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Thread: 200s vs. 170s vs. 340s

  1. #21
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    I also have a thing for sealed speakers. Ports blow. (get it?)

    However, I'm not going to give any "free pass" to the HTM-200 because they are smaller and sealed. If I don't like 'em they are going back. I very much doubt this will be the case.

    They use the same tweeter as the 170s, and TWO 4" woofers, as Quinn pointed out. With the 120+ watts per channel my amp puts out, I don't see me exceeding the dynamic range of these things anytime soon. Especially in my tiny room.

    - Member #001 of "HTM-200 doesn't get no respect" Internet Fan Boy Club

  2. #22
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    Quote Originally Posted by bikeman
    Thanks, Quinn. I'm going with the 200's because they'll fit my existing stands and they're more portable than the 170's. When not in use, my surrounds have to be move to a less trafficed area. If this were strickly my house, I'd use 170's as surrounds and just not use the downstairs closet on one side and bookshelf on the other. But SWMBO says otherwise so we compromise. I get my speakers and I keep em outta da way when not in use.

    David
    SWMBO told me the 200s were too big(!). I told her, "tough, that's the smallest speaker I'll get!"
    *I* wear the pants around here! (looking over my shoulder)

  3. #23
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    Default Let the games Begin!

    Over the next two weeks, I will be trying out (A/Bing, extended listening, set to small, large and in between, etc. etc) a few different bookshelf speakers.

    I hope by the end of it to have a pretty good set of small bookself speakers that, combined with a subwoofer, will play great music, and great home theater.

    The Players:

    Ascend HTM-200s About $280 a pair. Use a 1" soft dome tweeter and two 4" polypropylene woofers. Have a set of binding posts on the back, and threaded inserts for popular wall mounts. Dimensions: 11" H x 6.5" W x 6.375" D. Their listed "shipping weight" is 19lbs a pair. I don't know what they really weigh. Probably 7-8lbs each These are the only sealed speakers I am testing.

    Polk Audio Monitor 30s Found these at Circuit City. $200 a pair. Oddly, they have a two sets of binding posts, and crossover capable of bi-amping, just like Ascend CMT-340s. Odd feature on a speaker this price. They have a 1" Fabric/Polymer dome tweeter, and a 5 1/4-inch "Bi-Laminate Composite Driver". They have hole & slot type metal hangers on the back at the top, and rubber feet at the bottom to hold the speaker about half an inch from the wall when hung. They have a port on the back. The dimensions are: 11" H x 7" W x 8-3/8" D and they weigh 9 lbs each.

    JBL Northridge E20s From Best Buy. $250 a pair. 2 binding posts in back. Use a 3/4" Titanium laminate dome, and a 5" PolyPlas driver. There is a port in the back. These are 10-7/8ths" H x 6" W x 8 x 1/8" D. They are 7lbs each. The smallest frontal area of the three, and they weigh the least.

    And just for the heck of it:

    The TV speakers The are the little speakers built into the 32" Panasonic. I've been using these for awhile. They have been loyal, so I had to give them a chance. They are small, and built into the bottom of the TV. That's all I know.

    Cambridge Soundworks Cubes These came with a PC 2.1 system. They are single, B*se-sized cubes. These would look great and satisfy WAF easily, so I have to test them. Something like this was once at the top of my list, but after reading internet forums, I've realized that these probably won't cut it, even with a sub backing them up.

    Also-rans: I listened to some Athenas and Klipshes at Best Buy, but they didn't make the cut. The Athenas sounded tinny, and the Klipshes had *fantastic* vocals with that horn, that unfortunately totally overwhelmed any other sound they were trying to make. I also tryed the JBL Northridge E10s, which are a sealed, wall-hanging speaker. They sounded really different than the E20s. Tinny midrange. If I was making a JBL surround setup, I would use all E20s, and skip the E10s.
    Last edited by S_rangeBrew; 02-20-2005 at 03:52 PM.

  4. #24
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    Should be interesting and fun!
    -curtis

  5. #25
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    Default Round 1: Culling the herd.

    I got all the speakers home (except for the Ascends, which will get here in a week). The JBLs and the Polks were nicely packed, and had no visible damage when removed. The manuals in the boxes are skimpy and tell you pretty much nothing. (The Polk manual tells you to go to their website if you need more information. I did, and the Polk website is nicely done and quite informative)

    The first thing I did is unscrew the binding posts/crossover networks from the cabinets to see what was going on inside.

    The Polk Monitor 30 has a crossover that is pretty big and has quite a few more components on it than the JBL Northridge E20 x-over. The reason for this seems to be the fact it has 2 sets of binding posts and is bi-ampable. Other than that, both are very similar in their construction. The JBL x-over uses "JBL" capacitors. Horray for vertical integration. Both have lots of Poly-Fill inside. The port on the JBL is plastic, and smooth on both ends. The Polk one is plastic on the outside, with a cardboard extension inside.

