vtataru Posted October 5, 2015 Share Posted October 5, 2015 i have the rotel ra-1570 and the 683's.the sound is good but I feel that the speakers can handle much more power. I was thinking of bi-amping. my choice would be the rotel rb-1552 mk2 since it has the same power output. the 1552 would drive the bass. can I go higher on the bass drivers(power wise)? would it be too much power for the mid and tweeter to be hooked up to the rotel ra-1570? do I need to get an active crossover or it would work without one? thanks Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest thathifiguy Posted October 5, 2015 Share Posted October 5, 2015 Hi Victor, Having toyed around with passive bi-amping (which is what you're looking at doing), I feel you would have more to gain by upgrading from the 1570 to something better. If wanting to stick with Rotel, look perhaps at pairing the RC-1570 and RB-1582 MkII. Tarkan. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Sime Posted October 5, 2015 Share Posted October 5, 2015 Yup, forget bi amping, go a 1582, good amp. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
caminperth Posted October 5, 2015 Share Posted October 5, 2015 Even better - try some tubes on them. Worked well for mine. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Zaphod Beeblebrox Posted October 5, 2015 Share Posted October 5, 2015 i have the rotel ra-1570 and the 683's.the sound is good but I feel that the speakers can handle much more power. I was thinking of bi-amping. my choice would be the rotel rb-1552 mk2 since it has the same power output. the 1552 would drive the bass. can I go higher on the bass drivers(power wise)? would it be too much power for the mid and tweeter to be hooked up to the rotel ra-1570? do I need to get an active crossover or it would work without one? thanks Bi-amping, without an electronic crossover and considerable test equipment and experience is not going to end well. Buy a better amp. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
andyr Posted October 5, 2015 Share Posted October 5, 2015 Just to try and bring together the comments made by your various respondents: using 2 stereo amps on your B&W 683s (because they presumably have 2 pairs of binding posts) without bypassing/removing the existing passive XOs has questionable value (sonic-wise). much better - if you want to feed them more power than your 120w Rotel amp is able to supply - is to buy a much more powerful amp. or, if you know what you are doing, remove the passive XO, substitute an active XO and get a 2nd amp. Good luck, Andy Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
andyr Posted October 5, 2015 Share Posted October 5, 2015 Even better - try some tubes on them. Worked well for mine. So you say a tube amp - a 20w SET, for example - will drive the 683s better than his 120wpc Rotel? I suspect not - but if by 'tube amp' you mean, say, a 200wpc VTL ... then I would agree with you! Andy Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
davewantsmoore Posted October 5, 2015 Share Posted October 5, 2015 The 683-S2 will certainly sound very different when driven from an amp which wasn't designed for resistive loads. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
caminperth Posted October 5, 2015 Share Posted October 5, 2015 (edited) So you say a tube amp - a 20w SET, for example - will drive the 683s better than his 120wpc Rotel? I suspect not - but if by 'tube amp' you mean, say, a 200wpc VTL ... then I would agree with you! Andy Firsthand experience with a 30w Prima Luna resulted in great midrange, good bass drive and only a slight difference in overall volume compared with a 200w SS amp. However - I'm sure the VTL would have worked well.. Edit - Dave - mine were the S1 version Edited October 5, 2015 by caminperth Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
betty boop Posted October 5, 2015 Share Posted October 5, 2015 I have had benefit with bi-amping, but will come down to speaker in question and amps used. if have the spare channels or amps lying around sure. but if matter of buying an amp, as some others have suggested, I would just buy a better amp in the first place. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
davewantsmoore Posted October 5, 2015 Share Posted October 5, 2015 S1 Same. They're really quite difficult loads for an amplifier. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Volunteer sir sanders zingmore Posted October 5, 2015 Volunteer Share Posted October 5, 2015 The 683-S2 will certainly sound very different when driven from an amp which wasn't designed for resistive loads. whoosh! that's quite a rollercoaster Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
davewantsmoore Posted October 5, 2015 Share Posted October 5, 2015 Yep. The octaves between 60hz and 120hz, and 5khz and 10khz, will test some amplifiers. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
andyr Posted October 5, 2015 Share Posted October 5, 2015 Firsthand experience with a 30w Prima Luna resulted in great midrange, good bass drive and only a slight difference in overall volume compared with a 200w SS amp. However - I'm sure the VTL would have worked well.. Mmmm, the "difference in overall volume" is not the salient point, IMO. The difference in having 10 times as much power on tap is better delivery of leading edge transients. Andy 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
djb Posted October 5, 2015 Share Posted October 5, 2015 Much as I'd like to side with a mod who's brave enough to post an activity tracker in the wrist jewellery thread .... Betti your wrong Passive bi amping has never done anything for my systems I've tried conquering my ears with my imagination claiming a different better SQ result I was lieing to my self 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
