Tip for people using bi-wiring

[Suedkiez (Just a fellow user like you)]

@Peter_Sabbagh

Does it make sense to use the switch configuration as mono mode and bi-amp mode as long as i have twin cables already running to the speakers?

Only if you have two amps.

When using one amp bi-wired:

[ffk (Doctors Practice. Plumbers Perform.)]

@Suedkiez

though I’d still simply buy one better amp rather than two worse ones

Or 2 better ones and use the extra posts.

[Suedkiez (Just a fellow user like you)]

Instead of 2 better ones you can still buy one even better amp. It only makes sense to compare for a fixed overall cost

[ffk (Doctors Practice. Plumbers Perform.)]

Agreed, but more looks good on the shelf… especially if you get ones with the McIntosh glow.

[Suedkiez (Just a fellow user like you)]

@ffk

more looks good on the shelf

Being a Naim customer, I am not lacking in this department

[Boris_Molodyi]

@Peter_Sabbagh

Does it make sense to use the switch configuration as mono mode and bi-amp mode as long as i have twin cables

But do you? With bi-wiring you have one cable running from a single post on the amplifier, it just happens to be split at the speaker end. If you’d want to bi-amp your speakers, you need 4 channels of amplification.

Also, while straight bi-amping might make some difference if e.g. your amp were running out of power driving both bass and treble, this is probably not the case with a 200W 851, unless you are trying to run your neighbors out of town.

To get the whole “only treble flows through the cable connected to HF posts” thing, you need to have an external crossover. That’s crossing properly for your specific speakers. If you have an M9, or a higher-end Legacy or something like that, then it makes sense (is required really), but they give you a matched processor for it with the speakers anyway.

Sure, you can, if you really want to, but you would need at least one more stereo power amplifier (or, if you want to get adventurous, you could run HF signal through your 851, and LF through a pair something like D’Agostino monoblocks or some other combination), and use MiniDSP or some other crossover to split the signal into HF and LF portions.

To me it seems like a bit too much effort and expense to go to just because speakers have bi-wire posts on them.

@Graeme_Finlayson

I think this is the crux of it. Two sets of cables and an opportunity to upsell you a more expensive cable too.

Well, the first thing AudioQuest is doing after buying Goldenear is adding bi-wire posts to the top o the line series, so there’s that

[Peter_Sabbagh]

This is excatly how my system is wired, and i am using 2 pairs of relatively high quality wires. So it’s 4 poles to 4 poles right and left.

[Bill_Janssen (Wigwam wool socks now on asymmetrical isolation feet!)]

@Boris_Molodyi

To get the whole “only treble flows through the cable connected to HF posts” thing, you need to have an external crossover. That’s crossing properly for your specific speakers.

I think this sums it all up. Don’t see the point of buying expensive speakers with a presumably well-designed built-in crossover, and then subverting it. I’d think one would need serious skills and experience in systems integration and audio design to get this right. I sure couldn’t do it.

[Graeme_Finlayson (The Mad Scientist)]

@Boris_Molodyi

Well, the first thing AudioQuest is doing after buying Goldenear is adding bi-wire posts to the top o the line series, so there’s that

No surprise there, then. AudioQuest making more money by selling twice as many cables…

[Suedkiez (Just a fellow user like you)]

@Bill_Janssen

I think this sums it all up. Don’t see the point of buying expensive speakers with a presumably well-defined built-in crossover, and then subverting it. I’d think one would need serious skills and experience in systems integration and audio design to get this right. I sure couldn’t do it.

The only reason would be with speakers built for it / their designers supporting it and publishing specs for active crossover settings. Like the Naim of old with their own speakers or now Kudos and some others. And even then, it has become increasingly questionable with progress in design of amps and passive crossovers. If money is no object, it may make sense.

[Bill_Janssen (Wigwam wool socks now on asymmetrical isolation feet!)]

There are a number of speakers with variable internal crossovers, usually just two or three different settings, aren’t there?

[Suedkiez (Just a fellow user like you)]

I dunno, probably. I was referring to removing / bypassing internal crossovers and using an active crossover followed by separate power amps

[Bill_Janssen (Wigwam wool socks now on asymmetrical isolation feet!)]

Yeah, I know, I was just thinking out loud.

