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Servo-Controlled Bass Amplifier Protection 

The servo-bass amplifier has numerous protection circuits built in to 
protect both the amplifier and the woofers. If you over-drive the 
amplifier, it will self-protect and you will hear clicking or thumping 
sounds. This is caused by the amplifier limiting current to the 
woofers (much like the over-rev fuel-cut off in sports car engines). 

If that happens, turn down the volume of your system to protect 
your hearing and your speakers. The amplifier is designed to be 
current-limited to 20amps – this is more than enough to supply over 
1600W transients to the woofers. However, the servo-system in the 
G2 is not compression or dynamic limited. Hence, it is possible to 
play the system too loud, and damage the woofers (and also 
possibly blow your ribbons). 

Due to the efficiency of the amplification modules, they deliver 
and draw current extremely quickly. Even though in a well-wired 
home it is unlikely, you may find that a very loud bass drum thwack 
will cause your lights to dim, or the circuit breakers to trip if you do 
not supply enough power to your system. 

A possible solution will be to install an additional 20amp circuit in 
your listening room, and purchase an additional power supply to 
separate the power needs of the left and right woofer towers. Also, 
the Maximum Dynamic Headroom Reservoir (developed for the 
Genesis Reference Amplifier) is available as an optional upgrade. 

A Word about Finish 

The G2 is entirely covered in high-gloss acrylic. Acrylic was picked 
for its sonic properties as well as its beauty. However, acrylic is a 
soft material that can scratch easily. 

Every G2 system is delivered with a 3-stage acrylic polish system 
by Novus. Do not use any other cleaners or polish on your G2 
loudspeakers. In particular, DO NOT use paper towels to wipe the 
surface of your loudspeakers. Paper fibres are extremely abrasive 
and can introduce fine scratches on the surface. If dusting is 
necessary, we recommend a soft feather duster. 

Summary of Contents for G2.2

Page 1: ...Two ...

Page 2: ...PLIFIER PROTECTION 12 A WORD ABOUT FINISH 12 TUNING THE SYSTEM 13 BEGIN WITH THE BASS LEVEL 13 IMAGING AND SOUNDSTAGE 14 PHASE CONTROL 15 FURTHER ADJUSTMENTS 16 THE REFINEMENT STAGE 17 MAKE ONE CHANGE AT A TIME 17 DEFINING THE SOUNDSTAGE 18 APPROPRIATE MID BASS LOW BASS BALANCE 18 ROOM TREATMENT 19 MASTERING THE REFINEMENTS OF THE SYSTEM 20 THE TECHNOLOGY 22 DESIGN PHILOSOPHY 22 THE GENESIS RIBBON...

Page 3: ...uce music at ear splitting levels If you are looking for just LOUD this is the wrong loudspeaker A Ferrari and a Caterpillar may have the same price and horsepower but they are very different vehicles and you wouldn t use your Ferrari to move a load of gravel Please read this Owners Manual and Set up Guide to get the maximum enjoyment out of your purchase Also if you have access to the internet pl...

Page 4: ...iii absolute fidelity This page intentionally left blank Warranty Statement and Extended Registration Card should be placed here ...

Page 5: ...o make a plan of where you will place them You will not need a huge room but at a minimum the room should be about 16 feet 5m wide where the speakers will be placed You should have a minimum of at least 6 feet 2m of space behind the speakers The listening position should be a minimum of 10 feet 3m from the front of the midrange ribbon to allow for proper integration of the drivers In a typical pla...

Page 6: ...ll result in better integration of the bass frequencies to the room Keep the side of the woofer towers no less than 16 inches from the sidewall The suggestions here are typical in a minimum space With a larger room it is possible and optimal to have a layout as shown below with the midrange tweeters and woofers equidistant from the listening position Still the woofer towers should be placed asymme...

Page 7: ...lp The G2 2 loudspeaker system with crates weigh a total of 1 400 lbs Each woofer tower weighs over 220 lbs and each tweeter tower weighs over 150 lbs and they have to be lifted out of the shipping crates We are not liable for damage to either the speakers or your backs during unpacking and setting up We suggest the use of a forklift to move these crates around and at least four strong people to u...

