**Official Ascend Acoustics Tower Thread** - Page 44

Check out the "Sierra-1 NRT: Next Phase?" thread on the Ascend Acoustics Community Forum. Specific details/Information on the Sierra-2 has not been announced (including specs. and pricing), other than Dave estimating an end of June timeframe. The thread however provides some educated assumptions that can be made on where the Sierra-2 is headed.

That being said, Dave also mentions that a number of customers have customized the Sierra-1 with the same RAAL tweeters used in the tower. Recommendation is to contact Ascend directly for pricing and any information on specs. and performance. Best of luck.

Lol, Steve unless I have a dedicate listening space it isn't going to happen.



Dan

Dan.
Thanks. I'll check out your thread on Dipole/Bipole surround speakers on Ascend's forum. Also was myself thinking about an external amp last month and backed off (lower on the priority list). I have upgrade fever and am now thinking about a 7.1 system followed up by an amp eventually. Let us know when you make the amp purchase and your impressions on sound quality compared to the Denon AVR.
- Rob

Hey Dan-

Yeah, I'd love a dedicated room as well. I'd probably get another pair of Sierra-1s for back surrounds to go with the Towers + Horizon up front. What are your eventual sub plans?

Attempting to write from my cell and woe is it difficult:
Back to the subject at hand , hey Steve how many speakers you're running now? You have fronts/ height array don't you?

I'm hoping on getting a heathty income return for some new gear. Would love a pair instead of just one sub.

Dan

Will do Rob.

Is this with the grilles on or off? I also found that the towers were thin until I took the grilles off, and then it was as if I had an extra pair of speakers in the room. I wonder if the grilles were in contact with the woofers or something.
Audyssey sets the crossover at 50Hz.

Another tip, my Horizon sounded bad with some dialog frequencies even after Audyssey until I flipped it "upside down", and then it sounded right. I had it on MoPads tilted 4 degrees directly towards the sitting position in both cases.

When you say flipped the Horizon upside down, you mean positioned horizontally - the mid-range driver on top and the tweeter below it?

Yes.

Yeah, my last center was a 3-way that was flipable, but I'm fine with it normally set. I have it on a tilt adjustable stand, aimed at my head and as high as it can be and not intrude on the display behind it. Audyssey puts the Horizon at 40 hz btw.

I have two working theories right now. One, these things were fresh to the point of green - I could smell the sap - due to the wait for the RAAL. To the ear, they seem to have coalesced very nicely. The RAAL has lost its tiz, the bass is a bit more fleshed out, and the whole of it is startlingly cohesive. A very direct, live sound, but no sense of a box, and everything in balance, so I'm happy (but still feel they need a sub.)

Thing is, second theory here, their needing a sub (at least in my room - 27' long and ~4000 cubes) is a good thing. With the basic design parameters we have, I'm thinking any attempt to lower the bass response would do equal or greater damage to the mid/woofer blend, and that blending of drivers is the genius of the design. If it takes sacrificing a little bass to get that, I'm in And of course, it helps me, and most people, that the sub is already in place anyhow

The rear of my Towers are ~32" form the wall behind them, and there's about 5' to the side walls. Can you give me an idea of how yours are situated, and the size of your room?

I'm off to try without the grills ...

Anyone know if Ascend still offers the 1 year trade up offer? if they do I might save up the extra and trade up the Sierra-1s with the NrT for the Horizons or towers. Love the Sierra-1s so I wont be bummed if they don't.

Mine are currently 38" from the back wall at the shortest, and 16" from the side walls. My room is 24x12x8'. The MLP is about 12 feet from the speakers.
I had to toe them in (aiming behind the MLP), otherwise Audyssey was trying to compensate heavily for missing treble, and in fact at this distance the center was collapsing without toe-in.

7.2 with RAALs up front, Sierra-1s for SL/SR, and JBL in-walls for SBL/SBR. If I ever have a dedicated room I'll replace the JBLs, but they're fine for now.

So when I run Audyssey XT-32 it wants to put the Ascend fronts at full band of course. However, I have a quite capable subwoofer in the SVS PC-13 Ultra. So I manually have changed the crossover in the fronts to 60 Hz, have considered maybe goint to 50 hz or 40 hz to let the Ascends have their fair play. Thoughts please about changing Audyssey settings, which is pretty common for setups with subwoofers.

Set the crossover to the PC-13 as high as possible until you hear a difference.

I'm coming over with a six pack and pizza pie I bet it sounds amazing..


Dan

OK, but wear shorts--it's sunny and in the 80s this week

Right now, It is much cooler at the beach, but we should be in the high 70's for the weekend.
Edited by cschang - 2/25/13 at 3:42pm

Fjames, bathes2051 – you guys seem to be getting some strange results from your towers. We haven’t heard from either of you directly and, unfortunately, I haven’t been able to match up your AVS forum names with recent customers of ours. That said, please give us a call or send us an email so we can discuss and try to assist you.

