Any tips on bi-amping?

[bertie930]

Hello to everyone.

I'm new to this forum and was told this is the place to talk Rotel.
I've just bought an RC870BX pre-amp and two RB850 power amps. Having always had integrated amps I decided to try something different for a change. I have a pair of Mission 752 Freedom speakers (four b. posts) and want to try bi-amping.

Can anyone explain the best way to go about this, connections wise? I don't want to blow anything whilst experimenting.

Also, can anyone suggest a brand of phono/rca interconnect and also speaker cable which won't cost the earth but work well with Rotel equipment?

Any help and ideas would be much appreciated. Thank you.

[Nuthed]

I would use one amp per side in a "vertical" bi-amp configuration. Instead of using 1 amp for low pass duty and another for high pass. This way each amp will only be handling one low pass section of a speaker thereby decreasing the load on the power supply, at least for one amp. Instead of letting one amp cruise easy by driving both high pass sections and the other busting ass driving 2 low pass sections.

You'll need a pair of Y adapters with 2 male ends and 1 female end each. I'll tell you what to do for 1 amp, then you just need to do the same for the other amp:

Connect the female end of a Y adapter to the end of the interconnect cable from your pre-amp's left channel output. Connect the 2 male ends of the Y adapter into the left and right inputs on one amplifier. Connect the amplifier to a speaker with the left channel feeding either the high or low pass section of the speaker and the right channel of the amplifier feeding the remaining half. It doesn't matter which is which. You'll be running the amplifier in stereo mode, with the exception that each channel is driving 1/2 of a speaker.

Do the same for the right channel output of your pre-amp.

Be sure to remove your speaker's jumper plates. :T

As far as brand names, it doesn't really matter in my expirience as long as you don't go super cheap.