[pr1roda]

Solved.

 

[ProtegeManiac]

Quote:

I'm a total noob in case of speaker setups. Please enlighten me, if anything had gone wrong with the title. Knowledge is really valuable.

I'm thinking of pairing KRK Rokit 4 G3 with SMSL Q5 pro. I think that I'm going wrong here somewhere. The thing is, the Q5s do not have XLR outputs, as they are not supposed to. However, for balanced input in the Rokit 4 G3, I either need XLR or TRS. RCA counts as unbalanced. If anyone has experience with this, please let me know how much this matters. I'm aware what balanced and unbalanced refer to, but what I want to know is, what I'm looking at in case these particulars.

The main reason behind going for Q5 is the remote control option and it's perfect for the budget I have.

 

The Rokit 4 G3, like most studio monitors, are powered speakers. They already have an amplifier built in. What you're trying to do if we'd do something like that for headphones is like using a headphone amp to drive a wireless headphone, except wireless headphones when they can use an analog input via a wire typically have some kind of bypass mode that ignores the built-in electronics.

 

With the G3 all you need is a preamp. If you really need a remote, some AudioGDs have a preamp output and remote control compatibility. Otherwise, if you don't want to spend that much (and you don't need the headphone amplifier built into the AudioGD anyway), there's the Audioengine D1 but the trade off is that it only uses single ended RCA outputs. Receivers that come with remotes from bigger brands don't get a preamp output until you're paying a heck of a lot of money (and you're paying for the DSP, the amplifier circuit, the power supply that powers all that, the heatsinks, the chassis, the iDevice licensing, etc).

 

Still, since your goal is to use a remote despite how the Q5 has a volume pot, I assume you won't be using this in a nearfield set-up (ie, you sit at a computer desk with the speakers on that desk), but on a more conventional playback set-up (listening chair, minimum 2m distance from the speakers), so you can use the Q5 with practically any passive speaker out there. For starters, you want to use the Q5 and are not even aware that the Rokit 4 has a bi-amp architecture, so might as well just go with convenience - and a speaker designed for listening at that distance than much closer - and get any passive speaker. There's a cheap Dayton speaker on PartsExpress right now that is basically the same speaker that has been often recommended here to pair with a cheap T-Amp, except a new version uses a ribbon tweeter. AFAIK it's around $60 for the pair. That's a lot cheaper than the Rokit 4.