rt800's sounding terrible

[mcequalhp]

Bought a used set of RT800's after readign reviews. They sound very muddy with vocals lost behind the music.
I hooked up only the tweeters, and they sounded like an old transistor radio. The 6" drivers seem to be OK wih no drag or scraping when I physically push on them.

Are my tweeters blown? does any one have a new or good set?
Is there a way I can test the tweeters (ohm, volts)

Any help would be appreciated. I was really looking forward to these speakers and am so disappointed so far.

Mike

[CvillePolk]

Sorry to start with the obvious but are the jumpers between the top and bottom sets of terminals missing?

[McCelery]

Unless my taste in audio purity sucks donkey balls, once you get them hooked up right you will be very happy :D (or maybe I really do like all my music to sound like a walkman with low batteries lost in the bottom of a laundry hamper??)

[mcequalhp]

OK to start with the obvious. Mine came without the jumpers, so I used speaker cable.
When testing the tweeters I hooked ONLY to the top connectors. This is when they sounded like an old transistor radio. The sound is full when the jumpers are connected, but muddy with the vocals lost in the background.

This is why I wanted to know if there is a fairly easy test for the tweeters.

MIke

[mcequalhp]

McCelery,

I'm not quite sure what your affinity to donkey balls ha to do with my question.

I'm suspecting that there is something wrong with the speakers I purchased. You may want to be carefull no to get the animal activists in an uproar over your love of donkey genitalia!

Mike

[CvillePolk]

There are a lot of people in here that are more knowledgeable so take my 2 cents for what it's worth until someone else comes up with something better.

A tweeter played by itself is probably going to sound like you described even if it's right. If you're testing it by using the top terminals on the back of the speaker (as opposed to pulling it from the cabinet and attaching the wires directly) the crossover comes into play as well so none of the high mid frequencies will be coming through. If it doesn't actually sound distorted then it's probably ok. Do both speakers sound the same when tested in the same way?

If your speakers are the rt800 (and not the rt800i) then the tweeter in them is the sl6502. I have a dinged up pair of the rt55's that I keep around just for the spare tweeters (I have a lot of the Polks from that era that use the same tweeters). I'd check the resistance on one of mine but unfortunately I have two multimeters ... one with a a dead battery and another one that must be buried under some other 'project' because I couldn't find it when I just looked. If you call polk customer support and tell them the model of the tweeter I'm sure they can give you the value ... someone else might read this and supply it as well.

How much do you know about the history of the speaker? I bought a pair of the rt2000i's from an outlet a while ago and after noticing a mild kindof hot electronics smell a few times pulled the drivers and saw that the resistors on the crossovers had fried (pretty bad). I then found out that even though the mid-woofers in the speakers looked identical to the ones that should be in them they weren't the right model for that speaker. Must've had a different resistance than what the design called for so the added heat in the circuit caused the resistor to get so hot it looked like it carbonized and actually blew the little white case wide open. (despite that the speakers did work still, just didn't sound good) Nice huh. Store apologized and replaced all the necessary pieces so no big harm done.

Because the design of the rt800 and rt55 are so similar I'm guessing that they might have the same drivers. You almost certainly should have the sl6502 as your tweeter. I would think the midwoofs would be the same as well but Polk has a bunch of these that look identical but have mechanical differences (sometime different resistance, sometimes bucking magnets to minimize interference with crt tvs, etc.). The model # on my rt55s is the MW7017 ... but even if yours is different than mine all four should be identical to each other (they're wired in series and get the exact same signal).

So, if you feel comfortable opening them up (all you need is a hex key set) it might be worth checking those things then giving a call to Polk customer support. They are extremely helpful on even their older products.

Just for the heck of it too .... really make sure that the jumpers you made to go between the upper and lower terminals have a good connection before connecting the actual wire from your amp/receiver.

Lastly, if you didn't get a manual with the speakers the older products section of the polk site has the pdf of the owners manual for the rt800i which is pretty close to yours. And, if you go to the troubleshooting forum here and check the thread at the top if you scroll down you'll find the crossover diagram for your speaker which could be helpful at some point.

Sorry for the overly long post. Had nothing else to do while I was drinking my coffee this morning.

OK to start with the obvious. Mine came without the jumpers, so I used speaker cable.
When testing the tweeters I hooked ONLY to the top connectors. This is when they sounded like an old transistor radio. The sound is full when the jumpers are connected, but muddy with the vocals lost in the background.

This is why I wanted to know if there is a fairly easy test for the tweeters.

MIke

[AndyGwis]

If you have them running bi-amped with different amps, the top range may sound as described.

Back when I first though "the most watts" was the best way to go, I used my lil carver tfm-6's in mono to run the bottoms of my Monitor 60s and my HK 635 to run the tops.

