SVS Ultra Speakers User Manual

SPEAKER SERIES

ULTRA TOWER
ULTRA BOOKSHELF
ULTRA CENTER

OWNER’S MANUAL

ULTRA SURROUND

Thank you, and congratulations on purchasing your
new SVS Ultra Speaker!

The SVS Ultra series loudspeakers were designed for audio enthusi­asts, by audio enthusiasts with over fifty years combined experience in
the high-end audio arena, with a relentless passion for designing a
stunning, acoustically impeccable loudspeaker that convincingly
conveys the emotion of live music and home theater. The SVS Ultra
series delivers a deep, detailed soundstage with incredible resolution,
absolute transparency, and amazingly rich and articulated bass, outper­forming speakers two and three times their price.

If you ever have any questions about your SVS product, or need help
setting them up, feel free to contact us directly.

www.svsound.com • [e-mail] • [phone]

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owner’s manual v. 1.1_01282013

TABLE OF CONTENTS

SETTING UP YOUR ULTRA SPEAKERS 3
FOOT OPTIONS 3
ACOUSTICS & ROOM PLACEMENT 4
ACOUSTICS 5
ROOM PLACEMENT 6
CONNECTION OPTIONS 7
ULTRA SURROUND WALL MOUNTING 8
SURROUND MODES (DUET) 9
SURROUND MODES (BIPOLE & DIPOLE) 10
CARING FOR YOUR ULTRA SPEAKERS 11
WARRANTY 11
FEATURES & SPECIFICATIONS 12
ULTRA TOWER 12
ULTRA BOOKSHELF 13
ULTRA CENTER 14
ULTRA SURROUND 15

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SETTING UP YOUR ULTRA SPEAKERS

The Ultra Tower speakers come packaged with two sets of foot support
options that allow optimal placement on a variety of floor substrates. The
Elastomer Isolation feet that come pre-installed on the Ultra Towers can be
removed (unscrew to remove) and replaced with the included Threaded Metal
Spike kit. Both sets of feet are threaded to allow easy leveling of the Ultra
Towers if they should stand on an uneven surface.

Elastomer Isolation Feet

Threaded Metal Spikes

FOOT OPTIONS

The Ultra Bookshelf, Ultra Center and Ultra
Surround also include stick-on bumper kits that
can be attached to the bottom of your speakers
to protect them when placed on speaker stands
and other surfaces.

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SETTING UP YOUR ULTRA SPEAKERS

Front Left/Right Loudspeaker Placement and Room Acoustics:

Proper placement of the front left/right speakers is essential to achieve the smoothest frequency
response, optimal stereo imaging and the most spacious, three-dimensional soundstage.

Stereo imaging and soundstage are affected by loudspeaker location and the listening position,
relative to each other and room boundaries. Moving the loudspeakers away from room boundaries
will tend to improve stereo imaging and spaciousness by attenuating and delaying boundary
reflections, thus optimizing direct sound and helping to preserve spatial information in the
recording.

The amount of exposed glass, drywall and bare flooring in the room will increase the amount of
reflected sound and exacerbate problems like slap echo and ringing. Conversely, furnishings like
carpeting, drapes and upholstered furniture will reduce the amount of reflected sound in the room.
The ratio of direct-to-reflected sound and the decay characteristics of the listening environment will
have a large influence on the ultimate sound quality of any loudspeaker system. Dedicated room
treatments like absorbers, diffusers and bass traps can greatly improve the sound quality of any
listening environment, and are encouraged to extract the absolute best performance from any
high-end loudspeaker system.

SVS recommends starting with the front loudspeakers located 30-degrees to the left and right (i.e.,
a 60-degree total window) of the listening position. Toeing-in the loudspeakers 5-10 degrees can
often improve imaging, however this is also a function of the distance from nearby boundaries and
the ratio of direct-to-reflected sound, so experimentation with toe-in is recommended to obtain
optimal results.

The location of the front loudspeakers relative to nearby boundaries will excite various room modes
(a complex pattern of standing waves with associated peaks and nulls), which will affect the bass
response of the loudspeakers. Generally, placing the loudspeakers closer to room boundaries
(particularly corners) will increase the bass response. Conversely, moving the loudspeakers away
from boundaries and corners will reduce the bass response. Due to the complex interaction of the
loudspeakers with nearby boundaries/corners and your listening position, significant changes to the
bass response can occur with very small changes in either loudspeaker location or listening
position, so experimentation with both placement and listening position is recommended to obtain
optimal results.

A smaller tightly-enclosed listening room with a
high amount of 'room gain' (a naturally rising
low-end response) may cause an excessively
strong bass response from the Ultra Tower
model, regardless of its placement location in the
room. If this occurs, insert the included foam
port plugs into the port opening of each Ultra
Tower (see diagram). To obtain a good seal,
insert the foam port plug slightly below flush of
the port flare. Inserting the foam port plug
creates a low-Q sealed acoustic alignment, and
results in an earlier roll-off of the bass response.
This will often be a better complement to the
acoustics of a smaller tightly-enclosed listening
environment, resulting in a more balanced and
natural-sounding bass response.

ACOUSTICS & ROOM PLACEMENT

Ultra Tower Port Tuning

Port Open

Port Sealed

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SETTING UP YOUR ULTRA SPEAKERS

A note about Ultra Tower phase and A/V receiver auto-setup processes.

AUTO EQ - START

MIC INPUT

The Ultra Tower side-firing woofer array is designed to provide a more
accurate in-room bass response than a conventional front-firing tower by
uniformly loading the room, thereby reducing amplitude variations caused by
room modes. Since the woofers are side-firing, the bass at the listening
position is a combination of direct and reflected sound waves.

This may result in a phase warning during the A/V receiver auto-setup
process. If a phase warning is encountered, it does not necessarily mean
there is a problem with the Ultra Tower speaker setup.

ACOUSTICS (cont’d)

While moving the Ultra Tower slightly closer or farther away from nearby
wall boundaries may clear the phase warning, doing so is not required to
obtain optimal bass performance, and the phase warning may be safely
disregarded if the loudspeakers are already located in the preferred room
location.

As a matter of good practice, any time a phase warning is encountered, the
polarity of the wiring at the loudspeaker and amplifier should be double­checked and corrected as needed.

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