Absolutely spot on. Bass performance is hardest to optimize. I needed to re-arrange my living room after trying 4 different setups (orientations of speakers + subs) so find out which one works best. Living in a concrete walled apartment. Now, with non-ported speakers (ATC SCM40) and 2 REL subs placed inside of them, bass is quite even, quite deep, quite satisfying. One crucial element to success is proper floor (de)coupling, I use Isoacoustics feet.
Great subject and well thought out guidance on bass issues in home audio systems. So far I have achieved my best sounding bass by moving my large floor standers well out from the wall and integrating two large subwoofers into the mix. If using subwoofers, I have found it important to purchase subwoofer’s that have multiple adjustments available on the plate amp for fine tuning to the room sound acoustics. Subwoofers that are designed with built-in servo control of the woofer cone. My two subwoofers have this design feature, which allows adjustment of woofer damping, which I believe has been key to my excellent bass control in my listening room. My floor standers are capable of 23 Hz, however below say, 70 Hz the subwoofers do a far better job of producing beautiful sounding bass.
I agree that moving speakers away from the walls helps immensely. But the practical problem for many of us is that we just don't have the space available to do that. My speakers are about 2 feet from the back wall, and that's about as much as I can do given the dimensions of my multi-use family room.
Wow, that’s a great review. Tom and there’s one more element that you could’ve discussed and that is if your main speakers are ported or sealed, you probably want a subwoofer that’s the same ported or sealed because the speed that the woofer reacts to this music will integrate best if for example, you have sealed main speaker and a sealed subwoofer with no port.
That could easily be the case. Certainly the LF rolloff slopes will be different and perhaps different manufacturers allow for this under the assumption of matching.
Great vid. Room correction software like Anthem ARC, etc makes life much easier and I will never be without it or similar. Room EQ and base management/DSP, makes most of these problems moot, or at least much easier to address.
I have an acoustic ceiling, base traps ceiling to floor in each corner, defusers, and 8 pound pad under commercial carpeting. I also did THX microphone room setup with the microphone and my subwoofers issue are mostly good. Running good crossovers and playing with time alignment also helps. Thanks for the video!
I use the rel 812 with the high gain connection, It matches perfectly with my speakers and has the sound signature of my amplifier due to the type of connection. I’m very happy with it and I would never go back. All I want is a second one just for the sound pressure and even better sound stage, not directivity of the sound. Placement, gain level, and crossover is what it’s all about.
Thank you sir! Interesting 4 facts... But I find it hard to really find a good solution to implement... This concept need sub/woofers working in the +500 Hz range and need to be placed very precise in the room, stereo image wise, one per side. Smaller monitors is only needed to handle the upper part (+200 Hz) without playing bass information. This separation is mandatory to be able to EQ sub/woofers separately... Larger full range speakers will be over kill... There are probably as many tries to manage bass integration as there are people trying :) My way to accomplish good bass response are: First, I have a dedicated room to really have the chance to get nuts. It is made by thick concrete floor/walls/roof so the room nodes are heavy but without almost any leakage. I have tried to tame the long ringing nodes up to 500 Hz region by adding around 300 kg (!) of mineral stone wool here and there in the 25 m2 room. Yes it is a lot of absorbers, but it has also made my water fall delay time quite short down in the 70-80 Hz range. Below that is impossible to tame without using other tools like resonant absorbers. I like a dry direct sound from the speakers, not adding reverb from the room, only from intended record. That´s me! By using a lot of subwoofers in the 4 corners and with PEQ using REW + MiniDsp I have made the overall response quite to my liking. The bass is dry and full of texture. I use 100 Hz 24 dB/oct filters on front and back subs and use planar speakers as full range way out in the room. Planar speakers are known for weak mid bass (read slam) and by over lap multi subs it has turned my system to an amazing one. I have been experimenting with my room, treatment, speaker placement, EQ, time alignment for many, many years... I vote for multi-sub with EQ and match full rangers carefully and use as much room treatment you can accept. Good luck!
Two people I know of who researched bass related problems are, Roy Allison when he was at Acoustic Researsh and Floyd Toole at Harman Corporation. Allison addressed the problem of how woofers best interface with a room and the suckout problem around 200 hz. Toole addressed the problem of how many woofers do you need and where to place them in a room. My best sound system addresses these problems and more. They employ the findings of Allison's research. They are towers with two 12 inch side firing woofers, one on each side. They were originally used in designs that crossed them over at 1khz. In this design they are crossed over at 200 hz at 18 db per octave. The woofers are close to the floor and the manufacturer recommended placing them within 2 inches of the wall behind them and not near side walls. This 4 way 5 driver system has an 8 inlnch forward firing lower midrange driver that was used as a woofer in the manufacturer's lower priced systems. Toole said you need 4 woofers and that's what I have but his ideal placement was in 4 corners or at the midwall on 4 sides. The best way to address the room resonance problem is the way Dick Burwen did, build a room with no parallel surfaces. Short of that breaking up large uninterrupted planar surfaces with furniture and other room furnishings helps. As for leakage if you live in a house in a rural area like I do where there are no closeby neighbors who will be bothered just pump more power in. There is a lot you can learn from the Fletcher Munson curves. One thing looking at the bass, the curves are squashed closely together compared to higher frequencies. What this means is that once low bass is loud enough to hear it each small incremental increase in its actual loudness will have a disproportionately large increase in its subjective loudness. Therefore because of variations of the way recordings are made you need a way to adjust the relative loudness of just the low bass for each recording. Much of the subjective power of sound comes from deep low bass tones. As hard as it is to get the bass right, IMO the treble is much harder and if you don't get that right, for me nothing else matters
Yes. I love bass, but I can live with it being wrong when it is lower level than ideal. Bad midrange and treble are a problem any which way you choose. Still, one wants it all..