caminperth Posted October 6, 2015 Share Posted October 6, 2015 Mmmm, the "difference in overall volume" is not the salient point, IMO. The difference in having 10 times as much power on tap is better delivery of leading edge transients. Andy Well it worked well for me. I sold the SS and kept the valve amp. Your experience was different with these speakers? Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
djb Posted October 6, 2015 Share Posted October 6, 2015 ooh "leading edge transients" now that just used the terminology cal ante! Definition please 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Greygit Posted October 6, 2015 Share Posted October 6, 2015 Hi Victor, I'm running the RCD 1570 and RC 1570 Pre with the 1582 MkII for a pair of large 3 way floorstanders (Whatmough P33s). I find the 1582 has a good grip on the speakers - great sound quality across the dynamic range. If you can, I suggest getting a Rotel dealer to allow you to audition the 1582 at home and use the pre-outs from your RA 1570 to hook up the 1582. Better yet, if the dealer will also allow you to audition a RC 1570 you can at least make a comparison between it and your RA 1570. Let us know how you get on. Cheers, James Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Sime Posted October 6, 2015 Share Posted October 6, 2015 And if you really want to drive them, get a pair of 1581 mono's. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
vtataru Posted October 9, 2015 Author Share Posted October 9, 2015 what about a rotel RB-1572 2x250W at 8ohms class D amplifier? anybody has any experience with that? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
betty boop Posted October 9, 2015 Share Posted October 9, 2015 Much as I'd like to side with a mod who's brave enough to post an activity tracker in the wrist jewellery thread .... Betti your wrong Passive bi amping has never done anything for my systems I've tried conquering my ears with my imagination claiming a different better SQ result I was lieing to my self probably just not pushing the envelope djb, my experience where has had benefit has been purely where low wattage high quality amps have been used. and speakers that are in the medium to difficult load territory. examples a naim stack on largish standmount(audio note rebrand). a naim stack on B&W 805S. a cyrus stack on some large missions. on the same missions on other hand bi-amping with two grunty 250wpc high current power amps didn't add value. another example was colin whatmough bi-amping his flagship with the amps he used that were pure class A to a few watts on the tweeters and gruntier amps on the lower end. similarly have experienced some lovely low wattage tubes used on top end and grunter tubes on lower end on some power hungry speakers that swallow up the watts and would distort with the bass needs and colour the top end as result. passive bi-amping solved that. a little does depend on the xover used as well. some e.g. the missions had split xovers…particularly designed and suited to bi-amping. few approaches. my suggestion as made in my post above would always be to also consider a better more suitable amp in the first place, but I think its wrong to passive bi-amping does nothing. doesn't have to be down to imagination, and quite accept did nothing in your context Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gratefuleric Posted August 9, 2018 Share Posted August 9, 2018 I'm in the process of Bi-amping my B&W 686's with an active X-over (DBX 2/3) using a B&K Sonata 442 5-ch amp. Q: does removing the spades on the back of the speakers bypass the passive crossover? Or just separate the inputs leaving the passive X-over in place? I'd like to take them off line and utilize the phase correct active X-over Eric J Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
davewantsmoore Posted August 10, 2018 Share Posted August 10, 2018 3 hours ago, Gratefuleric said: Q: does removing the spades on the back of the speakers bypass the passive crossover? Or just separate the inputs leaving the passive X-over in place? The later. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AudioGeek Posted August 10, 2018 Share Posted August 10, 2018 4 hours ago, Gratefuleric said: I'm in the process of Bi-amping my B&W 686's with an active X-over (DBX 2/3) using a B&K Sonata 442 5-ch amp. Q: does removing the spades on the back of the speakers bypass the passive crossover? Or just separate the inputs leaving the passive X-over in place? I'd like to take them off line and utilize the phase correct active X-over Eric J Eric, your question is making me anxious. Best to learn how biamping and crossovers work before trying anything - you could do some damage. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
davewantsmoore Posted August 10, 2018 Share Posted August 10, 2018 Modern drivers are quite robust as long as careful with overall input power. The real "worry" (if that's the right word) with moving to an active crossover .... is the inherent question "What makes you think you can design a better filter than B&W did?" In the whole scheme of things "overall phase linearity" is not very important..... and so if all you did was design exactly the same response as B&W, but with phase linear - this will not be at all a dramatic change. If you design a different filter - then it will surely sound different.... but is it better performance than what B&W did? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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