NS690 in Home Theatre?

Jpete9

Active Member
I have NS690mk1 and they aren't getting much use in my listening room. I have a home theatre in a box (blue ray player with 5 X 3ohm slim tower speakers.

I will buy a receiver and replace the blueray player and buy speakers to work with the 690s or if its not worth it ill buy a home theatre speaker set and receiver.

Is the 690 worth considering in this role?

PS: i understand i can add the 690 to the blueray as they are 8ohm and the current speakers 3ohm...but wont be a lot of power available for them? Is it even worth considering?

Blueray/amp is Samsun D5550W no power spec avail other that: total power=1000w - but who know what that means.
 
NS 690s are likely better than any home theater in a box speakers would be. They won't match the rest of your speakers in timbre, but that may not be too important to you.

I suppose you can try to use the existing blu-ray/amp, but it's likely not very high quality. If you try it, try at lower volumes first.

A used home theater receiver may be your best bet. One that has a mic and auto calibration would be best to help you automatically adjust volume and equalization among you different speaker brands and characteristics.
 
I'll try them this weekend. If it shows enough promise i'll go ahead and hunt around for a receiver and new centre. Mine has that auto EQ feature...if i can find the mic. I think i can live with some imperfection if i can cure some of the issues you get with HTiB - clarity/boominess/cheapness.

Any issues with the 690s magnets next to LED TVs?
 
I don't think LED TVs are affected by magnets, just the old CRTs. And with the size and weight of the 690's, I bet you'll have them far enough away from your screen such that they wouldn't affect a CRT either.

One thing: I wouldn't judge the 690's purely on their performance with the combined blu-ray/amp. From your signature, it looks like you have other Yamaha amps that are much more capable of showing what the 690's can really do. So even if they sound bad with the blu-ray/amp, they're more likely to sound like they do with your CA-1000 if you get a decent receiver to drive them.
 
You might consider using up the Yammies as a phantom center given that the Samsung center won't match them assuming the receiver allows you to do that.

Some of the more upscale receivers with Auto setup routines such as Audyssey found in Denon and Marantz, Yamaha's YPAO and Pioneer's MCACC can alter the frequency response of the speakers to better match each other.

Of course you might want to start looking at Yamaha AV receivers although personally not a big fan of amp to speakers matching which is to say any of the other brands mentioned would likely yield an improvement.
 
Tried them on the Blueray - waste of time, can't drive them.

I dont use the receiver for anything other than ARC. I just want a pure 5.1 audio system using my original TV remote using CEC for control.

I'll definitely be trying Marantz or Denon or Pioneer. I am trying to find something that isnt over featured with rubbish i dont need that can just handle audio duties, not cost me a bomb and sound pretty good.

Thanks for the tip on a phantom centre. Does this come in some of the less feature units? i will buy a nice centre and sub, but not this year.
 
Hi again, would the Yamaha RXV 675 Receiver https://usa.yamaha.com/products/audio_visual/av_receivers_amps/rx-v675/index.html be able to handle the NS690 and i will build a custom centre and woofer. Its not very high power amp, but the yammys are 96bd, 8ohm so pretty easy to drive and i'll make a powered woofer.

I just want 5.1. If i acquire from rears, do they need to be 8ohm too and watch the total power consumption?
Also, can i use 3ohm cheapies with the 8ohm Yammies up front? or no mixing and matching?

Would this unit handle TV audio duties?
 
That receiver was designed to handle TV audio duties and has plenty of power to drive your NS690’s. Not sure what you mean by using 3 ohm cheapies _with_ the Yammies. I wouldn’t.

That sounds like a relatively new receiver. It has 4k Ultra HD upscaling?

Cheers,
John
 
Thanks. I have these 3ohm cheap speakers that come with a samsung home theatre in a box eg http://www.samsung.com/au/support/model/HT-D5550W/XY I could use as temp rears or centre. But not sure about running 3phm and 8ohm speakers at the same time, i know these receivers have seperate amps, but this is a big difference in load?

Dont think it has 4k. But i dont need. I will only use this for ARC and audio out from the TV to drive speakers. Everything i use for playback is an app on my TV. So i dont need to send any video to the receiver. I do have an XBOX, but its not 4k and it connects direct to TV and the audio out from the TV via ARC to the receiver model still holds.

My only goal is to turn on the tv, get audio to the receiver without any additional remote, which i can do now with the crappy home theatre in a box via ARC.
 
I bought the amp. From a speaker perspective, running with the NS690 is brilliant. But after a little while the amp transformer buzzes...very annoying, it was hours away, he will take the money back, but it wasnt much and its too far...so yet another amp thread coming up...i am going to start buying new under warranty i think.

EDIT good news, for me. Its a mechanical hum, i deformed the transformer case and hum gone! Plus the transformed part is available new locally and fairly cheap, so i'll keep it.

Off to learn re varnishing transformers.
 
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To timbre match your front three speakers (yes it is important) find a smaller bookshelf speaker that uses the same tweeter as your 690's. Viola! Timbre matched! The problem with phantom centers is nobody has yet invented a way to turn up the center - and thats where the dialog comes from.

Whenever there is action in a movie where something making noise passes from left to right - right to left etc, you will hear the difference in the tone - especially if the timbre is way off. More common than not in the speaker world. Lots of different sounding speakers and the tweeters will make up the bulk of that mismatch.

I have a custom made Selah Audio center that has the same tweeter as my song towers. The two 7" woofers and the 4" mid are both Seas woofers. The four 5" woofers in the song towers are also Seas but not in the same line as used in the center speaker. Doesn't matter, it's the tweeters that needs the match. By my (almost) experienced ears I'd say the timbre is as close as any front three LCR speakers that are made to match from the manufacturer. FWIW the Selah center speaker is as good as I've ever heard from a center channel speaker. I've owned quite a few over the past 15-20 years. Best I can recall I've owned 8-9 center channel speakers.
 
Sounds like a plan! Post back when you've built your center speaker and give us the impression from having a real center vs the phantom center. I've tried both and I'll always have a center speaker if I want some semblance of theater-like audio. Like I said, can't control volume on a phantom center or everyone would be doing it.
 
OK i've been reading up on this...its not very straight forward to make your own centre unless you buy a kit...would need to carefully design a crossover etc...might be outa my league. I could follow a guide if some one had done it before, but inventing my own will be a bit of a struggle.
 
I have been using the 690s on the TV and they're great! but i think a centre would be nice. I have access to a pair of 670s quite affordable as the cabs are shagged. Thinking about the convo on voicing, i think they would be very close. Two Mids, Two tweeters (or maybe just one) and use a wiring model like this to use just one crossover...would this work well?

fig3.gif
 
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It may not be "clean", but you could use both crossovers and just wire the crossovers in series internally. In the end it would be easier.

I'm using a pair of Canton GL 260 speakers as a center. Laid on their sides with the tweeters in the middle and wired in series. Works great.

Cheers,
James
 
In the end might not be so ideal. 1 tweet and 1 mid are cactus (hence the affordability) not sure its worth the effort, unless it can be had very cheap. Might be easier to find a more modern yamaha centre?
 
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