@thomasmartin2219 I'm not an audiophile, I'm an engineer and a music lover. I've loved both live and recorded music all of my life. I do not and have never worked in this industry. As an engineer I'm uncompromising. So when something doesn't work the way I want it to I have to figure out why and what if anything can be done about it. At 12 years old I heard stereophonic sound for the first time and loved it. I became an audiophile. At 25 years old I built and heard what the industry claimed was their ultimate solution, the disaster called quadraphonic sound. I hated it instantly, threw my audiophile hat in the trash, realized the gurus in this industry were clueless, and figured it out for myself. It's not an easy problem. Anyway I've been playing with and enjoying what I invented nearly 50 years ago. My journey is over. I have exactly what I wanted. The only thing left to do for me is to enjoy it. But I do also enjoy watching these videos showing me what I could have become if I hadn't thrown that hat away.
@glenncurry3041 yes. I've added 11 indirect firing tweeters per channel and revoiced them using extensive equalization. They are the main speakers in my experimental and best sound system. I don't shop or listen to other peoples' sound systems. They sound the way I want them to. The bass is the best I've ever heard. The F3 is 28 hz and the Q is 0.5. (AR3 type is 43 hz and I think Q is .707) My spectrum analyzer shows it produces sound down to at least 4 hz. Careful adjustment of the FR for each recording is necessary. I do that with most of the sound systems in my house but that's the only one I ever listen to anymore. Good thing there are two subsonic filters in series in the signal chain.
@@markfischer3626 I was an AR Rep when those were introduced. Travelled 6 S.E. states with a pair of those, 90's, 92, ... I think the combo was? Maybe a 91 in there...? Been a few years. Gave in store seminars on design, acoustic blanket, ... My 2nd oldest son has a pair I pushed him into buying some years ago! Loves them! Driven by LO-7M's, I was a Kenwood rep as well and introduced that series. And my oldest has my old 91's, driven by a pair of LO-7M's. I have Maggie 1.7i.
I ave been reading absolute sound since time immemorial. This is how I set up my subs 40 years ago: Place the subs slightly closer to yourself than the main speaker Connect the main speakers with red to black and black to red! Play a cd with lots of low frequencies Turn the phase knob until the low frequencies sound least loud. It means 180 degree out of phase. Reconnect the main. Speakers black to black and red to red. Now it’s in phase ! Good business!
So many people don't really understand fundamental base. This presentation goes in the right direction. Subwoofers theoretically can't couple with the main's because they have different T/S parameters and therefore can not sync, and couple leading to tones being messed up. When you have to distance the two because there is cancellations, your really just getting cabin pressure that sounds like bass. Subwoofers do sound good for sine wave reporduction when the main cant play that low. Thats why leading thought is to have a very low filter applied, And have the sub "disappear"
For most normal listening rooms, chasing excellent sub-bass is a fool’s errand. It is best to understand a room’s limitations, then work within those limitations. In my room, I have settled on full-range open baffles with no subs. I’ve tried with subs and I much prefer the audio presentation without subs.
@@pironi2405 I agree.. 90% of the time I'm listening to music with just a pair 2 way Dynaudio stand mounts. Now for movies, 100% subwoofer! A big, fat, sealed 15" Paradigm Studio 15.. with VERY usable bass well below 20 hz, which IS what a SUBwoofer is yeah 😀
Excellent information - I've found tinkering around with a pair of subs that the crossover points are very much higher than I initially and instinctively began with - the information Tom is presenting seems to add some assurance to my findings via experimentation without actual measurements - Also, Magnepan seems to be onto this approach as I'm understanding the proto types of the subs they're currently working on are nearly full range producers.
This just isn't true. Subs should normally be set really low (40 Hz) unless you have tiny speakers with limited bass or if they're used for Home Theater.
@@carlosoliveira-rc2xt I'm cool with that Carlos - - that's always been my thoughts as well, certainly a "safe" way to go, usually works very well - - some recent experimentation has changed my mind about that "standard" so I no longer believe that is the "only" way to go - and here comes Magnepan with their nearly full range subs lending some credence to this newer approach - - in my own experience with Maggies, back in the day, 80's, 90's, early 2000's (I had the MGIIIa's), I simply couldn't make subs work, coherence didn't seem possible, even with "servo" controlled subs - - the later sub designs have turned my head a bit - - the set up I'm messing with now are with the 3.7i maggies with a pair of S5 SHO (12") REL's - in my particular room, setting the sub crossovers higher than I would have ever even bothered with before definitely works out better in that ever important coherence "department" - very unintuitive but with Magenpan themselves going down this same path, they've lent me some reassurance that this isn't necessarily "wrong". Magenpan uses very "soft" slopes in their crossover design, there's certainly a fair amount of "frequency" sharing of their drivers, the same seems to hold true when integrating subs with them, at least in this particular room. Happy Listening Carlos - - Skip ( :
I use a pair of Genelec 8010A speakers and have no issues with bass or lack thereof. Every genre of music and HT audio sounds exquisite through them. They even turn themselves off after 20 mins of no signal.
