170 amazing...better than 340?

Got my 170, 340, 170 fronts over a year ago, and combined with my old onkyo speakers for surrounds found the system satisfying

6 months later I got the upgrade bug and bought the 340s w/stands and the vtf3 mk2... despite the time gap DaveF still gave me a package deal, hope I‘m not opening a can of worms, thanks dave…as some of you know I tried to sneak these past my wife but no success, but she relented after my groveling

So I have been enjoying the new setup with all 340 fronts and 170s for surrounds, run by the Onkyo 701 using 12 gauge Home Depot wires, mains connected to a crown amp

Yesterday afternoon, because I had nothing better to do, I decided to plop the 170s on the 340s stands for mains again just for 2 channel use…listened to Norah Jones-Come Away with Me- album, then to Eva Cassidy-Songbird- album…WHOA!!! :)

Listened all afternoon and throughout the night till 2:00 am when wife came down and told me to go to bed
The 340s play louder but I LOVE the 170s more…the 170s have as much detail and presence without the ssss sound I hear from the 340s… don’t they have the same tweeters?

Kpt. Krunch, Eddie, Bikeman, Quinn, Curtis, Lee, anybody who switched the 340 to 170 or vice versa for mains

…tell me it aint so…

my wife tells me she can’t tell the difference but she is no audiophile

I haven't tried that yet. From listening to multichannel music, I can see where you are coming from though. Also, I belive the 340's play lower - but that could be the multichannel mix.

I'm afraid I can't help you, I started with 340's across the front.

This is interesting. I posted some time ago (a year or so) how on some music I liked the presentation of the 170's over the 340's. I think the rest of the forum assumed I got ahold of some bad booze. Don't get me wrong, the 340's will always be my mains, but as I've said before,those 170's really are amazing!

Randy

I think there may be a couple of reasons you like the 170's better....

1. The 340's are not quite as flat as the 170's, and were designed to be a bit more dynamic. You may prefer the ultra flat 170's.

2. Maybe the room has something to do with it. The 340's have a wider dispertion and "bigger" sound, which in turn may interact with the room more.

I've said it before, if someone took my 340's away and replaced them with 170's.....I wouldn't be very upset.

340 stands are too short for 170s. your best A/B would be to have the tweeters at the same height, or at least have 170s on taller stands.

it's not impossible to think that you like the 170s over the 340s. your first speaker was the 170, and you never forget your first love. :) i preferred the 170s over a $1499 floor stander.

340s perform better in my large room, but they do not do well in this room which is quite small. i bring the 170s in here pretty often to listen to stereo music. at the same rate, i don't listen to stereo in my large room w/ the 170s. maybe it's just the best of both worlds. i can listen to either one depending on what i want to do. afterall, it's all about user preference.

and, it's OK to LOVE your 170s. ;)

While I've never heard the 340's, I wouldn't trade my 170s for anything under $1900, unless it was to sell the higher priced speakers, replace my 170s, and buy a bunch of DVDs... :D

I think you need to get in touch with Dave and figure why you have sibilence on your 340s. I don't nor does Curtis as far as I know. I doubt metalaaron would be happy if he had siblence either.

I have some Eva Cassidy stuff.....I love her voice, but the recordings are not the best.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by metalaaron

340 stands are too short for 170s. your best A/B would be to have the tweeters at the same height, or at least have 170s on taller stands.

it's not impossible to think that you like the 170s over the 340s. your first speaker was the 170, and you never forget your first love. :) i preferred the 170s over a $1499 floor stander.

340s perform better in my large room, but they do not do well in this room which is quite small. i bring the 170s in here pretty often to listen to stereo music. at the same rate, i don't listen to stereo in my large room w/ the 170s. maybe it's just the best of both worlds. i can listen to either one depending on what i want to do. afterall, it's all about user preference.

and, it's OK to LOVE your 170s. ;)

---

the 170s with 340s stand are at ear level when i am slouch on the couch so maybe that is why they sound better

heh, heh, heh....metalaaron, you are right about first love, i played the field and i am back for now till DaveF can help me on the 340s

do you have any sort of auto-eq implemented, or treble/bass adjustments?

it's my understanding that sibilance is always reproduced. i believe there is such a thing as excessive sibilance, and even not enough sibilance. a good or bad source can also make a difference. ever talked to someone who has a very sharp S to their voice? (usually a female) but, there are females w/o a very sharp S to their voice as well. i believe the types of sibilance the 170 and 340 reproduce will be different because, they are different. i believe that with the 170 davef sat out to create a speaker that measured very well and focused on vocal clarity. you're simply hearing a very good piece of hard work that does sound different than the 340.

i owned a different brand of speaker over a year ago. the series has metallic dome tweeters. the sibilance and listener fatigue bothered me so much over time that i turned the whole system off, missed several NCAA games, and even returned a few movies. i always thought listener fatigue was a myth, but i will say that experiencing it is quite unenjoyable. i sold the speakers. so, i guess i could say that i'm in love with my Ascends because of their balanced response and ability to reproduce a natural sound.

now, call this coincidence while talking about audio, but i just finished my chinese food and my fortune cookie said, "Relaxing music helps to make the right decision." Wow, I'm gonna keep this one!

