[Boink!]

So as to keep the XTZ Speakers powerbuy thread clean.

Any XTZ owners, feel free to post.

[mscofield]

I'll be following this one. Had my very first audition with XTZ today, so ain't an owner of them yet.
Auditioned them against the Monitor Audio RX range. They really impressed me at the clarity, great lows and fantastic(!) stage width.

Will probably start with 99.26's in combination with a Marantz SR5005 and will expend later on into surround.

[MI55ION]

Nice one Boink.

Moonfly, (when you've found your way here) think i might just place an order for the Behringer A500 - a small price to pay for small gain if it works as i plan. If it doesn't then heck, at least I've tried something many audiophiles turn their nose up to before giving it a go.

[markymiles]

Originally Posted by mscofield

I'll be following this one. Had my very first audition with XTZ today, so ain't an owner of them yet.
Auditioned them against the Monitor Audio RX range. They really impressed me at the clarity, great lows and fantastic(!) stage width.

Will probably start with 99.26's in combination with a Marantz SR5005 and will expend later on into surround.

Very interested in the differences on these. How much better were the XTZ's than the RX's and which did you listen to. The RX's are my second choice.

The XTZ's are top of my list but the RX are a fair bit smaller and are more likely not to involve a battle with SWMBO.

[ti33er]

I'll be saying having owned both 99.26 and 99.36 models this past year, that the 99.36 definitely sound a bit fuller - my wife noticed this immediately when I swapped our 99.26 out with my friend's 99.36, and even if you only power the tweeter and mids units (i.e. disconnecting the bass speakers terminals), the bass then acts as a passive radiator...you can feel it vibrate if you hold your hand lightly against it.

The 99.26 are more less obtrusive by SWMBO, but the 99.36 sound better imo.

[newbie1980]

if they would make the matte black ones in the dimension of the shiny blacks, I'd own a pair by now

[Moonfly]

Originally Posted by MI55ION

Ok Moonfly, you've lost me a bit there but I'll try my best to address what it is I think you're trying to say. My apologies if I've misunderstood. Regarding the Onkyo 875, usually inside AVRs there are two main modes for two-channel source (they may have different names for them though):

In 'Direct mode' (2.0) all bass management and signal processing are disabled. The AVR will not split anything signal wise since there is no active crossovers involved. Internally the signal will go through the shortest path possible from internal DACs to the built-in pre/power stage ready to drive your speakers. The speakers will receive a full range signal. The speakers built in crossover carries out all necessary filters for crossover etc and splitting the signal to high/mid/low. In this mode the sub output of the AVR will be deactivated. This mode is normally used with external DAC or CD players.

In 'Stereo mode' (2.1) the signal will go through the DSPs, so for example if you have set your speakers to small, the lower frequencies from the crossover point will go to the subwoofer output whilst higher output will go to the speakers. Strictly speaking again there is no active crossover involved apart from the aforementioned sub-bass frequencies. As before the speakers built-in crossover will carry out its function of splitting the signal to high/mid/low. The subwoofer output will be active. In this mode if external CDP/DACs are used the signal is converted back from analogue to digital (defeats the purpose) for processing and then converted again to analogue by the AVRs DACs.



You can run a dedicated DAC with a 2 channel 'PCM' signal from virtually any digital source via spdif or USB e.g. PVR, DVD player, TV, ps3, laptop etc. The only thing to remember though is you can't use an external DAC and use the AVR's bass management at the same time because the AVR needs to be run using 'direct mode'.



Agreed.

That clears things up much better for me. The Bi amping aspect is something I have never really looked into besides the arguments for and against it. The practical application I havent really thought about when it comes to using an AVR. The big question for me, is should I stick to an Onyko amp, or not. Ive always been an advocate of not being able to tell the differences between 2 amps that are comfortably working to power the same speakers. Having to put my money where my mouth is no doubt an impending event

Originally Posted by KUBBY

The Powerbuy closed in June.

The discussion aspect of this thread has increased since then.

K.