Page 8: ...tly transfer vibration to the floorboards A couple of points to note during the assembly of the acoustic suspension system 1 The triangular hole in the suspension frame points to the front of the speaker towards the listener 2 Do not over tighten the shock absorbers that are pre installed on the cabinet finger tight is sufficient A hex key or allen wrench is supplied to tighten the bolts holding t...

Page 9: ...Control Module with left and right balanced inputs and two control outputs 2 A pair of Control Interface Cables CIC these have 7 pin Neutrik connectors at each end 3 A pair of Servo Bass Interconnects SBI with XLR connectors at one end and a pair of banana plugs or optionally spades at the other end 4 Two Servo feedback Amplifier Modules with one control input and two Neutrik 50 amp Speakon output...

Page 10: ...e Servo feedback Amplifiers would ideally be set closer to the woofer towers with shorter Servo Bass Cables and the Control module can be placed between the midrange tweeter wings Using the supplied CIC link the Control Module to each of the Servo feedback Amplifiers One amplifier module is for the RIGHT woofer tower and the other will be for the LEFT This can be determined by the last letter of t...

Page 11: ...essary Midrange Tweeter Connections Next connect the mid tweeter panels to your power amplifier using a pair of high quality loudspeaker cables not supplied to the 5 way binding posts We recommend using good quality spade connectors for this job There are two ways to get the music signal from your hifi system to the Servo Controlled Bass Amplifier to drive the woofers The first and preferred way i...

Page 12: ... servo bass amplifier Your preamplifier will need to have two sets of outputs or you will need to use a high quality Y cable not supplied If you use this method of connection your power amplifier will be driving the midrange tweeter towers and the servo controlled bass amplifier will be driven in parallel by your preamp As no power amplifier is straight wire with gain we do not recommend this way ...

Page 13: ...n on on When you make any adjustments the display flashes to identify the function that is being adjusted The bass volume or gain is controlled with the Ch and buttons The Vol and buttons are used for your main volume control on your preamplifier When you first press one of the volume control buttons the currently set volume will flash The next press will move the volume up or down Pressing and ho...

Page 14: ...m The high pass filter determines how low the woofers will play and the low pass filter determines how high the woofers play to The frequency that you set these filters to will be the knee frequency after which the woofers will attenuate by 6dB per octave and is not the 3dB point The high pass filter and low pass filter is set using the up down left right navigation ring around the OK button Up do...

Page 15: ...uller in the lower midrange while position three will sound leaner and have more upper midrange The less obvious effect more obvious to some people of the midrange control is to make the soundstage sound more forward and change the perceived height and position of the performance Relative to position two you can raise the soundstage by moving to position three it s like moving your seat forwards i...

Page 16: ...ely quickly Even though in a well wired home it is unlikely you may find that a very loud bass drum thwack will cause your lights to dim or the circuit breakers to trip if you do not supply enough power to your system A possible solution will be to install an additional 20amp circuit in your listening room and purchase an additional power supply to separate the power needs of the left and right wo...

Page 17: ... down too much Concentrate on the mid bass regions as opposed to the very low bass in your recording to achieve a natural blend The voice and the music accompaniment should sound as if it were cut from one cloth not separate If the voice sounds thin or does not have enough chest to its sound turn the woofers amplifier s volume up till it does If you find that turning the volume up creates too much...

Page 18: ...he loudspeakers and be at the appropriate height for a standing person If it is not there are several remedies that will address this Assuming that the vocal recording is accurate if the vocalist appears to be larger than life you should first check the system volume Is it a volume that would be appropriate for someone actually singing in your room If there is too much volume the artist will appea...

Page 19: ...nels from 1 to 3 degrees inwards towards your seating position until you have a properly defined center image When properly set up very little sound should appear to come directly from the speaker instead the sound stage should extend far beyond the left and right edge of the loudspeakers and they should have tremendous front to back depth When the recording is close miked when the instrument or p...

Page 20: ...elow The other change to listen for is rhythm and timing Adjusting the phase will subtly change the relationship between the bass and the midrange When you get the phase perfectly correct you will find that the timing between the vocalist and the double bass snaps in place and your foot will start to tap and you will sway to the music This is basically what we term PRaT or Pace Rhythm and Timing F...