That was one of my thoughts that the 340 is revealing the sibilance.

I agree with Curtis on the quality of the Eva Cassidy stuff. I find some of it hard to listen to because of that.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by metalaaron

do you have any sort of auto-eq implemented, or treble/bass adjustments?

it's my understanding that sibilance is always reproduced. i believe there is such a thing as excessive sibilance, and even not enough sibilance. a good or bad source can also make a difference. ever talked to someone who has a very sharp S to their voice? (usually a female) but, there are females w/o a very sharp S to their voice as well. i believe the types of sibilance the 170 and 340 reproduce will be different because, they are different. i believe that with the 170 davef sat out to create a speaker that measured very well and focused on vocal clarity. you're simply hearing a very good piece of hard work that does sound different than the 340.

i owned a different brand of speaker over a year ago. the series has metallic dome tweeters. the sibilance and listener fatigue bothered me so much over time that i turned the whole system off, missed several NCAA games, and even returned a few movies. i always thought listener fatigue was a myth, but i will say that experiencing it is quite unenjoyable. i sold the speakers. so, i guess i could say that i'm in love with my Ascends because of their balanced response and ability to reproduce a natural sound.

now, call this coincidence while talking about audio, but i just finished my chinese food and my fortune cookie said, "Relaxing music helps to make the right decision." Wow, I'm gonna keep this one!

---

I do not know how to adjust the treble/bass on my onkyo 701 so I suppose sound is on direct mode?

I just replace the 340s with the 170s, that’s it…maybe I should move the speakers farther out from the tv instead of even… nevertheless, I’ll be experimenting

On a side note, I have the RS spl meter and test tones from my receiver to calibrate my speakers and sub. All I do is make sure all the speakers are at the same volume except my sub which is 3db hotter. Isn’t that enough?... I don’t want to be moving the sub from the left corner and equalize everything. I rented Avia from Blockbuster and it has been a month now and I still don’t know how to flatten the frequency. Is it worth doing it?


Music also relaxes me and hopefully i find the solution for the 340s. :)

rosa,

this should help you configure your 701.

http://63.148.251.135/redirect_servi...R701_601_E.pdf

"I don’t want to be moving the sub from the left corner and equalize everything."

That was my thinking initially but I went ahead and did it anyway and I am very glad I did. I now can't imagine a sub without EQ.

David

My 340 mains have never left their stands since coming to my house, but I will swap them and the 170 surrounds and see what happens. I will echo what bikeman said about the sub. After EQ'ing mine and getting it right, I can't see going back to the way it was.

Hi Rosa,

It is certainly OK to prefer the CBM-170 over the 340 main… :) both speakers were designed for specific purposes and what sounds best to you is purely subjective.

From a technical standpoint, the CMT-340 is superior… The CBM-170 uses a single high performance woofer while the 340 uses two. In any loudspeaker, distortion increases as output increases. Depending on how you look at it, the 340 has the capability to deliver either twice the output of the CBM-170 at the same distortion level, or close to half the distortion at the same output level.

The tweeter used in the CMT-340 is also technically superior, having lower distortion, a lower resonance frequency and extended high frequency response.

We actually post a very revealing graph on our website called the cumulative spectral decay. This is seldom understood, but still a highly important measurement. This is a measurement of a fast impulse consisting of thousands of frequencies ranging from 400Hz to 20Khz. What the graph reveals is what “noise” is left over once the initial impulse stops (in milliseconds). Notice on the 340 graph that there is very little (if any) artifacts left over after 1.92 ms past 2kHz (this is really amazing actually). On the CBM-170, there are artifacts between 2kHz and 5kHz almost reaching 3.5ms (about half that of the 340, which is still, quite good). Also you might notice more artifacts in the high frequency region as well..

http://www.ascendacoustics.com/image...40m/340mWF.gif
CMT-340 cumulative spectral decay

http://www.ascendacoustics.com/image...m170/170WF.gif
CBM-170 cumulative spectral decay

From a purely objective perspective, the 340 is a more transparent, more revealing speaker and I believe this is what you might be hearing… Sibilance is almost never produced by a loudspeaker (certainly not from a high performance product like the 340); instead the sibilance you are hearing is being reproduced more clearly from the 340 than the 170…

Sibilance can be a real pain to track down, but with some patience and logical troubleshooting procedures… the source can be found and resolved...

First off, we will need to know if you are hearing this on all sources or just some.

1. When listening to TV? Are you using cable or satellite?
2. Are you hearing sibilance when playing high quality CDs or just certain recordings?
3. Are you hearing it when playing DVDs?

These are the first steps needed to start the troubleshooting process and with your cooperation, we can resolve this. Since we will need to go back and forth on this, it is best if we handled this through email…

Substituting the 170 for the 340 so you no longer hear the sibilance is just masking it… it is still there, just not being reproduced as audibly.

Hope this helps!

