Meridian Unplugged - Powered by MrTechGuy.co.uk Forums Discussion Meridian - Systems 557 to bi-wire or not to bi-wire

Hi

I could do with some advice, recently got my 557 which I am very pleased with, lovely clean and natural sound, rhythmic and good sound stage.

It is partnered with a 565 and 508 on front end. Speaker cable currently are Chord Epics with Signature links on the speakers which are Dali Ikon mk2's. So I am wondering if bi-wiring is likely to give any improvement in sound stage or bass performance(which is pretty good)? The Dali's are a very neutral speaker and seem to work well with the Meridian and the end result sounds pretty musical, rather than hi-fi if that makes sense.

So any advise or experience in this area would be appreciated.

Thanks

Adrian

Hi

My own experience is that you will hear an improvement. These are such great amps, moving from one bi-wired to 2 in mono mode made a massive difference to SQ for me.

I have read elsewhere on here that 2 running bi amped opposed to mono sounds even better.

A friendly dealer should be able to lend you a pair of speaker cables to compare before purchasing. Chord speaker cables are so popular amongst dealers (mine has loads of pairs, rumour, rumour 4, odyssey etc) and I would imagine you could try with any of these to experiment.

Good Luck.

Very skeptical on the benefits of bi-wiring. The few times I have tried it, or heard it demonstrated, I detected no difference. Bi-amping is a whole different animal, and I think it can be quite beneficial. Bottom line, though, is you need to listen for yourself.

This is the beauty of active and DSP speakers, all those problems go away . However, i would at least demo bi wire if I was you with your kit though. You want the best from it all. Good luck and report back, Chris

I am with Simon on this one, no one in my family could hear any difference regarding bi-wire, now as Simon pointed out bi-amping is a different ball game, so I would save up and buy more 557's

Dumb question from someone who went DSP a long time ago:

Can you buy (conventional) amps that are optimised for particular frequency ranges? E.g. like Meridian does in it's active and DSP speakers? Expecting a single amp to work well at all frequencies isn't necessarily reasonable, but I'm not aware of tweeter-, mid- or bass-specific HiFi amps.

I have never seen amplifiers that are optimised. I believe it is another example of "hot rodding", selecting an amplifier that is low powered for tweeter duty and a larger powered amplifier for bass duty preferably from the same manufacturer.

Meridians designs become even more elegant when I think of the number of boxes needed.

Regards I

Naim for the tweeters, Quad for the woofers...


I don't think it's unreasonable, the frequency ranges aren't that large.
As Ian states, the power requirements are different for each range, so if you are going active, you can use different power outputs for each drive unit (same gain though).
I don't think Meridian or any other manufacturer optimise frequency response; the only way to do this would be with an active crossover or by making a poor amp (poor power supply, high capacitance feedback etc.).

My take;

Passive Single Wire; OK
Passive Bi-Wire; No difference, sells more cable.
Passive Bi-Amp; No difference, sells even more cables and amps.
Active Bi-Amp; Now were talking...

For those that swear by passive Bi-Amping, I'll agree that it would make a difference in absolute SPL, especially if the power amps aren't that good, but you'd be better off buying a single larger amp, unless you're going to go fully active at a later date.

All the best,

Steve.

A marriage made in Hell!

One can certainly buy different amps that have strengths in different areas, but I think it is done carefully as one can introduce discontinuties if not careful. For example, my analog speakers come with an amplifier for the bass section, but the buyer is expected to provide an amp for the upper panels.

Can you explain what you mean by passive bi-amping. I'm not familiar with the term.

Frank, This link is useful

Bi wiring and Bi amplifying

Regards I