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QS-500 Configuration questions

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DMcB123

New Member
I came into a QS-500 over the weekend and paired it with my Sansui Six, which has dedicated ports for a quad amp. I don't have a manual or any experience with quadraphonics so this is a foreign language to me. Would anyone like to confirm I have things configured appropriately?

I have rear speakers going into the QS-500 and my main front speakers going into the Six. My turntable is connected to Phono 1 on the Six. I have a CD player also going into the Six, into an AUX port. Am I able to connect that CD player into the QS500 instead? In order to connect a projector to the Six for viewing?

And the knobs on the QS-500 present a lot of options that I'm trying to decipher, which is impeded by the lack of a manual. For instance, the levels knob; and that the volume knobs on both amps are functional, if for different effects/channels.

Any insights/advice will be appreciated. I'm relatively new but I am finally content with my setup for a while. This Six and QS-500 look great stacked and more importantly were sounding great last night.
 
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Domimax said:
Please post some pictures. What speakers are you running?
Click to expand...

I'll post pictures later when I take some, I'm at work at the moment (shhh!).
My main speakers are Design Acoustic PS10s and the rears are early 90's JBL bookshelf speakers with titanium tweeters (a detail I'm providing not as a boast but because it may help you ID them; I don't have the model numbers handy).
 
I’m finally uploading these. Needed daylight for the rear panel.

I’ll be repositioning the whole system this weekend, including putting the rear speakers behind me.
 

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Related to this question, (and pardon me if this is inappropriately tangential or in a different discussion) but I was thinking about buying a QS-500 to complement my Sansui 5500. I'm a recent convert to vintage home audio and a complete noob with quad sound, so my question is this: Is it worth spending the money to go quad with a QS-500 or should I just hook another pair of speakers into my 5500? Thanks.
 
To be clear, if you had a QRX-5500 then you would have specified that, yeah? Because that would change my answer.

Bear in mind that I'm a bit of a noob, too, or at least it often feels that way. But I would say there's a big difference between using my QS-500 with my Six, versus using my Six or 771 with 4 speakers but no QS-500. It's really wonderful to listen to music using the QS-500. The thing is that you hear a lot more, the separation of the sounds really increases my enjoyment. I've even heard the argument that using four speaker for a two channel stereo amp isn't a good idea, although I haven't been able to resist doing that. The QRS-500 isn't for increasing your wpc, but to articulate the sounds through the addition of synthesized rear channels (or if you have quad-recorded media, it can reproduce that rather than synthesizing it).
 
DMcB123 said:
To be clear, if you had a QRX-5500 then you would have specified that, yeah? Because that would change my answer.

Bear in mind that I'm a bit of a noob, too, or at least it often feels that way. But I would say there's a big difference between using my QS-500 with my Six, versus using my Six or 771 with 4 speakers but no QS-500. It's really wonderful to listen to music using the QS-500. The thing is that you hear a lot more, the separation of the sounds really increases my enjoyment. I've even heard the argument that using four speaker for a two channel stereo amp isn't a good idea, although I haven't been able to resist doing that. The QRS-500 isn't for increasing your wpc, but to articulate the sounds through the addition of synthesized rear channels (or if you have quad-recorded media, it can reproduce that rather than synthesizing it).
Click to expand...

Wow, thanks so much for the detailed answer, I really appreciate it.

And no, I do not have a QRX-5500. I have a straight 5500 (from 1968, I believe). It has a "4 Channel Adapter" button on the front and that made me really curious. The "separation of sound" you referenced is really appealing. Thanks again and just for the heck of it, I've attached a photo of my 5500.
 

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Brunsvold said:
Wow, thanks so much for the detailed answer, I really appreciate it.

And no, I do not have a QRX-5500. I have a straight 5500 (from 1968, I believe). It has a "4 Channel Adapter" button on the front and that made me really curious. The "separation of sound" you referenced is really appealing. Thanks again and just for the heck of it, I've attached a photo of my 5500.
Click to expand...

Nice! I took a quick look at Google image searches of the 5500 and (as I suspected since you have the button for it) the rear panel shows inputs for the 4-channel adaptor. My Six does, too. You can use the tape monitor inputs otherwise, but it's nice to have the ports dedicated to the 4-channel adaptor already.

The separation is really worth it. I was listening to Pusherman by Curtis Mayfield and I'd never heard the percussion so clearly in that song (for example).
 
DMcB123 said:
Nice! I took a quick look at Google image searches of the 5500 and (as I suspected since you have the button for it) the rear panel shows inputs for the 4-channel adaptor. My Six does, too. You can use the tape monitor inputs otherwise, but it's nice to have the ports dedicated to the 4-channel adaptor already.

The separation is really worth it. I was listening to Pusherman by Curtis Mayfield and I'd never heard the percussion so clearly in that song (for example).
Click to expand...

This is all really great info to have (and an awesome album choice as well:)). As it's really hard to find, I genuinely appreciate hearing first-hand impressions of vintage Sansui quad gear. One quick question though...do you need to have four speakers that are exactly alike to hear the separation? As an example, I have a pair of floor speakers (Sansui SP-3200) and a pair of bookshelf speakers (Sansui SP-35). Is that appropriate or do I have to have four identical speakers or frankly, am I overthinking this?