...i was waiting on dave to reply. ;) this makes sense. while familiar with the first three graphs, a cumulative spectral decay graph has never really been translated. i certainly enjoy the data and descriptions here. this is great. :)

Wow!!

How many companies give you that kind of information?

Thanks Dave!!!

Quote:

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Originally Posted by davef

Hi Rosa,

It is certainly OK to prefer the CBM-170 over the 340 main… :) both speakers were designed for specific purposes and what sounds best to you is purely subjective.

From a technical standpoint, the CMT-340 is superior… The CBM-170 uses a single high performance woofer while the 340 uses two. In any loudspeaker, distortion increases as output increases. Depending on how you look at it, the 340 has the capability to deliver either twice the output of the CBM-170 at the same distortion level, or close to half the distortion at the same output level.

The tweeter used in the CMT-340 is also technically superior, having lower distortion, a lower resonance frequency and extended high frequency response.

We actually post a very revealing graph on our website called the cumulative spectral decay. This is seldom understood, but still a highly important measurement. This is a measurement of a fast impulse consisting of thousands of frequencies ranging from 400Hz to 20Khz. What the graph reveals is what “noise” is left over once the initial impulse stops (in milliseconds). Notice on the 340 graph that there is very little (if any) artifacts left over after 1.92 ms past 2kHz (this is really amazing actually). On the CBM-170, there are artifacts between 2kHz and 5kHz almost reaching 3.5ms (about half that of the 340, which is still, quite good). Also you might notice more artifacts in the high frequency region as well..

http://www.ascendacoustics.com/image...40m/340mWF.gif
CMT-340 cumulative spectral decay

http://www.ascendacoustics.com/image...m170/170WF.gif
CBM-170 cumulative spectral decay

From a purely objective perspective, the 340 is a more transparent, more revealing speaker and I believe this is what you might be hearing… Sibilance is almost never produced by a loudspeaker (certainly not from a high performance product like the 340); instead the sibilance you are hearing is being reproduced more clearly from the 340 than the 170…

Sibilance can be a real pain to track down, but with some patience and logical troubleshooting procedures… the source can be found and resolved...

First off, we will need to know if you are hearing this on all sources or just some.

1. When listening to TV? Are you using cable or satellite?
2. Are you hearing sibilance when playing high quality CDs or just certain recordings?
3. Are you hearing it when playing DVDs?

These are the first steps needed to start the troubleshooting process and with your cooperation, we can resolve this. Since we will need to go back and forth on this, it is best if we handled this through email…

Substituting the 170 for the 340 so you no longer hear the sibilance is just masking it… it is still there, just not being reproduced as audibly.

Hope this helps!

---

David,

Thank you very much for posting that-even I can understand those graphs now!! Very much appreciated.

Randy

that was a great detailed reply dave, thank you!!!! :))

i'll be emailing you

Hey Dave, I noticed the Y-Axis "dB" units begin at different points. Is there a reason for this?

Oh, and are both of these speakers being fed the same amount of power?

I'm really curious about the 340 tweeter, I'd love to compare it to the one on my 170s.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Nicholas Mosher

Hey Dave, I noticed the Y-Axis "dB" units begin at different points. Is there a reason for this?

Oh, and are both of these speakers being fed the same amount of power?

---

Hi Nicholas,

Excellent questions... You will notice on the graphs that the dB "scale" is the same... The amount of power fed to each speaker doesn't matter as this graph is time based and the results are normalized. No matter how much power I feed the speaker (up until compression begins) the results would be the same. The measurement equipment will automatically set the range of the dB axis so that the fundamental (the initial response) will fit inside the window. The fundamental is the first "slice" you see at 0 ms. Keep in mind that the CMT-340 is about 3dB more efficient than the CBM-170.

Hope this helps.

I have been exchanging email with Davef and he suggested that I swap one of the mains with the center to see if my center is defective. Here is my last email.



Dear Dave,

I swapped one of the 340 mains with the center and
found that the sound is the same. I think that all
340s are okay and what I have been hearing as
sibilance is due to a bad recording or source and
excessive volume.

I like the 340s, but if my house is burning down given
a sophie's choice, I'll go back in and take the 170s
before the 340s since they are lighter. :)

I'll let you know if I find anything else. Thank you
for your help.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by rosa

I like the 340s, but if my house is burning down given
a sophie's choice, I'll go back in and take the 170s
before the 340s since they are lighter.

---

This cracked me up!! :D Rosa likes his 170's... and there's not a thing wrong with that!! :D

Randy

not to sound like a broken record, but i've had my 170 mains for about 3 months now and i remembered reading somewhere someone listened to 2-ch music and the soundstage is excellent that the voice was coming from the middle. so i turned off my 340c and my 200 surrounds, popped in norah jones last night and sure enough, her voice is coming smack down the middle where the 340 is!!! i pulled my wife from the other room and she usually doesn't have ears for these things, and i asked her where the sound was coming from, and she said the same thing...omg. outstanding performance and value, 2 thumbs way up dave f & james!!! the 170s still surprise me