Even after using the auto calibration, music would sound huge and full on the bottom end and non-existent on the top. I thought I had blown tweeters or something. Tested the tweeters by pulling them out and putting wires directly on them. Sounded a little muffled, but were working. Ended up hooking the Carvers up bridged / mono to run the full speaker (not just the bottoms), and they came back to life.

[mcequalhp]

Thanks for the replies,
Yes I was testing the tweeters through the crossover, I will try connecting directly to the tweeter next time. The speakers seem to really be missing the mid-high frequencies. Singing and voices seem distant and get lost behind the music.

I'm going to try them with my new audio source class T amplifier on friday. My home theater receiver is nothing to brag about and may be just too weak for these speakers. All the reviews I've read said they were pretty tolerant of amp power output.

The class T was too much for my little R15's, very bright sounding and will hopefully be the cure for the RT800's. At least I'll feel confident that I'll be able to determine if it's a true speaker problem or just a weak amp.

Mike

[danger boy]

if your tweeters sound like a transistor radio.. it's blown. bad, fried, kapoot, DOA

email the seller back and ask him why he sold you RT800's with bad tweeters and if he will either refund your money or pay for new tweeters.

[zingo]

And then punch him in HIS donkey balls for selling you something like that.

[danger boy]

And then punch him in HIS donkey balls for selling you something like that.

donkey is the wrong, more like gnat balls. :D

[McCelery]

Whoa whoa WHOA!!! What's with all this hating?? Since posting the other day when I thought I liked music, it's been confirmed I have much deeper problems to deal with. Time to sell the system and pay for therapy :D

[mcequalhp]

OK, it's official, my rt800's don't sound terrible.

Hooked up to my new tri-path amp, broke out my single play CD player, lots of movement on the speaker placement and they finally sound pretty sweet.

they seem to have some soft spots in the upper midrange, but Mark Knoplfer's guitar from pretty much any Dire Straight's CD sound as clear and true as anything I've heard.

there seems to be a "sweet spot" that requires sitting in just the right place and right speaker location, but they sound good in the rest of the room now, just without that sparkling high end when out of the "zone."

BTW: If you want to hear what kind of bass these things are capable of: Listen to the intro to Face the Face on Pete Townsends cd's. It absolutely shook my kitchen at aprox 1/3rd power. the vocals get a little lost later in the song, but that intro...

Oh, and McCelery, you may still suck donkey balls... but that's for another forum.

Mike

[engtaz]

Congrats Bad sound stinks

[fredv]

Just curious, exactly what brought the better SQ back, inadequate amp at the beginning? My RT800's sound pretty good even driven by a 20wpc integrated amp.

[McCelery]

Yes, and I invite you to check out that other forum. NSFW.

I notice a lot of locality and sweet spot in my listening area. Literally one foot in any direction dramatically changes the sound. But I don't find this to be too terribly different (on a smaller scale, of course) than being at a concert and finding the sweet spot. It's kind of the way speakers work, just more pronounced with the RT800s.

Enjoy!

OK, it's official, my rt800's don't sound terrible.

Hooked up to my new tri-path amp, broke out my single play CD player, lots of movement on the speaker placement and they finally sound pretty sweet.

they seem to have some soft spots in the upper midrange, but Mark Knoplfer's guitar from pretty much any Dire Straight's CD sound as clear and true as anything I've heard.

there seems to be a "sweet spot" that requires sitting in just the right place and right speaker location, but they sound good in the rest of the room now, just without that sparkling high end when out of the "zone."

BTW: If you want to hear what kind of bass these things are capable of: Listen to the intro to Face the Face on Pete Townsends cd's. It absolutely shook my kitchen at aprox 1/3rd power. the vocals get a little lost later in the song, but that intro...

Oh, and McCelery, you may still suck donkey balls... but that's for another forum.

Mike

[mcequalhp]

fredv:

was so excited when I got the speakers I hooked them to our cheap RCA HT receiver. apparently the speakers accentuated the inadequacies of the receiver. It powered my little r15's OK and sounded pretty good, BUT the RT's just sounded like sh**!

the new amp is an audiosource Class T using the new tri-path transistor. this is supposed to put most of the power into the music and less into heat. I've run this thing hard for 5-6 hours and it barely gets warm. rated at 200wpc with very low distortion. They are VERY bright sounding when new, but seems to be gettign a softer, warmer sound as it breaks in.

mcCelery:

The RT's definetly have a sweet spot in which the highs come shining through. Placement seems to have reduced the effect of this throughout the rest of the room, I'm just used to my old Kef coda's and C40's that just seem to soound good no matter where you are in the room. It may be due to the KEF's being designed for 2 channel music and the RT's are for music AND HT application. 't watched a movie to the RT's yet, but I'm sure even with just the two channels it will bring a new experience to the film!

Planning to use my r15's for surround whien doing the HT thing, hope it will make for a good experience.

MC