Great speakers for their size but you're missing out on almost 2 octaves worth of content. I have larger Genelecs with dual subwoofers crossed over at 120Hz and it's awesome. Give subwoofer a go sometime.
That's a great talk. I had never heard of the Shroeder frequency. What I really want to know though is who is the manufacturer of these equipment racks in the background!
I’m just now reading this for the first time. I have a home theater and recently built 2 21” sealed subs that are basically flat out to 250hz. I have them in opposite corners (left front & right rear). Any sub on my front wall always has a bowl shaped curve and any sub on the back wall a dome shaped curve. Together, they are almost dead flat. My anthem processor is calibrating them with a crossover at 250hz. I always thought that odd, but I have tried to change it to a lower point and it always sounds worse. This seems to at least partially explain why that is the case.
Blimey, you could have condensed that lot into just a couple of minutes! Basics: your room dictates everything you hear below 250hz. You cannot fill troughs by adding power. You can shape bass to cut peaks. One solution: active control including DSP up to 250hz. Simple passive design above that to preserve polar axis. Live with the fact no room is perfect and use room treatments sparingly to avoid killing dynamics. Integrating subs wrt phase is notoriously difficult and rarely produces the goods because of phase issues and also there really is such limited amounts of infra bass on most recordings it’s really not possible to”recreate the recorded space” at all under any circumstances. This is often forgotten. You really are limited to creating only what your room dictates. Besides all of this mastering of recordings often alters the mic feeds for the purposes of the mastering engineer so we don’t know what we don’t know at playback. It’s a fools errand to think you can recreated the recorded space. Better to preserve phase relationship by keeping it simple and using full range speakers but play with room positioning to optimise then live with it. The time domain and phase relationships matter far more if you want correct timbrel information and immediacy or liveness of sound. I’ve been professionally designing speakers ling enough to know that the theorising in the video rarely translates to perceived accuracy and that all speakers and listening rooms are a compromise. You pick those compromises you can live with then just live with them. Some of the most realistic and best sounding systems I’ve heard were simple passive systems and especially large coaxial speakers done right or hybrid horn systems.
Measuring is knowing! Most of the people that thinks it is "a fools errand" or subwoofers is for "movies".. And this video don't help when it only point out problems and issues. And effectively scares away people but it is not that hard or scary. So don't kill/discourage the DIY:ers and those that what to learn with deeper understanding. The information provided here is in many ways overcome with more advanced and up to date techniques. For example who (!) Want a crossover point with a 6 db/oct? Yes THEN we run into schroeder and also more likely cabinet resonances when we ALOW that very slow roll off.. In the DSP we can select 48 dB/octave and we can choose a Linkwitz-Riley or Butterworth filter.. ..so beautifully (we can reflect on why should we even have passive and totally misplaced crossovers in our system..) So if we make worst possible preconditions and put the crossover point as high as 100 hz then a octave later at 200 hz we are already attuniated -48 db LOWER (and not just -6 dB that this presenter is talking about and of course if you play 100 dB at 100 hz you will still play 94 dB at 200 hz! Oh boy of course you will have an issue! And you then ALSO need a woofer that the presenter say that play midrange at 2000 Hz! With -6 dB/oct it will upset your room, box and main speaker that will have harder to blend with the subwoofer that playing along with it long after the crossover point have been passed! A calibrated mic (100$) REW and a miniDSP maybe the flex one. And 30 min the crossover point is perfectly implemented. A active subwoofer have the crossover dial (but what slope?). I had a active subwoofer put the dial to 80 Hz and i could still hear the electric guitar in the song trough it!😮 The other well keept audiophile secret thing that a (big) open baffle subwoofer is as FAR away we can come from a home Cinema subwoofer! Nothing is shaking, vibrating or punching as you like the effects when watching dinosaurs chasing you. That is a audiophile "music" subwoofer! But again it will NOT punch you in rhe chest as when you are at a rock concert. What it WILL do instead is that it will let you HEAR everything.. Even if you play LOUD and let it extend low down in frequency. DSP has so many more sound enhancing features that we can and should use! In short keep up with the times and never stop learning to be ABLE to get the best out of your gear.❤😊
Here are my column speaker characteristics BOOMER: Low pass 600 Hz at 6 dB/octave MID/BOOMER: Low pass at 3000 Hz at 12dB/octave no bass filtering. The two boomers work in parallel and in phase below 600 Hz. They sound fabulous in a small room. I have another system with monitors and a REL subwoofer. I enjoy both systems.
