On setting up my morduant short 905i center speaker i saw a diagram in the manual that shows how to bi wire it. So I did but I have since been told that bi wiring means you need a 2nd amp so one feed for high freq comes from one amp and the other feed for low freq comes from the 2nd amp....... I am a bit confused as it does not show or explain this in the manual... Anyone know more
what is bi wired ?
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You don't necessarily need a second physical amp unit - but your current amp would need to support "bi wiring" or "bi amping". It basically allows the speaker (if it supports it) to have separate channels for high and low frequency (in a similar way to how a subwoofer handles all the very low frequency sound). It will essentially wire the tweeter(s) in your centre speaker to one output from your amp (delivering just high frequency), and the woofer(s) in the speaker to another (delivering just low frequency).
Some 7.1 amps provide optional bi-wiring of the front left and right speakers at the expense of the rear left and right channels (i.e. 5.1 with front bi-amping). Unless you have a pretty high end amp it is probably unlikely it supports bi-amping of the centre speaker.
Basically I wouldn't worry about it too much if your amp doesn't do bi-amping - you can happily use the centre speaker in its default mode - it will (probably) have been provided with a couple of metal bridges between the two pairs of inputs on the back of the speaker and the frequencies are then filtered out by a passive crossover within the speaker. This passive crossover filter "wastes" power, which is why bi-amping is better if you can manage it - but it probably won't make a huge amount of difference to you.
Hope that helps.
Some 7.1 amps provide optional bi-wiring of the front left and right speakers at the expense of the rear left and right channels (i.e. 5.1 with front bi-amping). Unless you have a pretty high end amp it is probably unlikely it supports bi-amping of the centre speaker.
Basically I wouldn't worry about it too much if your amp doesn't do bi-amping - you can happily use the centre speaker in its default mode - it will (probably) have been provided with a couple of metal bridges between the two pairs of inputs on the back of the speaker and the frequencies are then filtered out by a passive crossover within the speaker. This passive crossover filter "wastes" power, which is why bi-amping is better if you can manage it - but it probably won't make a huge amount of difference to you.
Hope that helps.
[quote user="simon_soton"]You don't necessarily need a second physical amp unit - but your current amp would need to support "bi wiring" or "bi amping". It basically allows the speaker (if it supports it) to have separate channels for high and low frequency (in a similar way to how a subwoofer handles all the very low frequency sound). It will essentially wire the tweeter(s) in your centre speaker to one output from your amp (delivering just high frequency), and the woofer(s) in the speaker to another (delivering just low frequency).[/quote]
Erm, not quite... that's biamping.
Biwiring involves twin runs of speaker cable from the amp to a speaker with twin sets of terminals on the rear. You remove a jumper bar between the two sets of terminals on the back of the speaker, and then one cable run feeds the high frequency section of the speaker, and the other the low frequency.
What happens back at the amp end then depends on your amp, but any amplifier is capable of supporting biwiring provided you can phyiscally get the two sets of cable ends into its terminals. So, at the crudest, you'd twist together the two sets of red wire ends from the two cables to your left speakers, and put them into the left red or plus output terminal on the amp. Repeat this with the two black ends.
Do the same for the right channel, and you're biwiring.
There are various ways to make this simpler. If your amp has Speaker A/B terminals, you could use the left channel A terminals for the high frequency cables, and the B for the low frequency, and so on.
Or you can buy stacking banana plugs allowing two plugs to go into one terminal, or special cables with four conductors, made up with two plugs at the amp end, and four at the speaker end.
[quote user="simon_soton"]
Some 7.1 amps provide optional bi-wiring of the front left and right speakers at the expense of the rear left and right channels (i.e. 5.1 with front bi-amping).
[/quote]
Ah no, now that is biamping, not biwiring, in which each drive unit in the speaker, or each section of the speaker, is driven by its own power amp.
You can do the same thing with some integrated stereo amps, which have preamp level outputs, and their matching power amps (or indeed with a preamp and a pair of stereo power amps).
But you can still biwire any speakers you want, even with amps with no specific provision of this kind.
[quote user="simon_soton"]Unless you have a pretty high end amp it is probably unlikely it supports bi-amping of the centre speaker.[/quote]
Don't know of many set-ups that do this, certainly not in an integrated AV receiver or amp. I have run a set-up with biamped left, centre and right speakers, but this was using the old TAG McLaren AV32R processor and its matching 100x5R:10 power amp, which has the tend channels you need to run a 7.1-channel system with three channels biamped.
[quote user="simon_soton"]Basically I wouldn't worry about it too much if your amp doesn't do bi-amping - you can happily use the centre speaker in its default mode - it will (probably) have been provided with a couple of metal bridges between the two pairs of inputs on the back of the speaker and the frequencies are then filtered out by a passive crossover within the speaker.[/quote]
Agreed, but you may find the sound is better if you take off those bridges or jumper links, and replace them with short pieces of the same cable you're using to wire your speakers to your amp.
[quote user="simon_soton"]This passive crossover filter "wastes" power, which is why bi-amping is better if you can manage it - but it probably won't make a huge amount of difference to you.[/quote]
Not quite - the benefits are more to do with the complete separation of the bass and treble parts of the crossover. Biwirable speakers are designed with a split crossover, in which the bit that filters off the treble from the connections to the bass driver, and the bit that stops bass going to the treble drive unit, are completely separate, rather than just being a single filter network.
For more clarification on the connections involved in biwiring/biamping, see the diagrams I posted in this thread.
Erm, not quite... that's biamping.