Thanks again. Gonna go listen to my James Brown - Grits & Soul album now.
 
Brunsvold said:
This is all really great info to have (and an awesome album choice as well:)). As it's really hard to find, I genuinely appreciate hearing first-hand impressions of vintage Sansui quad gear. One quick question though...do you need to have four speakers that are exactly alike to hear the separation? As an example, I have a pair of floor speakers (Sansui SP-3200) and a pair of bookshelf speakers (Sansui SP-35). Is that appropriate or do I have to have four identical speakers or frankly, am I overthinking this?

Thanks again. Gonna go listen to my James Brown - Grits & Soul album now.
Click to expand...

My speakers don't match. I've read other posts specifically about the QS-500 I think that mentioned that the rear channel speakers needn't be very powerful. I use Design Acoustic PS10s for my front and some JBL for the rears (though I'd like to swap out those JBLs, they are not particularly special).

Here are a couple of threads that I found useful when I was getting this set up a few months back. Audiokarma user @sKiZo had posts that I found helpful- he mentions using bookshelf speakers for the rears.

https://audiokarma.org/forums/index.php?threads/what-can-pair-with-sansui-qs-500.787417/
https://audiokarma.org/forums/index.php?threads/sansui-qs-500.431625/#post-5558912
https://audiokarma.org/forums/index.php?threads/sansui-qs-500-help.762704/
 
DMcB123 said:
My speakers don't match. I've read other posts specifically about the QS-500 I think that mentioned that the rear channel speakers needn't be very powerful. I use Design Acoustic PS10s for my front and some JBL for the rears (though I'd like to swap out those JBLs, they are not particularly special).

Here are a couple of threads that I found useful when I was getting this set up a few months back. Audiokarma user @sKiZo had posts that I found helpful- he mentions using bookshelf speakers for the rears.

https://audiokarma.org/forums/index.php?threads/what-can-pair-with-sansui-qs-500.787417/
https://audiokarma.org/forums/index.php?threads/sansui-qs-500.431625/#post-5558912
https://audiokarma.org/forums/index.php?threads/sansui-qs-500-help.762704/
Click to expand...
Wow, thanks a ton.
 
Brunsvold said:
Wow, thanks so much for the detailed answer, I really appreciate it.

And no, I do not have a QRX-5500. I have a straight 5500 (from 1968, I believe). It has a "4 Channel Adapter" button on the front and that made me really curious. The "separation of sound" you referenced is really appealing. Thanks again and just for the heck of it, I've attached a photo of my 5500.
Click to expand...

Just chiming in here, I've got a 1972 Sansui 5500 just like yours, and picked up a QS-500 last weekend. Spent a few hours messing around with it yesterday; they look very cool next to each other. I've got it pairing through the "4 Channel" function, and it sounds pretty good. Still experimenting with speakers, settings, and all that. Couldn't resist chiming in when I saw your post!
 

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Wt.ashton said:
Just chiming in here, I've got a 1972 Sansui 5500 just like yours, and picked up a QS-500 last weekend. Spent a few hours messing around with it yesterday; they look very cool next to each other. I've got it pairing through the "4 Channel" function, and it sounds pretty good. Still experimenting with speakers, settings, and all that. Couldn't resist chiming in when I saw your post!
Click to expand...

See now, opinions and pictures like yours that make it nearly impossible for me NOT to buy one. Setup looks awesome, thanks for sharing.
 
Whelp, I went and did a thing.

Bought a Sansui QS-500 and just to make my life more complicated (in a good way), a friend gave me his old (pristine) Sansui RA-500 Reverb Amp as well. While I love having this beautiful vintage Sansui stack...connecting the 5500 Receiver, QS-500, and the RA-500 is confusing, to say the least, for this audio noob.

Luckily, I have the original manuals for the QS-500 (plus, I found a great connection guide in the list of posts DMcB123 posted earlier...thanks again for that) so hooking up the receiver and amp is fairly straightforward. But now I'm stuck.

Preemptive "thank you"s to all the helpful members in this community :)
 
Brunsvold said:
Whelp, I went and did a thing.

Bought a Sansui QS-500 and just to make my life more complicated (in a good way), a friend gave me his old (pristine) Sansui RA-500 Reverb Amp as well. While I love having this beautiful vintage Sansui stack...connecting the 5500 Receiver, QS-500, and the RA-500 is confusing, to say the least, for this audio noob.

Luckily, I have the original manuals for the QS-500 (plus, I found a great connection guide in the list of posts DMcB123 posted earlier...thanks again for that) so hooking up the receiver and amp is fairly straightforward. But now I'm stuck.

Preemptive "thank you"s to all the helpful members in this community :)
Click to expand...

I've got an RA-500 plugged in too, we match!
After a few weeks messing around with the two amps, still trying to find the sweet spot with the volume/balance. Let me know if your system gets louder when you disengage the 4 channel adapter.

The directions seem pretty daunting, but in a nutshell, the big black volume is now your overall volume and the level set is a gain control.
 
The QS-500 adds reverb, so unless you want a LOT of reverb, you don’t really need the RA-500.
 
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