Agreed, something is definitely funny. The Towers have accurate bass well into the upper 30’s low 40’s and this is typically where Audyssey will set the crossover point. Many of our tower customers have told us that Audyssey will set them to full range. Keep in mind that the towers and the horizon center have the same bass response, although the towers typically extend a bit lower since the port picks up some bass reinforcement from the floor. Since you mentioned that Audyssey set the Horizon center to 40Hz, which is about what I would expect from Audyssey, I suspect your towers might be sitting in a null or there could be a phase problem and bass between the two is cancelling.

Try this first, reverse the phase on one of the towers and re-run Audyssey. Any change in the bass response – do you hear more or less bass? Also, with the towers in their current position and in correct phase, play some bass heavy music and walk around your room – do you hear areas where the bass is deep and other areas where it is weak?

Bathes2051, the grilles are almost completely transparent with regard to the loudspeaker’s response and only have a minor effect (1dB) on frequencies starting from 3kHz on up and certainly would not have any effect on the loudspeaker’s bass response. See the attached production line response curves of a ribbon tower with no grille, and grille vs no grille. It is an absolute mechanical impossibility for the woofer cones to touch the grille, if they were – you would know it instantly as it would be very audible.

See the attached production line response curves I took about an hour ago of a Sierra Ribbon Tower with no grille vs grille.

grille.gif 52k .gif file
nogrille.gif 49k .gif file

The center can definitely be flipped but it is odd that doing do would change how vocals sound unless something else was going on, such as the slot ports picking up some bass reinforcement from what the center is sitting on. The acoustic center of the speaker is actually the halfway point between tweeter and the mid. I am curious about your setup; would it be possible to post a picture of the front of your room?

Thanks guys!

Hey it's lovely here on the east too, a whooping 41 degrees.


Dan

I also was surprised that taking the grilles off made such a difference because I knew it was supposed to be negligible, but I was listening to the same song over and over, and the effect was instantaneous. I haven't tried putting the grilles back on yet.
Maybe it's just a coincidence and something else was happening, e.g. the speakers were cold from shipping, and were only starting to warm up? I don't remember if this happened on the day I received them, or the day after.
In fact there's too much bass now :-), there seems to be a big room mode in the mid bass. Audyssey compensates for it nicely, but I've ordered some bass traps to experiment with for the corners.
Here's a picture from the MLP (towers 38" from the back wall, 16" from the side wall):


As to the center channel, it is sitting on Auralex MoPads (4 degrees up, 1 inch inside the room) on top of a glass shelf, but behind it is an Outlaw 7700. The top shelf is the only shelf that can support its weight (93 pounds, most of it in the front). I thought it would be OK because the Horizon is front-ported.
I'm planning on replacing the MoPads with the new Auralex ProPad XL (I borrowed the MoPads from another config), which should provide more decoupling.
Interestingly, Audyssey was setting the crossover at 60Hz for the center until I recalibrated with the mic closer to ear height (shouldn't have made a big difference due to the center's angle), and now it set it at 50Hz like the Towers (I bumped it to 55Hz for the center based on the -12dB measurement @~27Hz, will also try 60Hz).

Very nice, very nice indeed.

Djoel

just ordered my ascend system today,got the sierra towers with nrt tweeter and the horizon center with the raal tweeter,wanted them in satin espresso finish but that finish was on back order and since i have waited so long already to afford this system i went with the black bamboo finish,iam 56 years old and this will be the best set of speakes i have had.i thank i wii be very happy in the years to come.now as the tom petty song goes waiting is the hardest part.

Oooh, I love the satin black bamboo. Had those been available when I ordered by espressos, it would have been a tough choice.

the black bamboo was always my second choice anyway,iam 56 years old and i feel like a kid in a candy store.

It is interesting you went with the nrt tweeters for the towers and the raal for the center. I take it this is mostly for HT use then and you wanted the clarity of the Raal for the voices? At 56 you deserve a few splurges...and you will never have to wonder...but you probably would have been just peachy with the nrt tweet in the center.

I would almost bet you had that conversation with the good folks over at Ascend too... From all I read they seem more than willing to forgo a few bucks here and there to give the customer the best bang for the buck...but they know the customer is always right too!

would have liked to have gone raals all the way but at the time that is all we can afford,plus my wife would be happy with just tv speakers.

I have the same configuration as you do and love it.

what finish do you have yours in? iam sure i wii be just as happy as you.

Mine are espresso.

My first choice was naturals as I love the contrast between the cones and natural wood, but the wife said "No". Espresso was a good compromise. I really like the black bamboo, though, and would have leaned that way if they were around when I purchased.