Loving my new purchase - RT3000

[neils]

Decided it was time to upgrade from my RT12 fronts, and CS245i ceter. Got a great deal on these on eBay, $611 for the RT3000, and $345 for the CS1000. I am in heaven, been dreaming about owning this kit for a decade !! The sound from the RT5000 kit is breath-taking, and hits hard and tight, especially when fed with good power amps. In my case, those amps are Carver TFM.

Just wanted to share my joy on this forum. As you can tell by the Polk Audio sign in the HT room, huge fan!!!

Neil

[danger boy]

looks really good.. congrats on your new to you RTXXXX system. ;)

[Pycroft]

I've not been at this long at all, but I think that's the sweetest looking gear rack I've ever seen. Very nice setup and congrats!

[halo71]

Damn, pics #4.......damn. Sweet setup! Congrats!

[kcoc321]

SA WEEET..you must have been a good boy this year....

Congrats, looks great ;p

[leroyjr1]

Nice setup !!!

[tonyb]

Very nice , Loved those 3000's when they graced my home. Nice rack too but don't those amps need some more room to breath?

[concealer404]

Holy crap i saved picture 4 for "personal use."

Would you mind running through what's in that rack? There's a few pieces there that i don't recognize. :)

[cnh]

And we're 'loving' your pics!

cnh

[neils]

God guys, you sure as hell know how to make a guy feel great about his blood and sweat poored into making that room. Thanks for all the great compliments. I was only going to put up pics of the speakers, since this is a Polk forum, but thought I would throw in the rack pics to show what is driving them.

It would be my pleasure to list the gear. Those pics are actually a little outdated, I will add a new one shortly. A few more amps are missing, plus a new Aphex piece, which I think confuses people the most.

The Aphex piece is the one on the bottom with 8 dials. Reason I need it is to take the LFE XLR feed from the pre/pro, and provide 8 more outputs. It's something commonly used in pro audio for studios and concerts, to feed multiple amplifiers from one signal. I feed 4 channels of LFE to smaller Carver amp for the bass shakers in the couch, plus another 2 channels for LFE inputs to the RT3000 cabinets. This is the piece below.
http://www.aphex.com/120A.htm

Then I just ordered another piece from Aphex, to convert XLR to RCA, since the signal voltage is different, and can damage home equipment. Since all of my RCA connections are being used for the Carvers, example front out for the RT3000 tops, center out to the CS1000, I still need a feed from those channels to power the sub portions of those speakers. So this piece allows me to use the XLR outputs from the pre/pro, and convert to RCA. Here is the piece below.
http://www.aphex.com/124A.htm

Everything else in the list you will recongnize:

From bottom to top =>

Left most rack:
3 X Carver TFM-35x (Left, Right, Center, Left Surround, Right Surround, Rear Surround)
1 X Carver PM950 (for future use on a JBL 18" cinema sub)
1 X Toshiba HD DVD (soon to be swapped out for BluRay)
1 X Samson power condition (with voltage and ammeter monitoring)

Center rack:
1 X Aphex 120A XLR distro (8 LFE outputs)
1 X Aphex 124A XLR RCA interface (to feed front & center signals to built-in subs) not pictured, will arrive soon)
3 X Carver PM300 (2 for four bass shakers, 1 for Zone 3 audio, only 1 PM300 pictured)
1 X Bell Expressvu 9200 HD dual tuner PVR
1 X Samson Real Time Analyser (to see the sound curve of the room)
1 X Onkyo pre/pro (PR-SC885)
1 X Samson power conditioner

Right rack:
1 X HTPC (multi media music server, plus Cinemar front end - see below)
1 X Sony DVP-CX995 (400 disc SACD DVD changer, controlled by Cinemar software)
1 X LiteOn DVD recorder
1 X XBox (soon to be replaced by XBOX 360
1 X Wii (coming soon)
1 X Sony turntable (vintage, soon to be sold, servo drawer style)
1 X Samson power conditioner

OK, this is getting to be a long post. Will put more details in another post below.

[neils]

Sorry guys, still laughing from all your compliments, made my day !!! To the admin, promise, last post about non speaker related info, guys asked, so I am providing info. Don't want to take away from the RT3000 post topic.

While all the equipment above might be nice to have, imagine the headache of trying to figure out how to control a 400 DVD movie collection, and a couple thousand songs from a large CD collection (since been ripped to HTPC). Enter Cinemar, brilliant people with amazing software. What these guys allow you to do is to load a server type setup on the main HTPC, and then each PC in the house gets the client end. You'll understand once you see screenshots of the software from their website. Client side controls server side.

For the DVDs, you simply enter your movie collection into the database (server), either using the UPC code in back, or by name. Once your collection has been inventoried, you're pretty much done. Only thing left to do is learn your IR commands for the Sony changer, using a USB device called the USBUIRT connected to the HTPC. Now with that setup, you wife or kid goes to the laptop or mini PC in the kitchen, look at the thumbnails of the movies, search for a title by type of movie or title, and hit PLAY. The HTPC then knows where the movie is located, and fires off IR commands to the Sony changer to select that movie and play it.

The video feed is sent throughout the house from the Onkyo pre/pro, that has HD component out for Zone 2. I then feed that signal into what is called a balun, from CE Labs, which converts the HD video and audio to Cat 5 network cable. Each room then is fed 2 cables, converted back on the other end, and voila, HD in every room in the house. And each floor has a PC laptop, with the Cinemar client side.