Would it be worth cleaning that thread and moving some of the discussion posts here. I am happy for you to do that with my posts, or even delete them if you wish

Originally Posted by ti33er

I'll be saying having owned both 99.26 and 99.36 models this past year, that the 99.36 definitely sound a bit fuller - my wife noticed this immediately when I swapped our 99.26 out with my friend's 99.36, and even if you only power the tweeter and mids units (i.e. disconnecting the bass speakers terminals), the bass then acts as a passive radiator...you can feel it vibrate if you hold your hand lightly against it.

The 99.26 are more less obtrusive by SWMBO, but the 99.36 sound better imo.

The un-powered bass unit would act as a very poorly tuned passive radiator, and the results would be detrimental, if that was the case. Thats not an issue though, as the sections are divided and isolated internally so there is no way the bass driver can act as a pr. The vibration you can feel is just the driver moving in sympathy with the active drivers, but with enough reduction that it wont contribute to the overall sound in the room. It certainly wont be doing anything in the way of adding meaningful out in the lower bass frequencies.

Originally Posted by MI55ION

Nice one Boink.

Moonfly, (when you've found your way here) think i might just place an order for the Behringer A500 - a small price to pay for small gain if it works as i plan. If it doesn't then heck, at least I've tried something many audiophiles turn their nose up to before giving it a go.

As long as the financial implications are of no bother, then its worthwhile I think. I personally think you cant knock anything till youve tried it.

BK also do amp modules, they might be worth looking at and I would have thought they would be higher quality when it comes to HiFi, although that is purely speculation. The only problem with those is that they are raw unit, but getting a metal case made and powder coated would be pretty easy. It does give some things to consider though.

[XTZ]

Just a comment on disconnecting the lower woofer on a 99.36, it is a way of reducing bass output of course (if needed), but if you do - try shorting the bass woofern (obviously after having disconnected it from the mid- and tweeter input terminals). This way it becomes much more solid and helps absorb some energy. Could be useful if the room suffers from severe room modes.



/Rikard

[Boink!]

I see the 99.36 has three sets of terminals (tweeter, midrange, woofer), so what's the best way to bi-wire these speakers: one pair of cables to the woofer terminals, bridge the tweeter & midrange with the other pair of cables to the midrange?

[Moonfly]

Originally Posted by XTZ

Just a comment on disconnecting the lower woofer on a 99.36, it is a way of reducing bass output of course (if needed), but if you do - try shorting the bass woofern (obviously after having disconnected it from the mid- and tweeter input terminals). This way it becomes much more solid and helps absorb some energy. Could be useful if the room suffers from severe room modes.



/Rikard

For clarification, what is the correct way to do that?

[mscofield]

Originally Posted by markymiles

Very interested in the differences on these. How much better were the XTZ's than the RX's and which did you listen to. The RX's are my second choice.

The XTZ's are top of my list but the RX are a fair bit smaller and are more likely not to involve a battle with SWMBO.

Compared the 99.36+rx6 and 99.26+rx2.
+The low is much more in controll with xtz, the monitor audio's began to boink at high volumes.
+The soundstage is much better/wider with the xtz, thanks to the bandtweeter.

-The best finishing of product are the monitor audio ones though. So if that's really important..

[XTZ]

Originally Posted by Boink!

I see the 99.36 has three sets of terminals (tweeter, midrange, woofer), so what's the best way to bi-wire these speakers: one pair of cables to the woofer terminals, bridge the tweeter & midrange with the other pair of cables to the midrange?

Depends a bit on what amps are used, for example a tube amp might be more suitable to drive the tweeter, a mid power mosfet amp for the midrange and a high power transistor amp for the woofer. But if you intend to bi-amp using a AVR I would suggest mid- and tweeter to one channel and the woofer to another channel. Normally it wouldn´t matter to much as all amps are supplied from the same power supply, ie there might be a slight gain in terms of distorsion as the average load for each channel decreases, but in terms of power it won´t matter (for most AVRs). It´s about the same thing as filling up a bucket with water using one or two hoses, the bucket is still the same size. (hope that made sense in English )

Originally Posted by Moonfly

For clarification, what is the correct way to do that?

No correct way really, just another way to do it. Some users are happy with the woofer disconnected and some prefer it shorted. Check what sounds the best if the room turns out to be a disaster. Remember, this is almost never needed.

[Moonfly]

Originally Posted by XTZ

No correct way really, just another way to do it. Some users are happy with the woofer disconnected and some prefer it shorted. Check what sounds the best if the room turns out to be a disaster. Remember, this is almost never needed.

