Help with speaker set up

[MuseIcal]

After listening to Van Halen at a moderate volume, (0-98 scale - with volume set on 55) the tweeters in my one year old Monitor Audio S 200s being powered by my Denon AVR X6500H are shot. Blown. No sound emanating from within the MA boxes...
I was/am a little surprised. And, disappointed. Power is clean. No surge protection. Dedicated twenty amp breakers.

Called/emailed MA, and they say, they will send new tweeters. Not sure when.

In the meantime, I ordered a pair of Focal Chora 826s to try. Retained MA center channel....for now.

My room is 14' wide and 17' from the front wall to the rear wall. Main listening position is 16' from the front wall. Couch is on the rear wall with a love seat on one side and a bay window on the other side.
Room is carpeted with small area of tile at the entrance way.
Speakers are 18" away from the wall and about 6' apart.

Music is mostly, Pandora, or digital files in MP3 and FLAC. Rock, Jazz, Classical,.. All genres excluding pop and country. Well, new pop/country.
90% music, 10% movies/tv I don't listen at concert level Dbs.

Took out the MA S200s and plugged in the Choras. Did not run room correction. Played a little with some settings but not too much. Couldn't get the 'sound' right.
Ran Room Correction today, Audyssey MultiEQ XT 32, and was more disappointed by the sound.
First, I kept getting an error saying the speakers are wired out of phase. Checked the back of the speaker, in phase, checked the back of the receiver, in phase. Same with the surrounds.
Selected ignore and continued.

The front L/R speakers were set to large and -6.5dbs and crossed over at 40Hz.. The distances were right anyway. Sub was set 50% before EQ started. After EQ sub was set to -9.5 dbs.
EQ was set to 'Reference'.


I don't know, the sound is different from what I was imagining it would be with the Choras. Honestly, I'm unsure of what I was expecting...
The bass sounds flat and predominate.
I'm sure it's more my ears and room than anything else.

Apologies if this is too convoluted. Wanted to give as much information. Not sure if the info given is relevant, but here it is.

Any thoughts will be much appreciated.

Thank you!

https://www.focal.com/en/home-audio/high-fidelity-speakers/chora/chora-826

The Chora 826 features a one-inch aluminum/magnesium inverted-dome tweeter (with a perforated protective cover), a 6.5-inch Slatefiber midrange driver, and two 6.5-inch Slatefiber bass drivers in a three-way configuration, with crossovers set at 2,700 Hz and 270 Hz. A front-facing reflex port beneath the bottom bass driver brings low frequency response down to a very respectable 48Hz (-3dB), with extension down to 39 Hz at -6dB. Speaker measures just 41.5 inches high by 15.25 inches deep and just shy of 12 inches wide.

 

[andreasmaaan]

I would make sure firstly that the speakers (or perhaps one individual driver, if a mistake was made at the factory) are not wired in opposite polarity. I presume you have a measurement mic and software?

 

[MuseIcal]

I would make sure firstly that the speakers (or perhaps one individual driver, if a mistake was made at the factory) are not wired in opposite polarity. I presume you have a measurement mic and software?

Thank you for the fast reply.

Okay, I was thinking it either was a factory defect or a malfunction with Audyssey software because everything is wired correctly outside.

I have the mic that came with the Denon 6500 and no other software or mics.
I'm familiar with REW and the like, but trying to set things properly may go over my head.

 

[AnalogSteph]

The definition of acoustic speaker phase may vary from manufacturer to manufacturer and even between different series of one manufacturer. You can try to verify it by briefly holding the cable to an AA battery and observing in which direction the bass driver will move. It is basically irrelevant which absolute phase you settle on, it just has to be consistent between all speakers.

 

[MuseIcal]

You can try to verify it by briefly holding the cable to an AA battery and observing in which direction the bass driver will move. It is basically irrelevant which absolute phase you settle on, it just has to be consistent between all speakers.

While running Audyssey, I was watching the cones to see if they were moving in or out. Is this on par with what you're suggesting?
They looked to be moving 'out'.

 

[andreasmaaan]

While running Audyssey, I was watching the cones to see if they were moving in or out. Is this on par with what you're suggesting?
They looked to be moving 'out'.

They'll be moving in and out with Audyssey, because they're receiving an AC signal. The battery test just pushes the cones in one direction initially and then holds them there.

You won't be able to visually determine whether the speakers are in reverse polarity just by looking at them moving back and forth (they will be moving too fast).