Biwiring involves twin runs of speaker cable from the amp to a speaker with twin sets of terminals on the rear. You remove a jumper bar between the two sets of terminals on the back of the speaker, and then one cable run feeds the high frequency section of the speaker, and the other the low frequency.
What happens back at the amp end then depends on your amp, but any amplifier is capable of supporting biwiring provided you can phyiscally get the two sets of cable ends into its terminals. So, at the crudest, you'd twist together the two sets of red wire ends from the two cables to your left speakers, and put them into the left red or plus output terminal on the amp. Repeat this with the two black ends.
Do the same for the right channel, and you're biwiring.
There are various ways to make this simpler. If your amp has Speaker A/B terminals, you could use the left channel A terminals for the high frequency cables, and the B for the low frequency, and so on.
Or you can buy stacking banana plugs allowing two plugs to go into one terminal, or special cables with four conductors, made up with two plugs at the amp end, and four at the speaker end.
[quote user="simon_soton"]
Some 7.1 amps provide optional bi-wiring of the front left and right speakers at the expense of the rear left and right channels (i.e. 5.1 with front bi-amping).
[/quote]
Ah no, now that is biamping, not biwiring, in which each drive unit in the speaker, or each section of the speaker, is driven by its own power amp.
You can do the same thing with some integrated stereo amps, which have preamp level outputs, and their matching power amps (or indeed with a preamp and a pair of stereo power amps).
But you can still biwire any speakers you want, even with amps with no specific provision of this kind.
[quote user="simon_soton"]Unless you have a pretty high end amp it is probably unlikely it supports bi-amping of the centre speaker.[/quote]
Don't know of many set-ups that do this, certainly not in an integrated AV receiver or amp. I have run a set-up with biamped left, centre and right speakers, but this was using the old TAG McLaren AV32R processor and its matching 100x5R:10 power amp, which has the tend channels you need to run a 7.1-channel system with three channels biamped.
[quote user="simon_soton"]Basically I wouldn't worry about it too much if your amp doesn't do bi-amping - you can happily use the centre speaker in its default mode - it will (probably) have been provided with a couple of metal bridges between the two pairs of inputs on the back of the speaker and the frequencies are then filtered out by a passive crossover within the speaker.[/quote]
Agreed, but you may find the sound is better if you take off those bridges or jumper links, and replace them with short pieces of the same cable you're using to wire your speakers to your amp.
[quote user="simon_soton"]This passive crossover filter "wastes" power, which is why bi-amping is better if you can manage it - but it probably won't make a huge amount of difference to you.[/quote]
Not quite - the benefits are more to do with the complete separation of the bass and treble parts of the crossover. Biwirable speakers are designed with a split crossover, in which the bit that filters off the treble from the connections to the bass driver, and the bit that stops bass going to the treble drive unit, are completely separate, rather than just being a single filter network.
For more clarification on the connections involved in biwiring/biamping, see the diagrams I posted in this thread.
[quote user="kacey68"]On setting up my morduant short 905i center speaker i saw a diagram in the manual that shows how to bi wire it. So I did but I have since been told that bi wiring means you need a 2nd amp so one feed for high freq comes from one amp and the other feed for low freq comes from the 2nd amp....... I am a bit confused as it does not show or explain this in the manual... Anyone know more[/quote]
Don't get Bi-wiring and Bi-amping mixed up as they are different. Just do search on the web and you will see.
Bi-wiring, as per your instructions just uses 2 sets of speaker cable or a specific bi-wire cable to run from the stereo output from your amp to the 4 inputs on each speaker (tweeter/woofer). This is supposed to give better clarity of sound (but i've tried it in the past and can't hear the difference).
Bi-amping on the other hand is exactly that. The same cable arrangement as per bi-wiring is used but now each driver in the speaker cabinet has its own amplifier. One stereo amp driving the woofer and one driving the tweeter. This arrangement (at least in most cases) will give you better sound.
However, to achieve bi-amping you either need a conventional stereo amp with a set of pre-amp outputs to connect to a second power amp or you need a processor/pre-amp sending the signal to a pair of stereo power amplifiers. (If you don't know what i mean by power amp....it is an amplifier without any inputs for cd/tape/tuner etc and the volume is controlled by the source amp/processor).
But like i said at the start, do a search and you will find the answers you seek (with pics probably)
.
EDIT: Beaten to it (I need to type quicker ).
EDIT: Ooops, most of what i said is more applicable to Hi-Fi but the basics are still the same.
Don't get Bi-wiring and Bi-amping mixed up as they are different. Just do search on the web and you will see.
Bi-wiring, as per your instructions just uses 2 sets of speaker cable or a specific bi-wire cable to run from the stereo output from your amp to the 4 inputs on each speaker (tweeter/woofer). This is supposed to give better clarity of sound (but i've tried it in the past and can't hear the difference).
Bi-amping on the other hand is exactly that. The same cable arrangement as per bi-wiring is used but now each driver in the speaker cabinet has its own amplifier. One stereo amp driving the woofer and one driving the tweeter. This arrangement (at least in most cases) will give you better sound.
However, to achieve bi-amping you either need a conventional stereo amp with a set of pre-amp outputs to connect to a second power amp or you need a processor/pre-amp sending the signal to a pair of stereo power amplifiers. (If you don't know what i mean by power amp....it is an amplifier without any inputs for cd/tape/tuner etc and the volume is controlled by the source amp/processor).
But like i said at the start, do a search and you will find the answers you seek (with pics probably)
EDIT: Beaten to it (I need to type quicker ).
EDIT: Ooops, most of what i said is more applicable to Hi-Fi but the basics are still the same.
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