I mean, how do you go about shorting the woofer, if this is what you mean. Not sure exactly what it is you are describing here.

Originally Posted by XTZ

Depends a bit on what amps are used, for example a tube amp might be more suitable to drive the tweeter, a mid power mosfet amp for the midrange and a high power transistor amp for the woofer. But if you intend to bi-amp using a AVR I would suggest mid- and tweeter to one channel and the woofer to another channel. Normally it wouldn´t matter to much as all amps are supplied from the same power supply, ie there might be a slight gain in terms of distorsion as the average load for each channel decreases, but in terms of power it won´t matter (for most AVRs). It´s about the same thing as filling up a bucket with water using one or two hoses, the bucket is still the same size. (hope that made sense in English )

I agree with what you say here, and understand. I'm am unsure as to how exactly my AVF distributes its power, and whether sharing the power through 2 amp stages rather than through a single one would really make any real difference.

I think the idea of a separate amp just for the bass driver is interesting. I was looking at your line of amplifiers though, and pondering on the benefits of adding one to driver the front 2. Then I wandered if there would be any benefit of a pair of them to bi amp the front speakers, and any possible upgrades in the speakers down the road. The idea being I would get the best from the 99.36's now, but have the ability to do better speakers justice in a few years if I wanted. It would also open up the options for going pre-pro if I ever wanted to, but thats way down the road.

Do you think there would be any real benefit from trying to bi amp the 36 with a pair of A100's over a single one. How hard can the 36's be to drive really.

[XTZ]

Well, some clarification might be in place about shorting the bass woofer. This means, disconnect the two lower metal bridges so the woofer input terminals are "free". Then short them together with a piece of wire, or perhaps one of the bridges left over. Apply the signal only to the mid and tweeter inputs. This way, you end up with more or less a 99.26 with an "integrated stand". Could be useful if the room suffers from severe modes in the lower bass area.


About bi-amping, there is honestly not much of gains to be made this way, except if there are particular reasons to use a modified or processed signal to one or two of the drivers - woofer for example which can often benefit from being DSP corrected or at least EQd if the room is awkward. Just putting more amps in parallell driving separate drivers isn´t worth the hassle imho, unless you could bypass the passive crossover filters and use entirely active filtering of course.

The load conditions are perhaps somewhat improved, but not enough to justify the cost. And most amps can drive 99.36s very well, they don´t dip below 6 ohms and stay well within +-30 degrees of phase angle so they cannot be considered a tricky load. Even tube amps can cope with these figures. All the forum buzz about the need for amps with hundreds of Amps of current capacity is nothing more than buzz. Actually what you need is high voltage enough to make the speakers draw current as they are about 2 dB less sensitive than many others - a sacrifice to optimize for the lowest distorsion rather than the highest sound pressure. Not that you cannot play them loud....



/Rikard

[Moonfly]

Cheers Rikard, I figured this is what you meant by shorting, but wanted the calification

Given you used the A100 to drive the Divines, I figured they must be pretty good amps, and a single one should do the 36's justice. I am not worried about sensitivity, I am sure the will be plenty loud for my room and my normal listening levels. Lower sensitivity however, will likely mean these push my Onkyo a touch harder, and I will be moving from 3.1 to 5.1, meaning further power drain on the AVRs power supply. I havent needed to improve the amplification as things are now, but I predict the addition of these and the extra speaker load will make a new amp more beneficial.

One thing proving extremely attractive about the XTZ brand, is this forum support, giving the customers basically a permanent link to direct manufacturer support all the time, something very hard to get anywhere else. Most of the other manufacturers are indeed good, but the faith we put in you as an internet only supplier is repaid in other ways IMO. The 30 day free try before you buy, and this forum connection to continued support makes the XTZ's a more desirable option IMHO, to even dealership supported brands. A lot of these dealers arent even that knowledgeable, but your continued support is a reassurance that gives me a very positive feeling of security. Keep up the good work

One last question is on your amplifiers. My interest in them is based soley on 2 things. One is the fact you had enough faith in them to demo the devine using them, and the other is I am considering they offer the same VFM your speakers enjoy. I am not really considering anything other than these factors and without those probably wouldnt even look at your amps. Do they offer the same kind of VFM as the speakers, will they offer the kind of performance you only normally see in more expensive amps? All in your honest opinion of course.