I have a situation in my room where if I stand up, bass drops off. Is that a "mode?" Thinking a non-ported speaker or one with a different driver configuration may help; rather than the standard tweeter/midrange/woofer, a mid/tweeter/mid-woofer or woofer/tweeter/woofer driver configuration. I could live with the situation, but if I can improve it, that's nice. A woofer with good upper midrange is something I may look at, or a speaker with multiple woofers. BTW, I live in an apartment with suspended floors, and the back wall is immediately behing my head; I can't move the speakers due to room configuration. I was going to move my couch a few inches out from the back wall to see if that helps a bit.
To solve these problems you do need to think about the seating area and 'solve' with the appropriate compromises for wide enough area, phase alignment is also as noted a big area to manage properly and if the sub is in a different location to the main speaker the best choice for the alginment - usually the crossover frequency but as noted they work together over a range depending on slopes. I think phase alignment is worthy of a problem of its own, so 5 ?!
❤Hello, Thanks you for the information. My room is not treated and I definitely have wall leakage. I’m curious, my speaker play down to 32Hz and I run them full range and my subs can be adjust from 30Hz to 200Hz for the Low Pass filter and the slope has 4 setting, 6 dB, 12 dB, 18 dB and 24 dB. The subs also have a volume adjustment between 0 dB to -60 dB. I don’t play loud music, maybe up to 67dB in the listening position. Should I max the low pass to 200Hz and set the Slope to 6 dB? Any recommendations would be appreciated!
My solution was to buy a giant open concept condo and a tower of open baffle subs/woofers, Cross them above 200Hz, and use JL Audio electronic crossover for blend/balance. Just as he says ❤
Great video. Mostly on my current topic. I just started building my new stereo in a concrete irregularly dimensioned 30m2 room. Being afraid of resonance, I preferred small bookshelf speakers (Triangle titus ez), as they create less bass and are easy with placement. So far, so good. Now, I need to select a sub or two and a lot of trial and error. Any recommendations for subs?
I love TAS, Harry Pearson, Mike Fremer, etc, but I have to say their customer service regarding subscriptions and back issues is horrible. For 2 years in a row, I tried ordering a subscription through Amazon. Both times I ended up canceling the subscription because the magazines never arrived after 3-4 months. I ordered back issues about 6 weeks ago paying by PayPal. So far, nothing. No magazine and no replies to my queries from TAS. A great magazine, that so far I have to admire from afar.
With my many years of high end audio experience I find that bass is not the problem or even the room. The key is spending the time to find the right speaker or subwoofer placement with in the room. Yes I understand that rooms inherently have bass modes because of room dimensions. I have found that if you spend the time to really fine tune the speaker placement you can essentially tune any room colorations out. So the key is tuning the speakers to the room and not the room to the speakers. So I disagree there is an issue.
I think the value of subs in most installations is over rated. Laws of physics, as you say HxWxL and wall construction set limits. And in most rooms there just is not the length and/or cubit volume needed for a real low frequency to develop. So we use subs to create pressure effects.
@@labalo5 s I am learning about the Swarm concept, it would seem to act as an active pressure wave timing controller. I was thinking about how to use ports/ tubes/ channels in the walls to provide return path length extension.
Subwoofer arent a ,problem,. The problem is that people dont use DSP, the correct Room Treatment and Time to set them up properly. You NEED Room treatment and working absorbers, thats the main thing to get good performance and the biggest point why a system sounds not good. Double Bass Arrays are the best way (when youve the room for it). Youve one wall where you push the energy and the opposite wall to absorb it so it doesnt bounce back. And you need to get them as close as possible to the wall. So you get maximum room gain with big peaks, than you use your DSP to bring it down. But ,,Audiophiles,, dont use DSPs (Time & Phase Alignment) to set up subwoofers so the main opinion is that subwoofers are more a problem than a solution. Its all about the setup. No Floorstander in the world can beat a well set up Subwoofer(s) Installation. The (hig end / professional) Home Cinema Guys are way ahead in case of professional Subwoofer usage. The Stereo Listeners are just back in the 80s where youve one Stereo amp and one pair of speakers and they think they get a better performance and solve problems wich switching cables or amps
There is No problem with Bass. It's how the track is Mastered, what it is played through (reproduced) via receiver and speaker. Cerwin Vega solves your problem. Admit it!!
Like, literally, foreal, how many times did you need to say "problem with bass" before you literally, finally, foreal, said anything about bass? Get my point? I'm only mean this as constructive criticism. When you're planning a video, make a script. make an outline, first draft, MANY rewrites, and a final draft before you ever turn your camera on. Its literally, like, foreal the difference between an amateur and a professional. Like, literally, foreal...
![If you can't hear this then you're not an audiophile [See description for link to followup video]](/img/1.gif)
Absolutely spot on. Bass performance is hardest to optimize. I needed to re-arrange my living room after trying 4 different setups (orientations of speakers + subs) so find out which one works best. Living in a concrete walled apartment.
Now, with non-ported speakers (ATC SCM40) and 2 REL subs placed inside of them, bass is quite even, quite deep, quite satisfying. One crucial element to success is proper floor (de)coupling, I use Isoacoustics feet.
