Definitive Technology SV1106 User's Manual
Contents
1. or years Baltimore s Definitive l Technology has produced phalanxes of tall imposing powerful floor standing towers Nevertheless the eyes of the company founder Sandy Gross always seem to take on a special twinkle when he sings the praises of his latest pint size production which sug gests he gets a special buzz out of squeezing the mostest from the leastest like the ProCinema 800 array seen here Not pint size exactly quart and a half would be closer but impressively small nonetheless Definitive s latest ProMonitor 800 satel lite design employs an unusually located passive radiator firing straight up to help the bantamweight speaker produce enough low frequency output to Definitive sent a pair of their inexpensive fixed height stands for the front speakers which worked fine in my room The ProCenter went on a stand below my 50 inch Samsung s screen It has no tilt adjustment built in and only one rubber foot the front edge has molded in hard feet but I dialed in the substantial uptilt I need using a couple of stick on feet I had lying around The ProMonitors for the sur round channels went on my high shelves flanking the listening position angled back to bounce off the rear wall as I usually do with direct radiating surrounds reach and blend with a subwoofer effectively The same technique is found in the m2. The fixed 80 Hz filters of many inexpensive receivers which use 12 dB 24 DB per octave filter slopes should also work quite well this is a marvelously high value system MUSIC PERFORMANCE A brief session with the ProMonitors playing full range alone confirmed that they don t produce enough bass for satisfying sound on their own but that nonetheless they play amazingly loud without obvious distress These are strictly satellite speakers but they do go lower and louder than I ve had guessed on sight _ With the system tweaked and tailored I started as 3 usual with stereo listening finding a generally neu tral open sound with a slightly warm cast to male The Short Form Snapshot A must hear for those who insist on a very small accessibly priced system Plus Excellent overall tonality Good bass output extension ss Surprising volume potential Minus Needs careful setup But don t they all Center shifts tone at off axis seats 1 099 AS TESTED VYZOGHO9 ANOL A9 OLOHd Definitive Technology speaker system Full lab results at soundandvisionmag com deftech800 decibels dB hertz HZ Lf R mm 24 Hz to 18 2 kHz 2 9 08 Surround Ml 124 Hr to 18 koe 2 7 dB Center BB 120 Hr to 16 1 kHz 24 008 Subwoofer E44 Hr to 150 Hr 42 35 dB pleasant easy to listen to open and airy plenty of heft vocals and a
3. pleasant easy to listen to treble that was open and fairly airy without excess bit or sizzle Clean well recorded CDs like Ani DiFranco s Reprieve were very pleasing and surprisingly high end sounding with modest depth some genuine transparency and considerable more weight and impact from the below 50 Hz region than I d expect ed The solo acoustic bass was tight and realistically woody but still had plenty of heft for its occasional ventures below 60 Hz or so The Definitive system also displayed arresting clarity on stuff like the explo sively compressed crystalline Dobro or whatever that is that enters startlingly a bit later tweeter is no slouch this was rather loud indeed a tight well integrated screenstage MOVIE PERFORMANCE The little Definitives performance on even demand ing soundtracks was if anything even more pleasing Collateral may be no Citizen Kane but it s an expertly made movie in technical terms and the ProMonitors handled it with relative ease moderate to fairly loud volume say about 6 dB below commercial cinema reference level I never once came out of the story because of a sonic shortcoming 3 This system has smooth response blemished primarly by a depression centered just below 1 kHz The subwoofer s high frequency response to 150 Hz mates well with the limited bass of the upper channel speakers It ha