[MI55ION]

Originally Posted by markymiles

Question aimed at mi55ion, having heard your prev setup with the 99.25's and the XXLS400's are you saying there is a huge improvement in just the 99.36's without the subs.

My mono sealed isn't a million miles away from a 400 so I was edging towards the 99.25's with that, when I've saved the money, but if you're saying the 99.36's are substantially better then I may consider saving a little longer.

Originally Posted by saguk1234

MI55ION,

Was there a massive improvement going from a 99.25 to the 99.36?

Please tell me you guys read my reply before it got deleted...

[Dazzor]

Good to see a dedicated owner's thread

I too am keen to know what others are driving their XTZ's with and to what effect.

As my sig suggests, I'm using a Yamaha Z7 for HT duties and with the aid of a Beresford TC-7220 amp/speaker switch my front-2 99.25's are also (and separately) driven by a Roksan Caspian for music....The Roksan to me really does make my 99.25's sing!


A bit like Moonfly, I'd like to hear from those who have moved from alternative amplification to the A100 and what thier thoughts are.....I guess I am mainly concerned with true stereo/musical performance.

Cheers
Darren

[Moonfly]

Originally Posted by MI55ION

Please tell me you guys read my reply before it got deleted...

Why on earth didnt they move them over here

Originally Posted by Dazzor

Good to see a dedicated owner's thread

I too am keen to know what others are driving their XTZ's with and to what effect.

As my sig suggests, I'm using a Yamaha Z7 for HT duties and with the aid of a Beresford TC-7220 amp/speaker switch my front-2 99.25's are driven by a Roksan Caspian for music....The Roksan to me really does make my 99.25's sing!


A bit like Moonfly, I'd like to hear from those who have moved from alternative amplification to the A100 and what thier thoughts are.....I guess I am mainly concerned with true stereo/musical performance.

Cheers
Darren

This is also specifically the area I am most interested in when it comes to adding an amp for the front pair. HT will will follow suit and be excellent anyway, IME, if the music is right, the films will be too.

[MI55ION]

Originally Posted by Moonfly

BK also do amp modules, they might be worth looking at and I would have thought they would be higher quality when it comes to HiFi, although that is purely speculation. The only problem with those is that they are raw unit, but getting a metal case made and powder coated would be pretty easy. It does give some things to consider though.

Problem with bk other than needing two modules (one for each channel) and what you've said already, I don't think they have balanced inputs. My stereo rig will soon be fully balanced. The A500 accommodates this. With regards to whether it's 'hifi' or not, I really think at such low frequncies as those covered by the bass driver it'll be practically impossible to tell apart. I would love to be proved wrong though.

[XTZ]

Originally Posted by Moonfly

Cheers Rikard, I figured this is what you meant by shorting, but wanted the calification

Given you used the A100 to drive the Divines, I figured they must be pretty good amps, and a single one should do the 36's justice. I am not worried about sensitivity, I am sure the will be plenty loud for my room and my normal listening levels. Lower sensitivity however, will likely mean these push my Onkyo a touch harder, and I will be moving from 3.1 to 5.1, meaning further power drain on the AVRs power supply. I havent needed to improve the amplification as things are now, but I predict the addition of these and the extra speaker load will make a new amp more beneficial.

One thing proving extremely attractive about the XTZ brand, is this forum support, giving the customers basically a permanent link to direct manufacturer support all the time, something very hard to get anywhere else. Most of the other manufacturers are indeed good, but the faith we put in you as an internet only supplier is repaid in other ways IMO. The 30 day free try before you buy, and this forum connection to continued support makes the XTZ's a more desirable option IMHO, to even dealership supported brands. A lot of these dealers arent even that knowledgeable, but your continued support is a reassurance that gives me a very positive feeling of security. Keep up the good work

One last question is on your amplifiers. My interest in them is based soley on 2 things. One is the fact you had enough faith in them to demo the devine using them, and the other is I am considering they offer the same VFM your speakers enjoy. I am not really considering anything other than these factors and without those probably wouldnt even look at your amps. Do they offer the same kind of VFM as the speakers, will they offer the kind of performance you only normally see in more expensive amps? All in your honest opinion of course.