Great subject and well thought out guidance on bass issues in home audio systems. So far I have achieved my best sounding bass by moving my large floor standers well out from the wall and integrating two large subwoofers into the mix. If using subwoofers, I have found it important to purchase subwoofer’s that have multiple adjustments available on the plate amp for fine tuning to the room sound acoustics. Subwoofers that are designed with built-in servo control of the woofer cone. My two subwoofers have this design feature, which allows adjustment of woofer damping, which I believe has been key to my excellent bass control in my listening room. My floor standers are capable of 23 Hz, however below say, 70 Hz the subwoofers do a far better job of producing beautiful sounding bass.
I agree that moving speakers away from the walls helps immensely. But the practical problem for many of us is that we just don't have the space available to do that. My speakers are about 2 feet from the back wall, and that's about as much as I can do given the dimensions of my multi-use family room.
Wow, that’s a great review. Tom and there’s one more element that you could’ve discussed and that is if your main speakers are ported or sealed, you probably want a subwoofer that’s the same ported or sealed because the speed that the woofer reacts to this music will integrate best if for example, you have sealed main speaker and a sealed subwoofer with no port.
That could easily be the case. Certainly the LF rolloff slopes will be different and perhaps different manufacturers allow for this under the assumption of matching.
Great vid. Room correction software like Anthem ARC, etc makes life much easier and I will never be without it or similar. Room EQ and base management/DSP, makes most of these problems moot, or at least much easier to address.
I have an acoustic ceiling, base traps ceiling to floor in each corner, defusers, and 8 pound pad under commercial carpeting. I also did THX microphone room setup with the microphone and my subwoofers issue are mostly good. Running good crossovers and playing with time alignment also helps. Thanks for the video!
I use the rel 812 with the high gain connection, It matches perfectly with my speakers and has the sound signature of my amplifier due to the type of connection. I’m very happy with it and I would never go back. All I want is a second one just for the sound pressure and even better sound stage, not directivity of the sound.
Placement, gain level, and crossover is what it’s all about.
Thank you sir! Interesting 4 facts... But I find it hard to really find a good solution to implement... This concept need sub/woofers working in the +500 Hz range and need to be placed very precise in the room, stereo image wise, one per side. Smaller monitors is only needed to handle the upper part (+200 Hz) without playing bass information. This separation is mandatory to be able to EQ sub/woofers separately... Larger full range speakers will be over kill... There are probably as many tries to manage bass integration as there are people trying :) My way to accomplish good bass response are:
First, I have a dedicated room to really have the chance to get nuts. It is made by thick concrete floor/walls/roof so the room nodes are heavy but without almost any leakage. I have tried to tame the long ringing nodes up to 500 Hz region by adding around 300 kg (!) of mineral stone wool here and there in the 25 m2 room. Yes it is a lot of absorbers, but it has also made my water fall delay time quite short down in the 70-80 Hz range. Below that is impossible to tame without using other tools like resonant absorbers. I like a dry direct sound from the speakers, not adding reverb from the room, only from intended record. That´s me!
By using a lot of subwoofers in the 4 corners and with PEQ using REW + MiniDsp I have made the overall response quite to my liking. The bass is dry and full of texture. I use 100 Hz 24 dB/oct filters on front and back subs and use planar speakers as full range way out in the room. Planar speakers are known for weak mid bass (read slam) and by over lap multi subs it has turned my system to an amazing one. I have been experimenting with my room, treatment, speaker placement, EQ, time alignment for many, many years... I vote for multi-sub with EQ and match full rangers carefully and use as much room treatment you can accept. Good luck!
Two people I know of who researched bass related problems are, Roy Allison when he was at Acoustic Researsh and Floyd Toole at Harman Corporation. Allison addressed the problem of how woofers best interface with a room and the suckout problem around 200 hz. Toole addressed the problem of how many woofers do you need and where to place them in a room.
My best sound system addresses these problems and more. They employ the findings of Allison's research. They are towers with two 12 inch side firing woofers, one on each side. They were originally used in designs that crossed them over at 1khz. In this design they are crossed over at 200 hz at 18 db per octave. The woofers are close to the floor and the manufacturer recommended placing them within 2 inches of the wall behind them and not near side walls. This 4 way 5 driver system has an 8 inlnch forward firing lower midrange driver that was used as a woofer in the manufacturer's lower priced systems. Toole said you need 4 woofers and that's what I have but his ideal placement was in 4 corners or at the midwall on 4 sides.
The best way to address the room resonance problem is the way Dick Burwen did, build a room with no parallel surfaces. Short of that breaking up large uninterrupted planar surfaces with furniture and other room furnishings helps. As for leakage if you live in a house in a rural area like I do where there are no closeby neighbors who will be bothered just pump more power in.
There is a lot you can learn from the Fletcher Munson curves. One thing looking at the bass, the curves are squashed closely together compared to higher frequencies. What this means is that once low bass is loud enough to hear it each small incremental increase in its actual loudness will have a disproportionately large increase in its subjective loudness. Therefore because of variations of the way recordings are made you need a way to adjust the relative loudness of just the low bass for each recording. Much of the subjective power of sound comes from deep low bass tones.