4. atching center chan nel in doubles A must hear very pleasing and surprisingly high end sounding SETUP Acoustical balancing was a bit more involved First I found that all three front speakers benefited greatly from a little tilt Rocking them back on their heels several degrees made important improvements opening and defining the upper mids and airing up JUN JN the treble Proper adjustment of the subwoofer level and crossover also proved absolutely critical After initial meter balancing the system sounded a bit dis appointing heavy in the mid bass and not particular ly impressive down low What a transformation was won by an hour or so of fiddling I finished with a superb blend almost entirely free of boom or bloat and with surprisingly deep bass extension But too much sub level or too high a crossover and the Definitives could sound woofy or a bit bloated and the sub would localize too little or too low and they could become gaunt 3 Small differences of even 1 dB in sub level made very obvious changes as did experimentation with crossover settings I settled on 75 Hz crossover from my flexible processor with 6 dB high pass and 24 dB low pass curves which as it happens is pretty much what Definitive s own circuits yield if you use the sub s speaker level inputs instead of the LFE line connection I employed
5. e these always seem to work well in this configuration probably because their small diameter mid woofers are suffi ciently wide dispersion to avoid the beaming that might otherwise help the ear localize them Despite its diminutive roughly 6 gallon form smaller than a Texan s lid the ProSub 800 proved a worthy support This little sub produced ample rea sonably even output considerably lower than many inexpensive 8 inchers about 35 Hz or so rolling off fairly quickly below that point And it played unex pectedly loudly and cleanly The Definitive would become a bit grumbly at very high levels but thanks no doubt to intelligently engineered limiting circuits I had to push it to ludicrous settings well beyond THX reference from the overall system to elicit gross rattles or thumps It had plenty of bottom for thumping of Collateral s climactic club scene which indeed the full system delivered in fine loud ly enveloping smoothly claustrophobic fashion That I don t think you can do very much better said the ProSub 800 doesn t have the bottom octave grunt for fully cinematic deep bass the near infra sonic content of a T rex footfall or the underpinnings of the ram s horn calls of those War of the World s thingies but it does impressively just the same From Reality check This is a 399 subwoofer And t
6. here s a 10 inch ProSub 1000 499 that might well do bet ter still Bottom Line This is a marvelously high value system for smaller the system s music and effects keystone player the center is always the most important speaker in any movie surround system It made an excellent tonal match to the ProMonitors producing a tight well screenstage On the other hand it demonstrated moderately audible tonal changes Key Features rooms and even some not all that small ones If you ve simply go to have really small and by serious home theater standards really cheap speakers I don t think you can do much better Sv ProMonitors 800 250 pair 1 in dome tweeter 4 in mid woofer 4 2in passive radiator 8 sin high 4 Ib ProCenter 1000 200 pair 1 in dome tweeter 2 4 zin mid woofers 2 4 2in passive radiators 5 in high 8 Ib ProSub 800 z 399 8 in driver 8 in passive radiator 300 watt RMS amplifier 12 2 x 14 4x 13 zin 41 Ib Finish Gloss black matte white silver Subwoofer black ash or white vinyl DEFINITIVETECH COM 410 363 7148 Definitive Technology The Leader in High Performance THOWEN 11433 Cronridge Dr e Owings Mills MD 21117 410 363 7148 Visit us at www definitivetech com SOUND amp VISION NOVEMBER 2006 soundandvisionmag com
7. s good low end extension for a small sub delivering true 25 Hz output but only at 76 dB revealing its dynamic limitations It averaged 95 dB from 25 to 62 Hz and put out 103 7 dB max SPL at 62 Hz all at less than 10 distortion Tom Nousaine The ProCenter did a great job on dialogue and as integrated when heard from more than about 30 off axis becoming slightly muffled and hollow sounding on many male voices a common effect of lobing response from closely spaced dual woofer midranges And like the ProMonitors the center proved quite sensitive to vertical aiming As I ve mentioned to keep sounds evenly bright I had to tilt it up a good bit on my low stand The ProMonitors and ProCenter for that matter could play cleanly far louder than expected about as loud as plenty of much larger small bookshelf speakers I ve heard In fact their tweeters ran out of headroom resulting in hardness and shriekiness at about the same time as their woofers flatulating and tup tuping on transients which is quite rare among mini sats of this size And since Definitive s played unexpectedly loudly and cleanly I was also very happy with the ProMonitors at the rear corners When angled well back to reflect sound from the rear wall as I ve described the little 800s worked particularly well for plain non dipole 2 way surrounds Truly small 2 ways lik
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