Hello Folks!

I have a set of Acoustic Research 216PSB's as my rear
surround satelites. I had wire ran in the past but had
problems getting the wire under the carpet so I decided
that wireless was the way to go.

I purchased X-10's
Wireless Sound Power kit which consists of a Reciever,
Transmitter and power supplies. This system operates on
2.4Ghz and the Receiver is pre amped.

The Reciever says that it puts out 10 watts x 2 RMS and I get barely any volume from my surround. The AR 216PSB's require at bare minimum 10 watts each but to really sing they need much more..

Other than wiring the satelites again, I guess I have
no other options for wireless? Most of the wireless
systems come with speakers and I didn't want that.

Anyone here using wireless? If so what brand(s)?

Sincerely
Brett DiMichele

*Addendum*

After playing around with the settings on the X-10
Wireless Sound Power Receiver I have gotten a great
deal more sound from them. I suppose I should read the
manuals first and gripe later. Naturaly if you turn
the Receiver up to maximum you do get distorsion from
the lack of power it takes to drive a good pair of
satelites. But for surround the volume level goes
plenty high enough to get the job done! :)

"Naturaly if you turn
the Receiver up to maximum you do get distorsion from
the lack of power it takes to drive a good pair of
satelites. "

In other words, you have inefficient speakers that need a load of current to work.....

Robby,

Actualy it's an ineficient supply of power. Lack of
power causes distorsion. I run Acoustic Research 216PSB's and they are hardly a "bad" speaker..

You can not expect a set of satelites rated at 200 watts to function correctly at maximum volume on 10 watts RMS of power now can you????

Brett, this is important!!

If you run any transistor amplifier to audible distortion, you WILL damage your tweeters!

When a transistor amplifier distorts from being overdriven, it causes a phenomenon known as clipping, which creates a very intense, high-frequency signal, which damages tweeter voice-coils.

I would suggest that you use your wireless receiver to, in turn, drive a medium-powered power amp, about 100W/ch. should be plenty. If the output of the wireless receiver is turned low, you won't need anything between them. Otherwise, an automotive speaker-to-low-level-input adapter would work quite well.

Email me if you need more info.

Larry

Larry,

You are right on the money!

Thankfuly I do know what Clipping is and I have not
driven the speakers to that point. I know that I could
Bi Amp the satelites like you mentioned and then I
would not have to worry about the situation again. But
what I am going to do is just keep the Satelite volume
at moderate levels. Surround shouldn't overpower the
front stage anyway (right?) I can just keep them about
mid volume (they have a seperate volume,ballance,
trebble and bass control via the wireless receiver.

Thanks for the options and the great information!

i thought distortion could also be caused by the amplifier not having enuff power to drive good speakers? Or is that not correct?

Slocko,

That is what we are talking about. Underpowering a
speaker can do as much if not more damage than
overpowering. Usualy it's hard to overpower a speaker
with all but the biggest of amps. For example my 216PSB
Acoustic Research Satelites are rated for a maximum of
200 watts each. Even the best of Home Theater Receivers
falls shy of that wattage unless you get "components"
or spend thoudands upon thousands of dollars.

Underpowering causes distorsion at maximum volume
levels that can cause the condition Larry described
as "Clipping" it usualy destroys tweeters and can
also burn up voice coils in mid ranges as well.

gotcha. makes sense once you re-read it with that perspective. i remember when it was easy to blow speakers because the amps where much more ahead in power. seems the reverse is now true.

can you send me the website where you bought the wireless kit. i am kind of interested in wireless technology. i use a wireless keyboard and mouse and if the infrared port on my computer was on the side instead of the front, i would get an infrared printer. when bluetooth becomes more accepted, all external computers components will be wireless and probably can interact with your bluetooth cell phone.

i hadn't jumped into wireless speakers because people seem to think they are not that great for surround.

thxs.

The one thing that I did not take into consideration
when I wrote this post was that your surround channels
whether they are discreet or not, should not overpower
your front stage at all. Once I hooked my satelites up
to my full range output and listened to some music I
was impressed at just how loud they can go on only 10
watts RMS per channel (2 channels)

But again for surround that is not the goal. Seamless
transition effects is the name of the game. For this
I think the Sound Power kit is definatly worth it to
ditch having to run wire across the floor or inside
the walls.

You can read up on the Sound Power kit at www.x-10.com
just go under "Home Entertainment" and look for
"Sound Power: Wireless Speaker Kit"

Brett,

Does this thing have to be near the speakers? It looks kind of bulky to put on top of the speaker.

Slocko,

it's not as big as your thinking... Actualy here are
2 images of my Home Theater setup and if you look
closely at my AR 216PSB's you will see the Receiver
sitting beside one of them. And then you will see the
Transmitter sitting atop the TV... It's quite small..


Please don't make fun of my Bookshelf system....


See how small it is in comparison to everything else..


You can barely see the Reciever next to the left side AR216PSB

thxs. a picture is worth a thousand words come to mind. like your car collection. i think i will order it today.

Slocko,

Glad I could be of assistance.

Thanks for the compliment.. I am a certified car
nut case.. I collect cars all the way from 1:43rd scale
all the way up to 1:1 scale.. Unfortuntly I don't have
the room for too many 1:1 scale cars :)

Brett,

Got my kit yesterday. for some reason they sent me two remotes. very cheap remotes. don't need them and will not use them even if i needed them.

the receiver where you plug in the speaker wire needs to be plugged in to both speakers. if i am using it for two surround rear speakers they are going to be far apart. so i still need to run long wires from the speakers to the receiver.

for me this makes it unusable because there is no way for me to run wires from one speaker across to the other speaker or to the middle of the room if i put the receiver half way between the two speakers, since my speakers are not up against a back wall.

disappointed but that is due to me not thinking logically about how this works. i am going to see if i can set up a second pair of speakers in another room and use it in that room just for listening to music.