Biamping Tannoy XT6F with Audiolab 6000a and XTZ A2-300 - doable?

[Medazner]

Hi folks, I was thinking of bi-amping my tannoy XT6F speakers with my Audiolab 6000a driving the LF terminals in pre/pwr mode while the XTZ power amp drives the HF terminals (or vice versa depending on how they sound) - can you forsee any problems with this? Do class A/B and D play well together? What about the difference in power output of the amps (50w vs 150w)? Do these speakers have crossover circuitry that will cause problems? Any thoughts or advice much appreciated!
Cheers,
Medazner / Steve

 

[Ugg10]

I don’t see too much issue with that, remember to remove the jumper bar from the speaker terminals first though. Typically the class D would be used for the woofer and the AB for the tweeters so, I would start it that way as the tweeter is likely to have a lower power handling limit than the woofer. Only thing to watch out for is whether they have different gains when using different manufacture amps but luckily the Audiolab is quoted as 29dB and ASR measured the XTZ at 28.7dB so looks like you are good to go.

Do let us know how it turns out, may be worth doing a comparison between Audiolab only, Audiolab as Pre and XTZ as power, and then Biamped. After each change worth minimising the volume knob to make sure you don’t get a loud noise and ideally any comparison listening should be at the same volume (use a free phone spl app, don’t rely on the volume readout as this will be different for each setup).

 

[Medazner]

Thank you for your reply Ugg! Well I tried what you suggested, 6000a driving the HF and the XTZ driving the LF, jumpers removed. Fortunately the gain control on the XTZ seems to match the Audiolab when turned on max. The strange thing is that when I switch the amp onto "Pre Pwr" or even just "Pre" I get a very muffled, lowfi output across both HF and LF drivers but if I leave it in "Integrated" then it's as clear as a bell on both HF and LF drivers. Is my amp knackered or something or is maybe the XT6F internal crossover to blame? Also I get one hell of an earth din if I have the Audiolab off and just the XTZ on - is that some kind of grounding issue?
Reading the manual it does seem that Integrated is the correct setting for biamping but I just assumed that the Pre out would always send some kind of respectable signal no matter what?
Having said that I have to say biamping in Integrated mode it does sound very good...a little warmer than pure XTZ and a little more punchy and defined than pure Audiolab! And it's nice to be able to roll off a little bass to be neighbour friendly using the XTZ's gain trim!
Feeling the need to try XTZ on HF duties next and Audiolab running the LF...I did love the detail of the XTZ but the bass was just a bit dry but very well controlled...I'm thinking the Audiolab might warm things up a bit here! I'm only using the bluetooth connection to play FLAC from my PC so that will definitely have it's limitations...wondering what the 8300CDQ with 2x Class D monoblocks might sound! Hmmm...

 

[Ugg10]

On pre-out you need to remove the cables from the audiolab and put the jumpers back in so the XTZ is driving both low and high speaker elements which may be why it sounded muffled (no signal to tweeters). So I think you options are -

INT > jumpers in > cables from Audiolab to speakers only
INT > Jumpers out > Audiolab preout to XTZ using RCA cable > speaker cables from audiolab to HF and XTZ to LF - This is bi-amping.
PRE > Jumper in > Audiolab preout to XTZ using RCA cable > cables from XTZ to speakers only

 

[Medazner]

Gotcha, that makes sense. Yep so currently running:
INT > Jumpers out > Audiolab preout to XTZ using RCA cable > speaker cables from audiolab to HF and XTZ to LF - This is bi-amping.
and it sounds very good!
Tried swapping duties around, exactly the same setup as above but instead with Audiolab > LF and XTZ > HF and we were back to lowfi fartiness? How weird...is that something to do with the disparate power ratings of each amplifier? In my mind I should be getting the clarity and almost holographic top/midrange from the XTZ and the warmer bass of the Audiolab but no...LO-FA!