As hard as it is to get the bass right, IMO the treble is much harder and if you don't get that right, for me nothing else matters
Yes. I love bass, but I can live with it being wrong when it is lower level than ideal. Bad midrange and treble are a problem any which way you choose. Still, one wants it all..
@thomasmartin2219 I'm not an audiophile, I'm an engineer and a music lover. I've loved both live and recorded music all of my life. I do not and have never worked in this industry. As an engineer I'm uncompromising. So when something doesn't work the way I want it to I have to figure out why and what if anything can be done about it. At 12 years old I heard stereophonic sound for the first time and loved it. I became an audiophile. At 25 years old I built and heard what the industry claimed was their ultimate solution, the disaster called quadraphonic sound. I hated it instantly, threw my audiophile hat in the trash, realized the gurus in this industry were clueless, and figured it out for myself. It's not an easy problem. Anyway I've been playing with and enjoying what I invented nearly 50 years ago. My journey is over. I have exactly what I wanted. The only thing left to do for me is to enjoy it. But I do also enjoy watching these videos showing me what I could have become if I hadn't thrown that hat away.
So AR9's?
@glenncurry3041 yes. I've added 11 indirect firing tweeters per channel and revoiced them using extensive equalization. They are the main speakers in my experimental and best sound system. I don't shop or listen to other peoples' sound systems. They sound the way I want them to. The bass is the best I've ever heard. The F3 is 28 hz and the Q is 0.5. (AR3 type is 43 hz and I think Q is .707) My spectrum analyzer shows it produces sound down to at least 4 hz. Careful adjustment of the FR for each recording is necessary. I do that with most of the sound systems in my house but that's the only one I ever listen to anymore. Good thing there are two subsonic filters in series in the signal chain.
@@markfischer3626 I was an AR Rep when those were introduced. Travelled 6 S.E. states with a pair of those, 90's, 92, ... I think the combo was? Maybe a 91 in there...? Been a few years. Gave in store seminars on design, acoustic blanket, ...
My 2nd oldest son has a pair I pushed him into buying some years ago! Loves them! Driven by LO-7M's, I was a Kenwood rep as well and introduced that series. And my oldest has my old 91's, driven by a pair of LO-7M's. I have Maggie 1.7i.
I ave been reading absolute sound since time immemorial. This is how I set up my subs 40 years ago:
Place the subs slightly closer to yourself than the main speaker
Connect the main speakers with red to black and black to red!
Play a cd with lots of low frequencies
Turn the phase knob until the low frequencies sound least loud. It means 180 degree out of phase.
Reconnect the main. Speakers black to black and red to red. Now it’s in phase !
Good business!
So many people don't really understand fundamental base. This presentation goes in the right direction. Subwoofers theoretically can't couple with the main's because they have different T/S parameters and therefore can not sync, and couple leading to tones being messed up. When you have to distance the two because there is cancellations, your really just getting cabin pressure that sounds like bass. Subwoofers do sound good for sine wave reporduction when the main cant play that low. Thats why leading thought is to have a very low filter applied, And have the sub "disappear"
For most normal listening rooms, chasing excellent sub-bass is a fool’s errand. It is best to understand a room’s limitations, then work within those limitations. In my room, I have settled on full-range open baffles with no subs. I’ve tried with subs and I much prefer the audio presentation without subs.
I agree, sub only for movies.
@@pironi2405 I agree.. 90% of the time I'm listening to music with just a pair 2 way Dynaudio stand mounts. Now for movies, 100% subwoofer! A big, fat, sealed 15" Paradigm Studio 15.. with VERY usable bass well below 20 hz, which IS what a SUBwoofer is yeah 😀
Excellent information - I've found tinkering around with a pair of subs that the crossover points are very much higher than I initially and instinctively began with - the information Tom is presenting seems to add some assurance to my findings via experimentation without actual measurements - Also, Magnepan seems to be onto this approach as I'm understanding the proto types of the subs they're currently working on are nearly full range producers.
This just isn't true. Subs should normally be set really low (40 Hz) unless you have tiny speakers with limited bass or if they're used for Home Theater.
@@carlosoliveira-rc2xt I'm cool with that Carlos - - that's always been my thoughts as well, certainly a "safe" way to go, usually works very well - - some recent experimentation has changed my mind about that "standard" so I no longer believe that is the "only" way to go - and here comes Magnepan with their nearly full range subs lending some credence to this newer approach - - in my own experience with Maggies, back in the day, 80's, 90's, early 2000's (I had the MGIIIa's), I simply couldn't make subs work, coherence didn't seem possible, even with "servo" controlled subs - - the later sub designs have turned my head a bit - - the set up I'm messing with now are with the 3.7i maggies with a pair of S5 SHO (12") REL's - in my particular room, setting the sub crossovers higher than I would have ever even bothered with before definitely works out better in that ever important coherence "department" - very unintuitive but with Magenpan themselves going down this same path, they've lent me some reassurance that this isn't necessarily "wrong". Magenpan uses very "soft" slopes in their crossover design, there's certainly a fair amount of "frequency" sharing of their drivers, the same seems to hold true when integrating subs with them, at least in this particular room. Happy Listening Carlos - - Skip ( :
I use a pair of Genelec 8010A speakers and have no issues with bass or lack thereof. Every genre of music and HT audio sounds exquisite through them. They even turn themselves off after 20 mins of no signal.