    Now it was time to hook them all up. I first tried the TV speakers, the Cambridge Soundworks cubes, and the JBLs. The TV speakers made a good effort, but just couldn't hack it. The cubes were worse. They sounded ok up high, but that was it. It seemed they were even smaller than the TV speakers when it came to the lower ranges. Remember, I have the crossover set at 80hz. It was an easy choice. I turned off the TV speakers and hooked the Polks up in place of the cubes. It was time to do some A/B switching between the Polks and the JBLs.

    First CD is The Traveling Wilburys Vol. 1 This has a bunch of different instruments, so there is a lot you can try and pick out. Pretty mellow stuff for the most part. The first thing I noticed is that the Polk played louder in the high end with the same amount of power. (In other words, when switching, I often had to turn the JBLs up, and the Polks down) I also noticed the JBL had a more emphasized low end. A real difference, but I wasn't sure which I liked better. There was some metallic percussion being played (triangles?) that stood out more with the Polks, and was more subtle with the JBLs. Neither any better or worse with this CD, just different.

    The second CD: Sade - Love Deluxe You really have to be careful when playing this CD, as this artists sultry voice can be offically termed "music to shag to" That out of the way, this is a good CD with which to pick out what you like about a speaker. I know what I want Sade to sound like. Sexy. Whatever make her sound sexier... wins. This contest was easily won by the JBLs. The vocals were smoother, more "smokey" when played on them. The Polks were sharper, harsher. Not as sexy. I wanted Sade to smoke a pack after hearing the Polks. *I* wanted to smoke a pack after listening to her on the JBLs. The low end was still a little to boomy on the JBLs, but they won this round.

    At this point, I'm going to just let these speakers break in for a couple of days, and then come back to them. I don't know if I believe in speaker break-in, but I've heard people a lot more knowlegeable than me say it happens. We shall see.

    Thank you for letting me ramble here. I really enjoy reading other peoples speaker comparisons, so I feel I must make a modest effort myself.
    Last edited by S_rangeBrew; 02-20-2005 at 09:02 PM.

  6. #26
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    Question Brew. Are you using the receiver's A/B output terminals for this? On my receivers (Kenwood, Onkyo, JVC & Yamaha), there is a big difference between the the two outputs. The difference is so large that I wouldn't be able to use them for comparison purposes. All my receivers are on the low end of mid-fi. One of the ways these manufactures keep the cost down is to cheapen the "B" outputs. I don't know if your receiver suffers the same shortcoming.
    Thanks for taking the time to do this.

    David

  7. #27
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    Quote Originally Posted by bikeman
    Question Brew. Are you using the receiver's A/B output terminals for this? On my receivers (Kenwood, Onkyo, JVC & Yamaha), there is a big difference between the the two outputs. The difference is so large that I wouldn't be able to use them for comparison purposes. All my receivers are on the low end of mid-fi. One of the ways these manufactures keep the cost down is to cheapen the "B" outputs. I don't know if your receiver suffers the same shortcoming.
    Thanks for taking the time to do this.

    David
    Hi David, yes I am using the AB terminals on my Pioneer 1014tx to do this. I was planning on swapping them like you suggest, but it was not high on my list of things to do. Now it will be. I'm very suprised you noticed a change. Every reciever I've opened up uses the same opamps, connectors, etc for the A and B channels. It's simple, solid state electronics. The 1014 doesn't really have a "B" channel, you can just reassign the rear surrounds to that duty in the setup. So they should be the same quality as the real "A"'s, in theory. I guess I'll find out.

  8. #28
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    The other thing when comparing like this is using a sound meter to level match. If one speaker is a touch louder or softer it can effect your perception of its performance.

  9. #29
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    Quote Originally Posted by Quinn
    The other thing when comparing like this is using a sound meter to level match. If one speaker is a touch louder or softer it can effect your perception of its performance.
    The JBLs are 86db sensitivity vs. 89db for the Polks. I can confirm they don't pull these specs out of nowhere, as the Polks *are* noticeably louder. However, the differences I am noting are independent of volume levels, for the most part. For instance, the JBLs have a slightly more exaggerated bottom end. When I switch from the Polks to the JBLs, the high end gets quieter, but the bass actually gets a little louder. It's a bit annoying, but at this point, I guess I'm picking the least annoying speaker. I really hope the HTM-200s make things easy for me by being fantastic. Although after finding out I can buy the JBLs online for $60 each, the HTMs are gonna have to be pretty darn good!

  10. #30
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    I got the HTM-200 pair and have been listening to them for a couple of nights. They are very "clear" compared to the JBL E20s. The E20s sound like they have a cloth over them in comparison.

    However, when I listen to the JBLs, most of the sound comes from in between them. I guess you would say, from the middle of the soundstage. With the HTM-200s, some things (like vocals) come from the middle, but with other sounds, it is very easy to tell which speaker they are coming from. I don't know if I like that right now.

    Also, even though I have the crossover set at 80hz, when I use the JBLs, they have more bass than the HTM-200s. Once again, I'm not sure what I like better, and will need to play with the subwoofer level to see.

    Right now, the build quality and clear sound of the Ascends makes me prefer them over the JBLs, but the imaging and bass issues need to be resolved. Hopefully some setup tweaks will do this.

    Anyway, lots of fun. I'll be listening to them a lot more over the next couple of days.

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