Hi I recently purchased some Viper 650.2 components which are rated at 100wrms on the box. However, i have been getting confused by the instructions. I am considering bi amping the components and am unsure what i can give to each one. I read that the tweeters are 100wrms but this could be wrong. I'm hoping some one can tell me what power i can send to each of my tweeters and speakers

Many Thanks

Well, 100w for tweets is a huge amount, I garuantee it'll send you deaf! You don't have to use it all, but headroom is good, just advance the gains till things sound right... Same goes for the mids really, get em in, and increase gain (be sure XO settings are correct first)... Back the gain off a little as soon as you hear and distortion...

Thanks for the advice so do u recon running two 2 x 100wrms so 4 x 100wrms in total and just setting the gains so that they don't distorts. What do you think the crossover should be set at for the speakers?

I'd say that amount of power would be just fine... but as I say, go easy on the gains... start low

Tweeters - 3khz upwards
Midbass - 80hz - 3khz is usually a good starting point for an active system... work from there

cliobass,

are you running them active or using the passive crossovers? the passives allow you to run an amp channel for each driver (ie. drive all four speakers from a four channel amp - can't remember if this is called bi-wiring or bi-amping).

i will be giving mine 4x75wrms and using the passives to sort out the x-over levels. by using the front channels to run the tweets and the rear channels to run the mids, you can set the gains accordingly, giving more to the mids if they want it :twisted:

Thanks guys. Bazzason did you understand what the actual ratings of the components are from the instructions?(i didn't) Im intending to run them thru the crossovers that came with the components as far as i know its called bi amping. With these crossovers do i still need to set the crossover on the amp? as currently when running it from just one amp through the crossovers i get distorsion on deep bass until i set it to high pass on the amp

cliobass,

are you running them active or using the passive crossovers? the passives allow you to run an amp channel for each driver (ie. drive all four speakers from a four channel amp - can't remember if this is called bi-wiring or bi-amping).

i will be giving mine 4x75wrms and using the passives to sort out the x-over levels. by using the front channels to run the tweets and the rear channels to run the mids, you can set the gains accordingly, giving more to the mids if they want it :twisted:

Thats Bi-wiring dude :)

Not as good as bi-amping (running active) as your still getting passive XO inefficiencies, its a good stepping-stone though before running full active :)

Oh right thanks, so bi wiring is going through the passive crossovers. But bi amping is going straight from the crossovers on the amp. If im right on this do you know why it is possible to do it with these components and not with some other components? :)

as far as i understand, the speakers are rated to 125wrms using the passive crossovers. Viper state 175w dynamic power, which i took to mean "marketing watts" and not continuous power. if you are running them using the passive crossovers, then 4x100w sounds fine. i expect the speakers can handle more than 125w (you could probably get away with bridging the amp if you are very careful with the gain knob)!

however, i expect each individual driver is not rated to 125wrms if using an active setup. i would imagine (as blade said) if running active the tweets would not want 125w going through them...! that is what i always understood passives to do - break up the power from the amp into each component so they are balanced together.

the passives with these comps are great, imo. they give you another degree of flexibility, without being too fiddly. the crossovers have four tweeter attenuation settings, from -6db to +3db and allow bi-wiring (cheers blade ;)). i will be using the passives to get a bit more control over each part of my system. i am running a bridged 4-ch at the moment, so by going back to 4 single channels i hope to be able to increase/decrease the gains as necessary by using the bi-wire facility.

not sure i want to go fully active yet - more concerned about trying to get my left/right front stage working properly. currently got all parts of my stage coming from all speakers!!! :(

Oh right thanks, so bi wiring is going through the passive crossovers. But bi amping is going straight from the crossovers on the amp. If im right on this do you know why it is possible to do it with these components and not with some other components? :)

Thats right buddy...

But you can run active with any set of components... You can't bi-wire all component sets though...

Rich, you're horribly wrong :D

Bi-wiring... means using the passive crossovers. In a two way set where you have four drivers, you need 2 amp channels. From each amp channel you run TWO sets of speaker cable, these go into the passives as if you were bi-amping (below).

