeks and it should all be settled in and rockin'............then I'll probably move it outside again or something stupid like that.........it takes so long to move all this heavy stuff and set it up.............the hand cart has been up and down the basement steps alot lately............
I was reading this article linked below(read it, it's good) and found this paragraph...
"The basement alternative:
A properly partitioned basement space can make an excellent listening room, if its dimensions are such that three walls can be used as-is with the addition of only one partition. This still won't confine bass as well as six masonry boundaries, but it will be a lot better than six flapping wood-frame surfaces."
My room has masonry entirely, with just one door opening, on five of six sides (ceiling is Armstrong tile, then 2 inch plwood and oak floor above)so I have a fairly controlled room in that respect. It's a bit small to get deepest bass. My rig would be great with a projection system in a huge room...........
Soooooo, anyway, you can tell I'm looking forward to a nice fall/winter of finalyy being able to play with my system and keep a two year old from trashing things...............
What's new on your front?