Page 21: ...er towers equidistant from the midrange towers However have one woofer tower further to the side of one midrange tower and have the other woofer tower further to the back of the other midrange tower It may look strange but the principle here is to position the midrange tweeter towers for the best imaging and soundstage and the woofer towers for the smoothest and best bass and ambience retrieval Th...

Page 22: ...so be caused by the recording Try another recording if you cannot achieve what you are trying to do Appropriate Mid bass Low bass Balance Yet another problem is a lack of mid bass energy In order for the appropriate amount of mid bass energy to be present the speakers should be close enough together to achieve proper coupling of the midrange ribbon driver Coupling is desirable in the lower frequen...

Page 23: ...optimize your new speaker s performance This is because large space ambience information is largely in the lowest frequencies The wavelength of a 20Hz soundwave is approximately 60 feet 20m so if you want to recreate the soundspace of a cathedral you will need to go lower than even 20Hz In order to achieve what the speaker is capable of we suggest you focus your efforts on a proper balance of soun...

Page 24: ...irable because it is slightly delayed from the original sound This point on the sidewall can be easily determined with the help of a second person and a mirror Sitting in your listening position have an assistant hold a mirror up on the sidewall Move the mirror until you can see the tweeter This is the point of first reflection A diffuser see your dealer an absorptive material or even a CD rack ca...

Page 25: ... on hundreds and hundreds of hours of critical listening There are changes we can make to the crossover that we can measure but can hardly hear the difference And then there are the changes that we make that we can easily hear but cannot measure It is an artform as much as a science Setting up the audio system is the same If you have any questions feel free to contact us at Genesis Our website is ...

Page 26: ...77 There are still only two proper ways for a transducer to propagate sound in a room a point source and a line source Anything else or everything in between is a compromise In order for all frequencies of sound from the loudspeaker to reach the listener at exactly the same time a coherent wave front is important not just time alignment of drivers The ideal is either an infinitely small pulsating ...

Page 27: ...twice as loud as a point source loudspeaker This is the great advantage that a line source loudspeaker will have over a point source loudspeaker in a large room particularly when the seating distance is over 4m from the loudspeaker The second great advantage of the line source over the point source is that the change in loudness is much less over a small change in distance Hence it results in a mu...

Page 28: ...6 kHz The result of this design is a driver that has a rapid and uniform response to high frequencies and has the speed of the best ribbon electrostatic designs without the high distortion and poor dispersion that is typically associated with them The G2 2 uses twelve of these tweeters configured as a vertical line source Because the output is distributed over many drivers each works at very low s...

Page 29: ...o systems The technology has been constantly updated and refined over the past 40 years The concept of our servo bass system is an easy one to understand It employs an accelerometer as a sensor to constantly monitor the movement of the woofer cone and continuously compares it to the input signal This comparison circuit instantly identifies any deviation from the input and applies a corrective sign...

Page 30: ... linearly as a perfect piston it is unable to correct for distortion caused by cone wobble bending and break up Hence the drivers were designed to minimize these non linear distortions The woofers are a uniquely designed metal cone driver made for the Genesis servo system Made with a cone of solid aluminium the suspension and voicecoil have been maximized for long distortion free excursion so as t...

Page 31: ...PDS power supplies are used one for two channels to deliver balanced dynamics which are critical to bass accuracy This improves the power factor of the power supply in delivering the bass frequencies resulting in floorshakingly musical bass to power the servo woofers A further advantage to separating the amplifier modules of the left and right woofer towers is that if you are lucky enough to have ...

Page 32: ...ke cups under the spike A pin point suspension system is designed to pass all frequencies Using a spike cup under the spike will defeat this system The spike passes all frequencies to the spike cup and then depending on the diameter of the spike cup it passes only frequencies below a particular frequency A copper penny gets deformed the spike making an indentation where it meets the penny and a li...

Page 33: ...ower 270 lbs 123kg each Servo Bass Amplifier 90 lbs 41kg total Frequency Response 16Hz to 36kHz 3dB Controls on amplifier Bass gain phase low pass high pass Controls on speaker Rear Tweeters 1 5 dB Midrange 0 75 dB Input Impedance 4 ohms nominal 33K ohms amplifier Sensitivity 91 dB watt 1 meter Amplifier Power Rating 4 channels 400 watts each Power Supply 1 8kVA Amplifier Inputs 1pair XLR balanced...

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