Sonic Bliss? - MC275 MarkV with MC352 on B&W704 with Crossover
Great Forum!
As a freshly minted, soon-to-be McIntosh owner, I was recently stung listening to two setups:
1. MC275 driving a pair of B&W 704 (2.5 way floorstanding speaker)
2. MC275 driving the HF terminals on the 704 with MC402 driving the LF terminals on that same 704
Experience:
1. I was actually hoping not to hear a difference between tube and solid state, fearing the slippery and expensive slope into audiophile territory. The gentleman at the store was kind enough to perform blind tests for me.
Bloody hell, I could hear an immediate difference. Beautiful live-like sound on guitars, standing bass and vocals. It did struggle a bit with electronic bass and drums at higher volumes.
2. Goose bumps! Even though there was no active crossover, and you could tell something in the volume was off...some sort of layer effect, the sound was soooooo much better. Same sparkly/live sound with the guitars, standing bass and vocals but you could now feel the bass, it was much tighter, and I could really distinguish the various drum sounds better. Amazing.
Questions:
After reading hours of forum materials I remain with a couple of questions that I was hoping your collective experience could help me with.
1. Are the passive crossovers in the B&W 704 discrete and separated by the LF and HF binding posts? All I could find were the fact that there are 2 crossover points, at 150Hz and 4kHz, and there are separate binding posts for HF and LF. Does that mean that connecting to the HF binding posts will filter out any frequencies 150Hz and lower, with an additional crossover sending 4kHz and up to the tweeter? And that connecting to the LF binding posts will filter out anything over 150hz?
2. How do you tweak the volume of each individual power amp to get that overall gain balance between the two power amps? McIntosh's pre-amps can not do this, as per their tech rep. The power amps do not have a gain knob or setting. Is the only way an active crossover?
3. Is this banding or layer effect(for lack of a better phrase) on the MC275/MC402 that I heard purely due to volume differences in the amps or other effects of bi-amping?
4. When putting an active crossover in between the Pre and Power amps, which ones do not degrade the soundpath? I have read nasty reviews on the likes of Behringers and Dbx, even though they are used in audiostudios. Pass Labs (XVR1) and Bryston (10B) are the same if not more expensive than the amps themselves. Rane or Marchand are also mentioned. Suggestions?
5. The last thing I want to do is rip out the finely tuned passive crossovers in the 704. Perhaps a good combination is as follows:
A - Active crossover sends 150Hz and below to the MC402, which is connected to the LF terminals of the 704. The passive crossover in the speaker takes over and hardly has to filter out anything, sending 150Hz and below to the 6.5" Paper/Kevlar bass cone.
B- Active crossover sends 150Hz and above to the MC275, which is connected to the HF terminals on the 704. The passive crossover in the speaker sends the 4kHz and above to the 1" alloy tweeter, and the rest to the 6.5" kevlar bass/midrange cone.
Will this setup alleviate the increase in heat and distortion I have read about that bi-amping the MC275 will cause? Is this the best of both worlds; "pseudo-active" bi-amping without ripping out the finely tuned passive crossovers that make the speakers what they are?
I was looking at the MC352 as a substitute for the MC402 in this same setup.
Have I gone absolutely stark raving mad? Please help before I plunk down a ridiculous amount of cash.
Sorry for the long post.
Thank you much for your inputs!
Great Forum!
As a freshly minted, soon-to-be McIntosh owner, I was recently stung listening to two setups:
1. MC275 driving a pair of B&W 704 (2.5 way floorstanding speaker)
2. MC275 driving the HF terminals on the 704 with MC402 driving the LF terminals on that same 704
Experience:
1. I was actually hoping not to hear a difference between tube and solid state, fearing the slippery and expensive slope into audiophile territory. The gentleman at the store was kind enough to perform blind tests for me.
Bloody hell, I could hear an immediate difference. Beautiful live-like sound on guitars, standing bass and vocals. It did struggle a bit with electronic bass and drums at higher volumes.
2. Goose bumps! Even though there was no active crossover, and you could tell something in the volume was off...some sort of layer effect, the sound was soooooo much better. Same sparkly/live sound with the guitars, standing bass and vocals but you could now feel the bass, it was much tighter, and I could really distinguish the various drum sounds better. Amazing.
Questions:
After reading hours of forum materials I remain with a couple of questions that I was hoping your collective experience could help me with.
1. Are the passive crossovers in the B&W 704 discrete and separated by the LF and HF binding posts? All I could find were the fact that there are 2 crossover points, at 150Hz and 4kHz, and there are separate binding posts for HF and LF. Does that mean that connecting to the HF binding posts will filter out any frequencies 150Hz and lower, with an additional crossover sending 4kHz and up to the tweeter? And that connecting to the LF binding posts will filter out anything over 150hz?
2. How do you tweak the volume of each individual power amp to get that overall gain balance between the two power amps? McIntosh's pre-amps can not do this, as per their tech rep. The power amps do not have a gain knob or setting. Is the only way an active crossover?
3. Is this banding or layer effect(for lack of a better phrase) on the MC275/MC402 that I heard purely due to volume differences in the amps or other effects of bi-amping?
4. When putting an active crossover in between the Pre and Power amps, which ones do not degrade the soundpath? I have read nasty reviews on the likes of Behringers and Dbx, even though they are used in audiostudios. Pass Labs (XVR1) and Bryston (10B) are the same if not more expensive than the amps themselves. Rane or Marchand are also mentioned. Suggestions?
5. The last thing I want to do is rip out the finely tuned passive crossovers in the 704. Perhaps a good combination is as follows:
A - Active crossover sends 150Hz and below to the MC402, which is connected to the LF terminals of the 704. The passive crossover in the speaker takes over and hardly has to filter out anything, sending 150Hz and below to the 6.5" Paper/Kevlar bass cone.
B- Active crossover sends 150Hz and above to the MC275, which is connected to the HF terminals on the 704. The passive crossover in the speaker sends the 4kHz and above to the 1" alloy tweeter, and the rest to the 6.5" kevlar bass/midrange cone.
Will this setup alleviate the increase in heat and distortion I have read about that bi-amping the MC275 will cause? Is this the best of both worlds; "pseudo-active" bi-amping without ripping out the finely tuned passive crossovers that make the speakers what they are?
I was looking at the MC352 as a substitute for the MC402 in this same setup.
Have I gone absolutely stark raving mad? Please help before I plunk down a ridiculous amount of cash.
Sorry for the long post.
Thank you much for your inputs!
