(3x Horizon RAAL) vs. (Sierra 2 RAAL + Horizon RAAL)

[curtis]

Ah, I got it now. Since my issue is with room placement, could the tower be front ported?

Also, the slim Horizon should give you the same imaging as the Tower since the driver configuration is vertically aligned.

[FirstReflect]

Guys, guys, guys...

I know how easy it is to get excited about Ascend's flagship speakers, believe me! haha. But I'm seeing a lot of overthinking going on here.

Let's not forget that these are going in a 12 x 13 room, so there's basically zero chance you're going to be sitting farther than 12 feet away from your Front speakers.

My current tiny apartment theater room is pretty close to the same size. I do NOT need the custom Horizon RAAL speakers that I have. I don't even come close to needing their output capabilities. The only reason I got them is because I intend to use them in a much larger room one day, and much like TheHorizon, these are my "forever" speakers, so I went ahead and got what will be appropriate for a 16 x 23 foot room with 12 and 18 foot seating distances.

But in my current, very small room, the Sierra-2 and Sierra-2 Center would easily provide all the output capability I would ever need.

There's so much concern about concert-level output levels and mid-bass slam. What exactly is the goal with this mid-bass slam? Is it to have horribly overblown, non-linear response? Of course not! The main reason mid-bass slam becomes a problem in so many setups is because it happens to fall right in the crossover region of the speakers and subwoofers. It's important to remember that even with 24dB/octave slopes, the speakers are still producing significant output down at 40Hz, and the subwoofers are still producing significant output up at 160Hz. So the entire mid-bass region ends up being played by two or more sources of sound. And all of that sound wave interaction is the reason so many people's setups end up either lacking mid-bass slam or sounding bloated and overblown in that region.

So the key isn't to get speakers that can play far louder than you actually need - ie. the Horizon RAAL in this small of a room at these short seating distances. The key is to position and integrate the speakers properly with the room and with the subwoofers. Do that, and the Sierra-2 can provide all the mid-bass slam you could ever hope for in a room this small.

Don't get me wrong, if these are your "forever" speakers, like they are mine, and if you have even the slightest thought that you might move them to a larger room in the future, then by all means get the larger Tower RAAL or Horizon RAAL speakers! It's not as though they will sound worse than the Sierra-2 in your current room. I can attest to that! But it's just this idea that they're somehow actually needed in this particular setup; that's the only thing I'm taking issue with here.

I could easily, EASILY use a pair of Sierra-2 and a Sierra-2 Center as my Front 3 in my current room. The real magic was in setting up my pair of subwoofers (which again, are beyond overpowered for my current tiny space, but they are my "forever" subwoofers intended for a much larger room one day - their volume dial goes from 0 to 100. I have it them at 4 ) at the mid-points of my left and right side walls. That positioning got me incredibly uniform, even response across my entire 3-seater sofa. That uniformity allows me to very easily equalize my bass response to be extremely linear and accurate. And by carefully selecting the crossover frequencies and getting a perfect, seamless blend, NOW I have excellent, delineated notes, and percussive, tactile mid-bass slam that sounds realistic, not enhanced or overblown, but just a very good facsimile of the way bass sounds in real life!

So if that is your goal, and I happen to know that it is ( ), then the worry needs to be far less about the Sierra-2 vs. the Horizon RAAL and a lot more about just ensuring that you get your subwoofers (and yes, there need to be at least two, although four would be even better) positioned properly and calibrated in phase and output properly to produce even, uniform bass across all of your seats. Then have those subwoofers carefully integrated with your speakers so that the blend is truly seamless.

Getting more mid-bass and bass output from your speakers is unnecessary in such a small room with such a close seating distance. And trying to just get your Front speakers to play lower and louder can be detrimental rather than a benefit. We are not listening outdoors in a wide open field. We are not listening in a massive auditorium where the dimensions of the room exceed the wavelengths of the bass sound waves being produced. We are listening in a very small room, in this case, so we should be worried about what is appropriate, not just out-and-out, never-to-be-used capabilities.

Again, if the plan is to eventually move to a larger room, then by all means, get the speakers that will be suitable for those future plans. That's what I did. But if getting three Horizon RAAL speakers means you'll have to postpone getting a pair (or better yet, quad) of excellent subwoofers, then that is a poor choice and trade-off, IMO.

And I agree that many people go completely overboard with subwoofer output capabilities, as well. I mean, I'm hardly one to talk in my current situation - haha! But truly, a pair of SVS SB-1000 subwoofers would be perfectly adequate for this room size, while a pair of PB-1000 could practically blow the door off its hinges.

So I think we all could benefit from taking a breath here. I have zero problem with over-buying when future plans and ideas are involved. Obviously! haha. But if these speakers are going to stay in this very small room, let's not get caught up in capabilities that will never, ever be needed or used.

Sitting as far away as is physically possible in this room, the Sierra-2 would deliver something very close to 82dB of output using just a single Watt of power. And yet, they can utilize 150 Watts of power continuously. So how about something in the range of 102-103dB playing continuously? Is that not enough mid-bass slam for you? And they'll take a short term peak of 300 Watts, so hitting full 105dB Reference Volume peaks is no problem.

So if anything, maybe be more concerned about adding a really solid external amplifier that can deliver a really nice, silent noise floor plus more continuous power and higher peak power than your AV Receiver can likely muster. Again, probably not even necessary, but there's at least a possibility you'll actually use it, unlike the output capabilities of the Horizon RAAL speakers, which will just never come close to being used in your small room.

That's my thinking on this, in any case. And I'm not disagreeing that the Horizon RAAL can deliver more mid-bass slam than the Sierra-2. I'm just saying you really don't need it. The Sierra-2 can already hit 105dB if you feed them enough clean Wattage. Do you honestly believe you need/want 115db+? There's slam, and then there's silly, and then there's downright painful. So let's not worry ourselves too much with capabilities we'll never use. That's all

- Rob H. - AV Rant Podcast Co-host