Great speakers for their size but you're missing out on almost 2 octaves worth of content. I have larger Genelecs with dual subwoofers crossed over at 120Hz and it's awesome. Give subwoofer a go sometime.
That's a great talk. I had never heard of the Shroeder frequency.
What I really want to know though is who is the manufacturer of these equipment racks in the background!
I will do a review of the racks soon. They’re from Salamander.
@@thomasmartin2219 Thanks for this! They look awesome.
I have found that if you crossover the subs too high, you can tell where that are and this affects the sound stage and makes the music sounds muddy.
I’m just now reading this for the first time. I have a home theater and recently built 2 21” sealed subs that are basically flat out to 250hz. I have them in opposite corners (left front & right rear). Any sub on my front wall always has a bowl shaped curve and any sub on the back wall a dome shaped curve. Together, they are almost dead flat. My anthem processor is calibrating them with a crossover at 250hz. I always thought that odd, but I have tried to change it to a lower point and it always sounds worse. This seems to at least partially explain why that is the case.
Blimey, you could have condensed that lot into just a couple of minutes!
Basics: your room dictates everything you hear below 250hz. You cannot fill troughs by adding power. You can shape bass to cut peaks. One solution: active control including DSP up to 250hz. Simple passive design above that to preserve polar axis. Live with the fact no room is perfect and use room treatments sparingly to avoid killing dynamics.
Integrating subs wrt phase is notoriously difficult and rarely produces the goods because of phase issues and also there really is such limited amounts of infra bass on most recordings it’s really not possible to”recreate the recorded space” at all under any circumstances. This is often forgotten.
You really are limited to creating only what your room dictates. Besides all of this mastering of recordings often alters the mic feeds for the purposes of the mastering engineer so we don’t know what we don’t know at playback. It’s a fools errand to think you can recreated the recorded space.
Better to preserve phase relationship by keeping it simple and using full range speakers but play with room positioning to optimise then live with it. The time domain and phase relationships matter far more if you want correct timbrel information and immediacy or liveness of sound. I’ve been professionally designing speakers ling enough to know that the theorising in the video rarely translates to perceived accuracy and that all speakers and listening rooms are a compromise. You pick those compromises you can live with then just live with them. Some of the most realistic and best sounding systems I’ve heard were simple passive systems and especially large coaxial speakers done right or hybrid horn systems.
Why aren't subwoofer manufacturers like SVS and correction like Dirac killing it in the bass guitarist equipment market? 🔈🔉🔊
Measuring is knowing!
Most of the people that thinks it is "a fools errand" or subwoofers is for "movies"..
And this video don't help when it only point out problems and issues. And effectively scares away people but it is not that hard or scary. So don't kill/discourage the DIY:ers and those that what to learn with deeper understanding.
The information provided here is in many ways overcome with more advanced and up to date techniques.
For example who (!) Want a crossover point with a 6 db/oct? Yes THEN we run into schroeder and also more likely cabinet resonances when we ALOW that very slow roll off..
In the DSP we can select 48 dB/octave and we can choose a Linkwitz-Riley or Butterworth filter.. ..so beautifully (we can reflect on why should we even have passive and totally misplaced crossovers in our system..)
So if we make worst possible preconditions and put the crossover point as high as 100 hz then a octave later at 200 hz we are already attuniated -48 db LOWER (and not just -6 dB that this presenter is talking about and of course if you play 100 dB at 100 hz you will still play 94 dB at 200 hz! Oh boy of course you will have an issue! And you then ALSO need a woofer that the presenter say that play midrange at 2000 Hz!
With -6 dB/oct it will upset your room, box and main speaker that will have harder to blend with the subwoofer that playing along with it long after the crossover point have been passed!
A calibrated mic (100$) REW and a miniDSP maybe the flex one. And 30 min the crossover point is perfectly implemented.
A active subwoofer have the crossover dial (but what slope?).
I had a active subwoofer put the dial to 80 Hz and i could still hear the electric guitar in the song trough it!😮
The other well keept audiophile secret thing that a (big) open baffle subwoofer is as FAR away we can come from a home Cinema subwoofer! Nothing is shaking, vibrating or punching as you like the effects when watching dinosaurs chasing you.
That is a audiophile "music" subwoofer! But again it will NOT punch you in rhe chest as when you are at a rock concert.
What it WILL do instead is that it will let you HEAR everything..
Even if you play LOUD and let it extend low down in frequency.
DSP has so many more sound enhancing features that we can and should use!
In short keep up with the times and never stop learning to be ABLE to get the best out of your gear.❤😊
Here are my column speaker characteristics BOOMER: Low pass 600 Hz at 6 dB/octave MID/BOOMER: Low pass at 3000 Hz at 12dB/octave no bass filtering. The two boomers work in parallel and in phase below 600 Hz. They sound fabulous in a small room. I have another system with monitors and a REL subwoofer. I enjoy both systems.