Cinemar software also allows you to select and control your music collection, view weather data, and much more. I do not work for them, but swear by their stuff. My setup would be nothing if I had to run downstairs everytime to look for a movie or play a specific song.

Cinemar software:
DVDLobby
http://www.cinemarsolutions.com/dvdlobbypro.php

MusicLobby
http://www.cinemarsolutions.com/musiclobby.php

CE Labs baluns:
www.celabs.net (under Cat 5 component distro)

[neils]

As for the RT3000, they do need some TLC, have 2 issues to address with them. One is that 2 MW8500 8" drivers are damaged, and need replacing. They are impossible to find. Been asking around the forums, and been in contact with Polk, no luck though in the US. The Polk rep in Canada (where I am from), might have 1 replacement 8" lying around, waiting to hear from him this week. Second thing is the famous radio stations and buzz that plays thru the RT3000 sub cabinets and center channel. The amp section needs to have ground work done to it, called Revision 3, waiting to see if Polk can do this work still. I am catching a Spanish radio station in my sub cabinets, low but distracting. Supposedly the Revision 3 ground work upgrade takes care of this.

See what you guys did now, I got caught up on all the great love on this forum, and am now late for work. Chat with you guys a little later. Any other questions, feel free to ask, either here or PM. And to the admin, would be a great idea if there was a section for us to showcase and disucss our 2 channel stereo and 6.1 + HT setups. Unless it gets put into an Other section.

[concealer404]

There's a 2-channel section, and i think we usually put the HT setups in "Electronics." :)

Thanks for the rundown of the components, gives me something to read about today! :D

[Pycroft]

Hell yah! I have one 4 shelf rack taht isn't even full. Again, that just looks sexy as hell! I bet it sounds fantastic! Did you purchase all of your gear used, and if so, where?

James

[neils]

That is one thing that I forgot to mention. While all that gear above might look like I am a blank cheque writer, quite the opposite. I am a very simple guy that grew up on audio, and constantly looking for a deal. Most of that gear is pre-owned (hate using the word used), purchased off of eBay at great prices. I think only the Samson RTA was purchased new. Even the Onkyo pre/pro was bought new on eBay at like half the price of market. Don't purchase new gear in stores anymore. All comes from forum sales or eBay.

For example, those Carver amps used to once sell in the $1200 range, from what I can remember, picked them up for $350 on eBay in mint condition. Got my Onkyo pre/pro for $1K when it was selling for $1800 when it came out. Deals like that. Oh yeah, almost forgot to mention the subwoofer, Sunfire Signature, paid $1K on eBay, MSRP $2500-$3K.

If you are patient like I am, and constantly scout the sales out there, you can piece together a killer system.

Will look in the electronics section for other folks HT setups, like to read about that and see what other people are using.

[concealer404]

^Also check out the "System Showcase" link at the top of the page. :)

[gtu2004]

love the center speaker stand. i gotta get myself one of those!

[halo71]

Yeah Neils. I have never said this to a guy before. But you sure got a great looking rack! :p

[neils]

Laughed my ass off when I read that you liked my rack, gonna remember that line for a long time to come.

And imagine, I find the rack incomplete and messy. I am missing custom Middle Atlantic RSH panels, which basically goes around non-rackmount equipment like a picture frame, giving it a cleaner look. Been putting it off because I need about 6 or 7 of them @ $60 a piece. Will look something like this when installed.

http://www.smarthome.com/images/876042big.jpg
http://www.middleatlantic.com/images/iracacc/ta_on.jpg

[dpowell]

For the price you can buy the RT5000 gear now, I just can't see where you can get a more fantastic movie experience for the $$. I love mine. You are absolutly correct that separate power amps make the RT3000's sing.

I'm interested in your opinion of how they sound using the bass cabinets for LFE. I found that the bass was not as tight using the LFE input as when I ran L/R line level and used a dedicated sub for LFE.

WRT replacement drivers, keep your eyes open for RT3000 subs being sold separately. I've seen several for sale over the past couple of years and you could just buy it for the parts.

Welcome to the club and enjoy your awesome new speakers!

[neils]

Thanks for the kind welcome. I am loving the RT5000 kit. For sure, any good power amp will make speakers come alive, compared to thos built into receivers. Not to say that the better receivers out there are not capable. But if you are like me, and like to feel your music, and like a lot of power and headroom, power amps are the only way to go.

As for your question, the RT3000 is quite unique in that you can mix the front signal with LFE. So I plan on running both. I find that the double 8's are very tight and I like adding that to my Sunfire Signature sub, and run both on LFE.

Fortunately for me, my Onkyo pre/pro has both RCA and XLR out on all channels. So the RCA outs are going to the power amps for the tops and center, and the XLRs are being converted to RCA via the APHEX converter, and feeding the sub amps in the RT5000 kit.

I was able to find 1 replacement MW8500 driver in Canada, still waiting to find another one. At this point, I agree about purchasing the RT3000 sub cabinets if they come up for sale, would give me 4 spare drivers, plus 2 replacement amps. Gotta keep an eye out...

One last thing, been in touch with the Canadian rep out here (Walter), and he is talking with head office to find out about the workaround for the revision 3 ground issue. I have RF interference in my cabs, getting a radio station, very distracting. He said once he locates the paperwork for revision 3 on the amps, he will send them down to Montreal, and have a local repair shop perform the work. Happy I won't have to ship the amps across the country !!