greets all!

first off, no matter what... the outlaw so far has impressed me. granted... upgrading from nothing to the outlaw 1050 for both HT and music isn't really much to debate about. =)

long story short, after a few weeks of research and blah blah, i settled on the 1050 mostly on the blind faith that all the positive reviews both online and in print can't be wrong. so far, so good. =)

my system is mated to a set of definitive technology procinema 80 speakers (i had a set of energy take 5.2s for a week before making a comparison/switch this weekend -- that's another story for another day ).

what i'm curious about is the fact that some users report that their pc80 systems (in addition to other brands of sat/sub speakers) actually sound better ("smoother" is a common term) running high-level outputs from the receiver to the sub, using the sub's crossover (75-150Hz user-selectable) to feed the main channel speakers (60Hz-30kHz response), and setting the front speakers to "large". in addition, they run a LFE interconnect for the .1 channel to the low-level input on the sub. the speaker owner manuals actually list this as an optional hook-up routine. aside from the fact the sub's xover network is added into the signal path, i am puzzled...

it almost sounds like belt-and-suspenders hookup and i'm not understanding how the outlaw would handle a setup like this. one shortcoming of the deftech pc80's is that there is no input that bypasses the sub's internal crossover/gain network anyhow (at least for the sub channels). the user does have the option to leave the main channel speaker outputs on the sub unused, of course. the settings to make this work would be:

front = large
center = small
surrounds = small
sub = on

what would be the proper setting for the outlaw crossover frequency (currently set at 80Hz)? is the outlaw bass management even active with a "large" main channel setting?

as i understand it, the .1 coded channel of dolby digital soundtracks would still be passed to the LFE sub interconnect by default if the sub = on rather than sending it to the main high-level outputs, correct? does the outlaw's xover setting affect the LFE channel as well?

i hope all that makes some semblance of sense... you might understand why i'm a bit confused!

thanks and happy outlaw'ing!

-e

I suppose it is a bit of a belt and suspenders approach, but I have my mains wired to both the satellites and the sub (2 cables on each post on back of Outlaw) as well as the LFE cable to the sub. My mains are set to large and it sounds much better than all the other cofigurations I tried. I'm using BA's System 9000 with a match to the mains for a RC. I set my crossover according to my most limiting speakers (BL and BR for me) and have just been enjoying life since.

Hope this helps!

i played around with things a bit more tonight and i realized... no matter what, since i have the rear surrounds and center set to "small," the outlaw crossover frequency will still need to apply to those. given the satellites i have in this setup, 80Hz seems to be a good setting.

playing a variety of music cds and a couple of movie dvds (toy story 2 and episode II), it appears that the sub output (i assume from the LFE connection) is much more than the satellites, souding unbalanced. after turning down the sub's gain control to compensate, music cds sound anemic with not enough bottom end.

i have all the satellites calibrated with an SPL meter (test signal at 75dB), so their outputs are balanced. at one point, i had the sub trim on the outlaw set to -10dB to see if that would help alleviate the bass output on movie dvds... i still had to turn down the gain a bit to keep the dialogue at a level matching the sub output.

any ideas why things might be so imbalanced? i feel like i'm running around in circles, but i'll keep messing with things to see if i can figure it out. i might try running the satellites all directly off the outlaw and see if that's any better.

thanks!

-e

Having everything connected through the sub to me would pretty much stop the 1050 from being able to properly tune/adjust the sats properly.

I don't have my 1050 yet and my speakers are being ordered next week, but having everything connected through the sub does not seem like the correct way to hook everything up.

Connect everything directly to the 1050 and start again in your tuning.

Larry

I concur. It seems to me the 1050 would be doing double duty, if I understand this hook-up correctly. Try the traditional set-up and re-tune the speakers.
I haven't done it, but try using the delay set-up feature also as described in the manual. I would think this would help 'balance' the sound also.



[This message has been edited by CBWills (edited December 03, 2002).]

yeah, i'm thinking that's the way to go. i'll let the outlaw take care of the bass management by itself. it did seem odd to run everything through two crossovers (basically). very odd that the speaker manuals should suggest this. i'll have to set the sub's input xover way up high to its max setting of 150Hz to avoid its getting in the way i suppose.

from what i've read, the people setting their sub/sats as large via the high-level inputs might be folks with receivers lacking the flexibility the outlaw offers in terms of setting the crossover point. (most receivers cutoff large/small at 100Hz by default?)

back to the "traditional" small-speakers-all-around setup tonight!

thanks all.

-e

[This message has been edited by leeep (edited December 03, 2002).]

The only reason I can think of to have a setup like that is if the sub is passive (does not have its own amplifier). Your sub is active isn't it?

Please report back tonight as I am interested to hear how it all turned out.

Also, where can I get instructions on how to setup the speakers and placement using an SPL?

As I said I am getting my speakers next week and also ordering my 1050 then as well. I am going to have to mount the 4 Sats on the wall and am fairly flexible as to placement, so if I can test them before mounting anything it would be much better.

Thanks.

Larry

The 1050 manual does a fine job of explaning speaker set-up and calibration. If you need more help than that feel free to ask here as often as it takes all of us are happy to help in any way we can!
Gonk has a primer on his site as well but I can't seem to locate it?! He will post it up here for you shortly for you I am sure.

------------------
m-mmeyer
GO TWINS
My DVD's

[This message has been edited by m-mmeyer (edited December 03, 2002).]

The manual does give some good advise on speaker setup and calibration using an SPL meter. I'd recommend starting there.

(Oh, and the bit that m-mmeyer mentioned is probably this section of my site...)

------------------
gonk -- Saloon Links | Pre/Pro Comparison Chart | 950 Review

hi all,

hooked everything back up the "old" way last night... receiver -> sats (set as small), LFE -> sub, etc. i left everything else the same.

immediate and very noticeable reduction in bass output. i had to turn the gain on the sub back up again to fill out the bottom end.

very interesting behavior... it's almost like the bass output is doubled when you do the alternative setup using the sub's internal crossover input/output.

i'd love to hear an explanation why/how this is occurring...

thanks all!

-e

You probably are getting some bass doubling when you put the sub in-line with the mains and hook it up to the LFE output, since you're getting the amplified signal from the mains' output plus the line-level input from the LFE output. (I'm not entirely sure how the signal path works in that scenario -- where the high-level input would "merge" with the internally amplified line-level signal -- but the two have to be mixing somewhere for the "two connections" method to work, probably immediately downstream of the sub's internal amp...)

------------------
gonk -- Saloon Links | Pre/Pro Comparison Chart | 950 Review

yeah, it's almost like you get the main-channel bass output + the LFE output in an additive combination, resulting in 2x the bass amplitude...

it would seem weird to simply superimpose the two signals giving a "double-amplitude" result versus merging the two, but i'm not an expert in signal processing...

thanks!

-e