I have a situation in my room where if I stand up, bass drops off. Is that a "mode?" Thinking a non-ported speaker or one with a different driver configuration may help; rather than the standard tweeter/midrange/woofer, a mid/tweeter/mid-woofer or woofer/tweeter/woofer driver configuration. I could live with the situation, but if I can improve it, that's nice. A woofer with good upper midrange is something I may look at, or a speaker with multiple woofers.
BTW, I live in an apartment with suspended floors, and the back wall is immediately behing my head; I can't move the speakers due to room configuration. I was going to move my couch a few inches out from the back wall to see if that helps a bit.
Open baffle bass causes far fewer room resonances to be agitated. Why was that not mentioned?
I agree so much. I use gr research open baffle subs and heard nothing better at any cost. Cross them high too.
To solve these problems you do need to think about the seating area and 'solve' with the appropriate compromises for wide enough area, phase alignment is also as noted a big area to manage properly and if the sub is in a different location to the main speaker the best choice for the alginment - usually the crossover frequency but as noted they work together over a range depending on slopes.
I think phase alignment is worthy of a problem of its own, so 5 ?!
❤Hello, Thanks you for the information. My room is not treated and I definitely have wall leakage. I’m curious, my speaker play down to 32Hz and I run them full range and my subs can be adjust from 30Hz to 200Hz for the Low Pass filter and the slope has 4 setting, 6 dB, 12 dB, 18 dB and 24 dB. The subs also have a volume adjustment between 0 dB to -60 dB.
I don’t play loud music, maybe up to 67dB in the listening position.
Should I max the low pass to 200Hz and set the Slope to 6 dB?
Any recommendations would be appreciated!
You have not touched on the power outputs.Are these magnepens mainly Indore speakers?
My solution was to buy a giant open concept condo and a tower of open baffle subs/woofers, Cross them above 200Hz, and use JL Audio electronic crossover for blend/balance. Just as he says ❤
Great video. Mostly on my current topic.
I just started building my new stereo in a concrete irregularly dimensioned 30m2 room. Being afraid of resonance, I preferred small bookshelf speakers (Triangle titus ez), as they create less bass and are easy with placement.
So far, so good. Now, I need to select a sub or two and a lot of trial and error.
Any recommendations for subs?
Two SVS 3000 micros. Fast and lots of tuning options. They take some break in as all subs do.
Thanks... but it's too steep for me. Any suggestions for less?
If I can only get one, should I try an SVS SB-1000 PRO or save up for a 3000 micro?
I love TAS, Harry Pearson, Mike Fremer, etc, but I have to say their customer service regarding subscriptions and back issues is horrible. For 2 years in a row, I tried ordering a subscription through Amazon. Both times I ended up canceling the subscription because the magazines never arrived after 3-4 months. I ordered back issues about 6 weeks ago paying by PayPal. So far, nothing. No magazine and no replies to my queries from TAS. A great magazine, that so far I have to admire from afar.
With my many years of high end audio experience I find that bass is not the problem or even the room. The key is spending the time to find the right speaker or subwoofer placement with in the room.
Yes I understand that rooms inherently have bass modes because of room dimensions. I have found that if you spend the time to really fine tune the speaker placement you can essentially tune any room colorations out. So the key is tuning the speakers to the room and not the room to the speakers.
So I disagree there is an issue.
I think the value of subs in most installations is over rated. Laws of physics, as you say HxWxL and wall construction set limits. And in most rooms there just is not the length and/or cubit volume needed for a real low frequency to develop. So we use subs to create pressure effects.
Or we use subs to smooth out the mid and upper bass.
4 subs in a swarm?
@@labalo5 s I am learning about the Swarm concept, it would seem to act as an active pressure wave timing controller. I was thinking about how to use ports/ tubes/ channels in the walls to provide return path length extension.
Subwoofer arent a ,problem,. The problem is that people dont use DSP, the correct Room Treatment and Time to set them up properly. You NEED Room treatment and working absorbers, thats the main thing to get good performance and the biggest point why a system sounds not good. Double Bass Arrays are the best way (when youve the room for it). Youve one wall where you push the energy and the opposite wall to absorb it so it doesnt bounce back. And you need to get them as close as possible to the wall. So you get maximum room gain with big peaks, than you use your DSP to bring it down. But ,,Audiophiles,, dont use DSPs (Time & Phase Alignment) to set up subwoofers so the main opinion is that subwoofers are more a problem than a solution. Its all about the setup. No Floorstander in the world can beat a well set up Subwoofer(s) Installation. The (hig end / professional) Home Cinema Guys are way ahead in case of professional Subwoofer usage. The Stereo Listeners are just back in the 80s where youve one Stereo amp and one pair of speakers and they think they get a better performance and solve problems wich switching cables or amps
too much premise... please make it more direct
There is No problem with Bass. It's how the track is Mastered, what it is played through (reproduced) via receiver and speaker. Cerwin Vega solves your problem. Admit it!!
Like, literally, foreal, how many times did you need to say "problem with bass" before you literally, finally, foreal, said anything about bass? Get my point? I'm only mean this as constructive criticism. When you're planning a video, make a script. make an outline, first draft, MANY rewrites, and a final draft before you ever turn your camera on. Its literally, like, foreal the difference between an amateur and a professional. Like, literally, foreal...