My new-to-me amplifier, a Bedini 200/200

I have and I've settled in a really good spot, I think.

Back to using just one sub. If I left it at old settings (42 hz low pass, gain at about midnight I'd guess), it seemed to overpower the rest of the presentation, even into the midrange. Guitars and horns didn't seem to have as much bite. So out of that experiment, I went back to no subs.

So I tried one last thing - I backed the crossover all the way down to 34 Hz, or about as low as it goes. Dialed the gain back just a tad, and I'm really liking it. Dynamics in the midrange and that "pop" these speakers can deliver is all still there but that last bit of foundation in Classical and Electronic music is fully formed, doesn't overpower anything, and it all works together nicely.

Didn't run any measurements, just purely going on listening enjoyment. I think I'll stick with the single sub at this point. Maybe down the line I'll go with a more musical unit like something from JL Audio or REL, that lets me set an even steeper crossover point (SVS is 12 db/octave, I think).

And I can say I've almost worn out the new Tool album down in my room. While it's not perfect throughout, it absolutely lights the room up with excellently recorded percussion, and has been a great reference for the tweaks I've been trying out with the sub arrangement.

 

Nice, are you running your F260's full range and naturally letting them roll off, or are you running a high pass filter on them? 34HZ makes sense since the 3 dB down point of your 260's is 32HZ.

The new Tool album is definitely a good test CD, especially Chocolate Chip Trip!

 

Thanks for sharing! I've also gone the single sub route on my end, I believe currently I have the crossover set to a couple of clicks up from the lowest and gain is a couple of clicks above 9 o'clock. Seems to work pretty well in my room so far but I am still experimenting with it and speaker placement so nothing set in stone just yet.

Next step will be adding another Vidar and running it all fully balanced, though I've been looking at class A amps with balanced inputs under 3k lately (not a whole lot of choices at that price range that can deliver 200w into 4ohms and have balanced inputs though).

 

Yep, full range on the 260s. For such a tiny window of bandwidth, and these things never seem to lose their cool, bottom out, or have any sort of port noise even at very high volume, I don't want to run into the sub(s) and then back out to the amp. I did try it that way before but I prefer the full range + lowest octave reinforcement approach on the whole.

CCT is absolutely a blast to hear on a well-adjusted setup in a good room. It's well, trippy

@elmoe - There's a McCormack DNA2, no upgrades, but looks mint, for sale on the Hoffman forums classifieds for $1700 and he has everything needed to ship it.

I don't need it, but man do I want it. It has XLR ins, but I'm not sure if it's truly balanced or not. But that's a grail amp for me.

 

Thanks @toddrhodes im not a member there so no access to classifieds but that gives me another option to look at. Not quite ready to make a purchase yet.

 

Wait, you have to plug it in? I thought you said it was a Bedini.

Which, for those who don't know Bedini's history, is a joke about John Bedini's fascination with perpetual-motion machines and magical free energy generation. He's zany.

But he seemed to be serious about audio gear. And he did interesting stuff that nobody else was doing -- like building speaker cables for high-powered systems out of just two strands of 30-gauge wire with a transformer at each end, or designing equipment to be powered from rechargeable batteries instead of AC. The friend who introduced me to high-end audio found one of those battery-powered Bedini preamps back in the 90s. It was pretty cool -- didn't need a huge supply for ripple-free power, couldn't produce AC hum, didn't get hot -- and he liked the sound. He had a little "range anxiety" at first, but the thing ran for days and days on a charge.

Anyway, congratulations on getting that amp. I'm not surprised that it sounds good.

 

I've seen that whole "wireless power" thing they pitched at one point. It's... interesting. Nevertheless, I'm happy to report the Bedini has settled in very nicely. I actually had a bit of a scare about 10 days ago - was listening to a track off Stravinsky - The Firebird and there is a very, very large drum at one point. I must have had this thing cranked far more than I thought (the one downfall of OG Saga, I cannot tell where volume is since I mostly use the remote), but it popped a fuse. I figured it was the inline fuse to the right speaker but it was actually the fuse just before the transistor section.

I replaced all the fuses with new, "better" fuses. Nothing crazy, but I have to think the fuses that were in there were every bit of 30+ years old. Since the change, and the new fuse holders, and the updated RCA input jacks, we're smooth sailing and I still marvel at how bold this amplifier is, yet it's also very delicate up top and insightful in the midrange. Just a really cool piece of gear, frankly.

I also have settled on a pretty basic 4-pot surge protector. I have the amp and the Saga plugged into it and I just flip the switch on about an hour before I'll listen, and turn it off when I'm done. For the amount of output and current this amp is capable of, it doesn't even get warm to the touch with the active cooling inside it, and that's after hours of beating on it.

I've been procrastinating on selling my Odyssey, but that's coming, as soon as I stop being lazy.