Is bi amping worth it ?

@erik_squires and @russbotton (as well as OP)

Thank you for your informative input. I have learned a lot from you this morning.

This was a nice read. Unusual in the 'blast' climate we seem to be in.

You both contribute positively to our community and I wanted to say how much I personally am grateful for that . There are others here too that I am missing, but I wanted to let you know as I was reading through this.

Thanks,

Ken

OP - 

I do not have experience bi-amping as I have had a long path with Dynaudio speakers. There is one avenue that has been touched on here that I can offer some input.

As others have stated, adding 2 subwoofers can do a lot of good, and I will give a TLDR explanation in a bit. However, One person above did state what I consider to be the obvious and doesn’t cost much. Room placement, and treatment. Moving your speakers around makes a massive difference in sound. Moreso, sometimes, than different amplifiers. Your amplifiers have an enormous amount of (overkill) power for your speakers. Is it possible that you want new speakers?

TLDR;

Adding two subs will open up your bass regions - read clean bass - as well as increase your overall soundstage in both depth and width.

I truly thought this was ad-speak for subwoofer companies to sell more subs. I bought my first SVS SB-16 when my Velodyne DD gave up the ghost. I was tired of the amps needing to be repaired in the Velodynes, and they seemed to somewhat disappear for quite a while from the Subwoofer manufacturing game. So gave SVS a try. While it wasn’t as good as the Velodyne, it was about 95% IMO, it did go lower and with more output as well as being very easy to integrate. 

Because SVS has very good Client support (I say client as I repeatedly purchase from them) I rang them and asked if there was a real benefit of having multiples of subs. So, after that convo, I agreed to order another SB-16. I did tell them that I was probably going to return that one as I was mentally struggling with the concept as a single SB-16 was already too much sub for my 2.0 stereo needs and it wasn’t in a HT setup.

Long story short - (or long depending on your perspective) I now have dual subs on my main systems and am considering doing that for my office setups as well. It really did make that much of an improvement. 

I would also like to note, that most of my Dyn’s don’t really require subs and I usually don’t mind the subs being off.  Adding the dual subs in my systems is the single most important upgrade to sound next to swapping from a SS Pre to a Tube Pre. It really is that good.

Hoping this helped in some small way and didn’t detract from all of the above very solid input.

Thanks for starting this very informative thread!

Ken

• @hardhattg @russbutton 
• I mistakenly described my set up as vertical bi-amp. I was wrong, and am using horizontal bi-amping. We were having discussions about the various methods of wiring speakers and it got me to thinking that I might not know what I was talking about. First time for everything I guess. :) I now have to wonder if doing the vertical set up would help in some way. Worth a try. All I know for sure is that doubling up the power to my old speakers made a world of difference. It may not in a lot of newer speakers or with newer amps. This seems to be how Paul McGowan feels about it anyway. 
• Note to OP, I also checked my AR9 owners manual and it does address this, offering both methods of bi-amping AR9's. It goes on to say that the AR9 was built such that the woofers and the mid/treble section have equal power requirements and it is critical to use two equal stereo amps or 4 equal mono amps. It also says to never attempt to disable the crossover or ever use an external one. 
• I also read the specs and while the range is given as 18hz to 30khz, it does say that they are off by -3db at 28hz. Just how these measurements were made, I have no idea. All I can say is that the bass literally became twice as good by adding a second equal amp.
• BTW, site is really dragging again today. 

I have used a McIntosh MC206 6 channel to biamp AK6 Khorns and a center Heresey.   I'm very happy with the bass and overall sound.

Nope. Next question.