The Tower Discussion Thread!

[pierreterrier]

Dave said he had the Towers as close to 6 inches from the rear wall with excellent results. I have mine about 7 to 8 inches from rear wall at the required angle to aim them at the center listening position in a stereo setup, so the port holes don't actually bounce directly off the back wall, and the result is nothing short of spectacular, specially for the bass as Jonathan mentions. If you don't like bass and have to have the speakers that close you may want to use the plugs. I don't, the bass is so much better for me without them. All a matter of listening preferences but Towers 1/2 foot from rear wall present no problem at all.

[dazler]

Thanks, the more feedback the better.
I asked cause I read some rear ported speaker need a absolute minimum space from the wall.
My search for speakers have ended :-)

[steelbolz]

Hi Steelbolz,

Well this is a first but with the way shippers have been handling packages lately, I would not be surprised if something in the speaker is not quite right. Although, the fact that the speakers are functioning and sounding good makes this even more bizarre.

If it is not too much trouble, I want to arrange to get that speaker back for thorough evaluation. I will contact you by email...

Dave is replacing my satin espresso towers with a new pair in the natural finish at no extra cost! Thanks, Dave. No wonder Bruce said you always come through!

[sesquipedalian]

Okay. I am working on potentially setting up a second dedicated 2-channel listening area (more or less). I would be moving my RAAL towers to that room. However, space is a problem and acoustics are challenging as my listening area would be butted against the back wall. I'd like to move the listening area forward a foot or two if possible and put GIK acoustic panels/bass traps on the back wall.

My question is, what is the minimum distance that one could sit from the towers and still experience all that great tower sound? In other words, how "near-field" can the towers be? My current position would be about 7 feet from the speakers but closer if moved. Alternatively, would the Sierra-2s work better in such intimate proximity?

[Sam1000]

Customer feedback from the forthcoming Sierra-2 will steer us towards any possible changes to the towers. That said, the feedback we receive from the towers is still overwhelming and the customer satisfaction rate remains at an unbelievable high -- higher than any other product we offer.

Happy new year all. Hope the new year will be another blockbuster year for Ascend and it's customers.

I was wondering if swapping of the new woofers along with possible crossover can make a big difference in case of towers with RAAL? Since towers already have a dedicated Mid driver in a sealed enclosure, it will be difficult to trump that with a new driver. However, with more radiating area for the bottom drivers, can the Towers be even more open and dynamic?
PS - I'm enjoying the towers with 2Ch. music, however, there's always an itch to see if I can buy a new and better speaker for the price of an upgrade :-)

[RicardoJoa]

Happy new year all. Hope the new year will be another blockbuster year for Ascend and it's customers.

I was wondering if swapping of the new woofers along with possible crossover can make a big difference in case of towers with RAAL? Since towers already have a dedicated Mid driver in a sealed enclosure, it will be difficult to trump that with a new driver. However, with more radiating area for the bottom drivers, can the Towers be even more open and dynamic?
PS - I'm enjoying the towers with 2Ch. music, however, there's always an itch to see if I can buy a new and better speaker for the price of an upgrade :-)

That sounds like a great idea. How about getting the tower on steroids? For example, a MTM top with 4 bass drivers. Of course the cabinets will have to be much larger. Not sure if the rall would have enogh sensitivity tough.

[tme110]

It seems like a lot of people who use Ascend speakers also use Emotiva amps so I have a question for here that I specifically didn't want to post at Emotiva. I have towers, horizon and seirra-2's all powered by a XPA-5 and everything is pretty amazing. Even people who work for Emotiva have stated that they think the XPA-1's (and xpa-1L) are their favorite amps and even compare them to the reference series. I'm wondering if there would be a noticeable change to power my towers with the XPA-1L? This would allow be to have a fully balanced audio chain from source to amp too.

I am familiar with the my system/my ears/my room issue with how changes are different to different people but still wanted to ask. The change from my old AVR to using my XPA-5 was pretty significant.

[SpeedD408]

tme110,

I to have an Emotive amp (granted mine is an old MPS-2) and I am saving for your Ascend setup /w RAAL's and I think about upgrading my amp about every 4-6 months. I've decided to wait until I get the speakers. However, then I will be in your boat. I'm thinking there will be a measurable difference in sound quality with the update amps as the .pdf files on the bottom of each amp page shows the THD per watt and per frequency and the XPA-1(L) look great. The XPA-5 seems to have differences per channel. So if you had test equipment I'm sure they would measure better with the XPA-1's I'm just not sure you would hear the difference. I guess it all depends on the type of audio you are listening to (MP3, CD, SCAD, HT, etc) and how hard you want to push them. I'm thinking I'll upgrade to the XPA-1's for the L/C/R and keep my MPS-2 for the surrounds. You could do the same.

[natetg57]

I'm wondering if there would be a noticeable change to power my towers with the XPA-1L? This would allow be to have a fully balanced audio chain from source to amp too.

I would call Emotiva.

[davef]

Happy new year all. Hope the new year will be another blockbuster year for Ascend and it's customers.

I was wondering if swapping of the new woofers along with possible crossover can make a big difference in case of towers with RAAL? Since towers already have a dedicated Mid driver in a sealed enclosure, it will be difficult to trump that with a new driver. However, with more radiating area for the bottom drivers, can the Towers be even more open and dynamic?
PS - I'm enjoying the towers with 2Ch. music, however, there's always an itch to see if I can buy a new and better speaker for the price of an upgrade :-)

The bass woofers on the Sierra Towers are specifically designed for bass... the S2 woofer is designed for bass -and- mids. To get improved mids, we had to go with a lower mass cone and this limits deep bass capabilities. Swapping the bass woofers in the towers with the S2 woofer would hurt overall performance, even though there is more radiating area -- bass response would suffer and since the bass woofers cross to the mid at ~200Hz, there would be no performance improvements at any frequency (just considerable added expense)

Hope this makes sense!