Crossover settings

[newguy987]

This could be a noobie question, however I'm going to ask it anyways. There seems to be a little bit of confusion when it comes to Ideal crossover settings. I Understand that when you select "large" for speaker size, that the speaker receives the full signal(20htz-20khz), and that when you select "small" for speaker size then the signal is passed to a sub/s at the desired crossover setting. Is this correct? ie 80htz. Keeping in mind, my receiver (arcam avr300) crossover setting is for the whole set up...not one for each speaker like some do. My question is that with mismatched speakers, like in my case: CWM500 55htz-20khz (back surround)
DS3 85htz-10khz (dipole mode surround)
HTM61 49htz-22khz (center)
683's 38hz-22khz (front)
What would be the ideal settings.....for example I could go large with the fronts and center and then have small for the surrounds, and set the crossover to 80-90hz. But then wouldn't the bass be too much for the fronts and especially the center? The other option would be to go everything small and set the crossover to 50-60htz, but then the surrounds, especially the ds3 would be getting too much bass, and the fronts wouldn't be getting as much bass as they could handle. see the problem? Which scenario would work best, keeping in mind I like it loud. Or is there a better way of setting this up? This brings me to my original point earlier where the same speakers for everything would be much easier for set up, especially crossovers. It would be nice to have the fronts receive as much bass as they are intended to without cutting them off too early with a crossover and without putting the other speakers in jepordy of too much bass. also if the fronts were set to large(full range) would that be too much for them to handle. For this 7.1 set up every speaker gets 100w, and in 5.1 the back surrounds are not used and the fronts are bi-amped. yes I know I need a power amp for the fronts.....I have played with the settings a bit, however I am finding it difficult and I don't have a proper test cd/dvd. hope this isn't too confusing, as I have gotten to the point where I have no idea what to set things at. Any hints would be apprciated......thanks.

[Opus007]

I have the 683's also as fronts.See my sig.I have my fronts set to large even though I have 2 subs as I feel like I lose something when they are set to small.I have all others set to small and crossed over at 80.Can the 683's handle being set to large?Yes ..but I have run into distortion if I have them cranked way to loud which I tend to do during movies and keep in mind I mean very loud.Hope this helps.

[scanido]

I was in the same dilemma. I have 803S as fronts, an HTM3S as center, and SCMS as surrounds. Initially I set the fronts (including center) to 60Hz and the SCMS at 80Hz, but then there was a frequency gap between my sub which was also set at 60Hz and the SCMS. I even tried setting the fronts to Large, but then I was not getting the full benefit from my F113. Although the SCMS can handle a 60Hz xover, I too, like to play my system loud and I did not want to add unneeded stress to them so I put them to 80hz.

I found that if you keep the xover the same across each channel the soundfield is more balanced across each channel as well you can get more dynamic and clearer sound as the amps for the front do not have to work as hard. I ended up setting each channel to 80hz.

[Isaac]

If you have a HT with subwoofer, set the all speakers to small. 80 Hz has always worked out best for the crossover setting. Your system will work more efficient. The speakers will not be pushed beyond their limits and like Scanido said will be more dynamic.

[newguy987]

That's pretty well how I have it set up now......however at a crossover at 80hz and the fact that the fronts can go down to 38hz, won't I be missing out on their full potential? One other question, I have a crappy "Cerwin Vega" 12" sub with it's own crossover dial.... I was told to turn it all the way up (ex 120hz) Since the amp is doing the cross over at 80hz, is this correct? or should the sub's xover be at 80hz too? It doesn't have a bypass or crossover defeat switch.

[emig5m]

Yea, leave the sub's crossover off (or up fully) if the electronics is doing the crossover.

BTW, I don't know why, but my system just sounds fuller when everything is left set to "large". Heck, even the auto room EQ in my Yamaha set all my speakers to "large" including the HTM61.

My system consists of 683's and a HTM61 up front, 685's for rears, and a Velodyne MiniVee sub. I'm even powering them with a pretty hefty amp (Emotiva XPA-5) and even when I was toying with the 685's as mains, they handled the power of the amp (275watts into 8ohm) in full range no problem playing some R&B pretty loud.

So my Yamaha detects and sets my speakers to large.

The system sounds better and more fuller and natural to me when everything is set to large.

[robert L]

can u set the crossover differently for both movies and music, my rotel rsp1068 prossesor allows me to, i set all my speakers to small in movies and let my sub handle all the bass, hell thats y i bought the sucker, and it is ten times better then when fronts are large in dd or dts, then in stereo i set the crossover to 80 hurts and it works well, blends real nice, fronts b&w 703 and sub b&w asw750

[Opus007]

Yea, leave the sub's crossover off (or up fully) if the electronics is doing the crossover.

BTW, I don't know why, but my system just sounds fuller when everything is left set to "large". Heck, even the auto room EQ in my Yamaha set all my speakers to "large" including the HTM61.

My system consists of 683's and a HTM61 up front, 685's for rears, and a Velodyne MiniVee sub. I'm even powering them with a pretty hefty amp (Emotiva XPA-5) and even when I was toying with the 685's as mains, they handled the power of the amp (275watts into 8ohm) in full range no problem playing some R&B pretty loud.

So my Yamaha detects and sets my speakers to large.

The system sounds better and more fuller and natural to me when everything is set to large.

I TOTALLY AGREE .