Thanks a lot for your kind words! I´m almost embarrassed...

Naturally we are fully confident in demoing even the Divines using them, it would certainly look very odd if we had chosen something other than our own products. The Divines were developed using a D3 most of the time, so no problem there. The amps are developed much in the same way as our speakers, so they should theoretically offer the same VFM. It´s important not to go out and claim we make the best amps in the world, of course there are better amps available, but I do believe it will be extremely hard to find a better one for the same money. They are built using a combination of well dimensioned traditional amp technology together with some new twists such as the sliding bias class A configuration. No other fancy super hyped gimmicks really. I´m researching further steps that can possibly be the next level of improvements (such as feed forward error correction), but at this time I think we have done the best of the budget.



/Rikard

[Moonfly]

Originally Posted by MI55ION

Problem with bk other than needing two modules (one for each channel) and what you've said already, I don't think they have balanced inputs. My stereo rig will soon be fully balanced. The A500 accommodates this. With regards to whether it's 'hifi' or not, I really think at such low frequncies as those covered by the bass driver it'll be practically impossible to tell apart. I would love to be proved wrong though.

Its certainly the case for sub bass. It might be a little different in speakers, but only the trial will show you that.

Rikard, whats the crossover point from bass driver to mid bass on the 36's? Surely it cant be that high.

[MI55ION]

With regards to Rikard's view on bi-amping I would have to agree to a large extent. My P1's are driving the .36s comfortably, in fact I notice the power (db) goes up when all three drivers are fed suggesting an impedance drop from running just 2 (mid/treble) to all three (mid/treble/bass) drivers. The amp is capable of 175wpc continuous at 8ohms and 250wpc at 4ohms suggesting at 6ohms they'll be pushing out roughly 200wpc - perfect continuous power handling for these babies with plenty in reserve for the amp! The effect of bi-amping just the bass driver was subtle, perhaps imaginary as I didn't conduct any blind tests, it does leave me wondering though if another amp is necessary. Think I'll sit back and spend a little more time with these speakers before making any further decisions. Besides, waiting on a few other units to complete the system so for now think I'll just tinker with the bass/port tuning. Hate it when there's too much choice!

[MI55ION]

How to bi-wire three terminals? Here's how I have them wired currently. Since I see little or no point in using the terminal links the treble and mid terminals have been linked directly using the speaker cable whilst the bass has its own: (sorry about the rubbish pics, using phone camera)

[Boink!]

Thanks, that's a big help.

[xSequentialx]

Is there any sound advantages by using the speaker cable instead of the links they provide for connecting the trebble and mid?

[MI55ION]

In isolation probably not audible but im of the opinion the less interlinks in signal path the better, these small things all add up imo.

[XTZ]

Originally Posted by xSequentialx

Is there any sound advantages by using the speaker cable instead of the links they provide for connecting the trebble and mid?

None at all imo. There is no measurable difference between the metal bridges or that small lengths of speaker cable whatsoever. But if you are in doubt, just ask somebody to switch between them and perform a blind test on yourself.

However, there could be other advantages, cables might be easier to combine with other cables rather than the metal bridges just to make sure you get a good solid connection.



/Rikard

[ti33er]

I have done the exact same thing with my speaker cable - there is a long length of bare copper going through all three terminals (instead of using the supplied jumpers)

To SHORT the Bass driver on the speakers - simply take the supplied Gold Plated Jumpers, double them up (or just use one) and run them horizontally across the + and - terminals of the BASS driver (i.e. instead of them going vertically which usually connects the Bass to the Mid, which is the default) - so this isolates the last pair of terminals and shorts them together.

[MI55ION]

Originally Posted by XTZ

However, there could be other advantages, cables might be easier to combine with other cables rather than the metal bridges just to make sure you get a good solid connection.



/Rikard

That's precisely why I have used bare wire rather than the jumpers.

[Buckster]

interesting - I found on a Swedish forum - a load of pics of the 99.36 insides - actually looks rather good inside to me - although the wiring looks a bit "complex" - but some neat features for sure

Minhembio.com - Hemma hos Kent Johansson - Insidan av ett par 99.36:or..