[Graeme_Finlayson (The Mad Scientist)]

Damn, after an extended period of good behaviour, I got flagged again. Not sure why it was flagged as “off-topic” - a cable company buying a speaker company and adding bi-wiring binding posts isn’t off-topic IMHO, but obviously a couple of fans didn’t like my brand of honesty.

[Boris_Molodyi]

@Peter_Sabbagh

This is excatly how my system is wired, and i am using 2 pairs of relatively high quality wires. So it’s 4 poles to 4 poles right and left.

So CA does it in a somewhat confusing manner, making it almost look like you are bi-amping your speakers. But it is still a stereo amplifier, with only two channel, output to each side’s terminals is the same, and the same as it is to the single pair when you’re not using the second pair of wires. At least you get double the contact area for wire terminators, so your resistance is lower, but that should be the only effect…

@Graeme_Finlayson

No surprise there, then.

That’s the entire business model.

@Suedkiez

The only reason would be with speakers built for it / their designers supporting it and publishing specs for active crossover settings.

Yup. Or supplying the external crossover. For that matter, that’s what all good active speakers do, they just hide the entire shebang inside the cabinet.

@Suedkiez

I dunno, probably. I was referring to removing / bypassing internal crossovers and using an active crossover followed by separate power amps

I think e.g. Tannoy’s have switches to adjust something. One pir of my M&K’s has two pairs of binding posts, but instead of bein for bi-wiring, which terminal you use controls whether you use the higj-pass filter, and whether you get normal or maximum output. Active crossover with separate power amps, that’s what all good digital active spekers do.

[David_Gibson]

CA advertises the 851W as follows: “The 851W can be used in stereo, bi-amped or bridged mono configurations.” That suggests there may be some sort of internal crossover to at least separate the signal into “high” and “low”. Not sure how this would provide any improvement in SQ. If this is not the case, then their advertising is completely false and all they’re doing is bi-wiring which is not the same thing at all.

[WiWavelength (Andrew J Shepherd)]

@David_Gibson

That suggests there may be some sort of internal crossover to at least separate the signal into “high” and “low”. Not sure how this would provide any improvement in SQ. If this is not the case, then their advertising is completely false and all they’re doing is bi-wiring which is not the same thing at all.

Think about it. A two channel amp cannot use a hypothetical internal crossover to separate HF and LF terminals for both L and R channels because that immediately would become four channels.

AJ

[Suedkiez (Just a fellow user like you)]

@David_Gibson

That suggests there may be some sort of internal crossover to at least separate the signal into “high” and “low”

No it doesn’t. If there was an internal crossover, the amp would need to have adjustment options because every speaker needs different crossover points and fall-off slopes. And as @WiWavelength wrote, it would need 4 channels.

The pictures just show how to connect the amp in the various configs so that people don’t make mistakes setting them up if they follow the description. When bi-wiring, one amp output has to go to HF wires and one to LF wires either way, but the separation is done in the speaker’s crossover. It would not make much sense to have two different pictures for connecting them one way or the other in the bi-wiring case.

[Boris_Molodyi]

@David_Gibson

CA advertises the 851W as follows: “The 851W can be used in stereo, bi-amped or bridged mono configurations.”

Sure it can. You buy two 815’, and you can bi-amp to you heart’s content (assuming you want stereo). Of course you can also do it with any other amp as well…

If there were an internal crossover, there would also have to be separate power amplifiers for HF and LF, so it wouold be a 4 channel amplifier, not a stereo one. And of course you’d also expect to have some information abut the crossover in the manual – no matter how it is set up, it’d make things significantly worse for most speakers out there. And at the bare minimum you’d expect output terminals to be marked HF and LF.

[Bill_Janssen (Wigwam wool socks now on asymmetrical isolation feet!)]

@Boris_Molodyi

If there were an internal crossover, there would also have to be separate power amplifiers for HF and LF, so it wouold be a 4 channel amplifier, not a stereo one.

Not sure I understand this. Couldn’t there be two internal crossovers, one for each channel, each driven by its own internal power amp channel?

@Boris_Molodyi

And of course you’d also expect to have some information abut the crossover in the manual – no matter how it is set up, it’d make things significantly worse for most speakers out there.

Yes.

@Boris_Molodyi

And at the bare minimum you’d expect output terminals to be marked HF and LF.

Also, yes.