Bi-amping... also using the passive crossovers. In this case the only difference to bi-wiring is that you need an amp channel per driver (like active) but you do NOT need to deal with 3kHz crossovers etc - the passives do this as normal.

You need speakers with bi-ampable crossovers to do either of the above. Bi-wiring is pointless, there's no need to run extra cables like that. Bi-amping however, is well worthwhile.

As for power per driver, it's not something to worry about. I'd suspect 100RMS continuous would cook your tweeters tbh but the gain control is there to get the right amount of power to them. You probably won't need much (start gain on minimum).

HTH,

HB

Thats what I said, you spanner! :D

Not as good as bi-amping (running active) as your still getting passive XO inefficiencies, its a good stepping-stone though before running full active :)
Bi-amping is NOT running active, you fool ;)

And bi-wiring isn't what he's doing, it's bi-amping.

You spanner :p :D

HB

Shut up fool!

You with your silly home hi-fi wiring techniques! Have you got a car yet!? <winge winge> :D

I agree with HB here but continue scrapping you two, its funny.

I've read a convincing argument for bi-wiring with long cable runs but IMHO its pointless in a car, Bi amping through passive Xovers is good because it lets you set seperate gains for mids and tweets like in an active setup without having to worry about Xover points.

Running fully active without the passive crossovers is the most effective system IMHO but it does require more skill to set up and get the best sound (My active setup really needs the Xovers tweeking at the moment)

I know he's right in a way, but I'll just get my own back on him when I puck up the MAX on the weekend... I'm going to burn him in his sleep :D :twisted: :flame:

right, so that means i will actually be bi-amping my comps...?! just so i know before telling anyone duff information... ;) :D :p

What does the name matter? :D

Normal-> 2 amp channels, running mids and tweeters through the passive crossovers

Good-> 2 amp channels, but 4 channels of wiring running into passive crossovers

Better -> 4 amp channels, running down 4 channels of wiring, into passive crossovers

Best -> ACTIVE> 4 amp channels, 4 channels of wiring, 1 channel for each mid, and one for each tweeter... Crossovers used on amp/external XO

harry/blade,

maybe you can answer this - by using the 'better' method (as above ;)) i will be using the front and rear channels of my amp to power all four front speakers. this will mean using the front two channels for the tweeters and the rear two channels for the mids (in order to control the gains).

i have one RCA lead going to this amp from the 'front' pre-out from my HU. should this go to the front or rear RCA input on the amp? or will i need to use y-splitters to send the signal to both front and rear inputs?

i'm getting all confused with this, as i want to get the left and right balance sorted out. at the moment when i play the left/centre/right voices on the IASCA test disc, the voices come from both sides on all voices. i can't visualise how i will run the RCA's to keep the left and right balance seperate. is it something to do with the red/white colours on the RCA leads?

sorry for the hijack, but it sort of seems topical :)

Erm... I may be misunderstanding you, but running the left and right channel RCA leads together and not seperate will not alter how your system images, and make all your musical information come from both channels ;) :lol:

You'll need ot use Y-splitters with the method your refering to, if your amp does not allow you to use 1 stereo RCA input to supply signal to both your front and rear channels...

at the moment, i have the four channels bridged with the RCA's going to only one RCA input. there is no seperation of left and right signal (ie. when i fade fully left on my HU, sound still comes from both left and right speakers, and vice versa).

i think i'm gonna need to have a play around with the splitters and see what happens.

cheers fella.

Splitters will be the way here, the amp's manual should have details :) You will be bi-amping though.

Blade, "Good" is only good in the sense that the person who sold you cable just made some more cash. :)

Bill, I'm interested to know what you've heard about bi-wiring, feel free to drop me a PM or email.

Cheers,

HB

Blade, "Good" is only good in the sense that the person who sold you cable just made some more cash. :)

Well, your going to reduce voltage and signal loss along your amp -> XO cabling, but it's going to be negligable... I didn't say it would be my choice for wiring, it's just an option...