PB12-Plus/2 set-up ??

[oil99]

Hello All,

Just received my new sub after much research here. I have some questions though as it isn't quite delivering as I expected and I'm hoping it's just the set-up. It's in a room about 18x24 and my receiver is a Denon AVR-3802. While it does sound pretty good it's not delivering the WOW, punch in the chest bass I was expecting. Sure you can feel it in the couch and the pic's on the wall are vibrating but it's not quite what I expected. Questions:

1.) Is it OK to place the sub outside of the front mains? Due to room acoustics I'm getting slightly better sound moving it to the left of the front main by about 2'. It's close to a corner here but unfortunetly is directly ajacent to the stairwell going up. The ports fire off a wall and then go directly up the stairs. I may be losing some output because of this I don't know.

2.) I used the radio shack meter that came with the sub but if I adjust the speaker levels to be equal the sub seems way, way too low. I initially set the sub gain at 1/3 and my Denon at -6db.... moved Denon up to 00db and it sounds better. Should I be bumping up the sub's gain or the Denon?

3.) Playing music their isn't enough bass. Is it normal to manual turn up the sub's gain when playing music to get more thump? What about HT? IS it normal to keep the sub gain at 1/4 to 1/3?

4.) I haven't touched the PEQ on the sub. Will this help? Should I start plugging ports as well?

My previous sub was a Sound Dynamics 12" sealed w/150W amp. Not to say it was close but I'm not seeing the difference I was expecting.

HELP! Any advise is greatly appreciated.

[mojomike]

oil99 wrote:

Hello All,

Just received my new sub after much research here. I have some questions though as it isn't quite delivering as I expected and I'm hoping it's just the set-up. It's in a room about 18x24 and my receiver is a Denon AVR-3802. While it does sound pretty good it's not delivering the WOW, punch in the chest bass I was expecting. Sure you can feel it in the couch and the pic's on the wall are vibrating but it's not quite what I expected. Questions:

1.) Is it OK to place the sub outside of the front mains? Due to room acoustics I'm getting slightly better sound moving it to the left of the front main by about 2'. It's close to a corner here but unfortunetly is directly ajacent to the stairwell going up. The ports fire off a wall and then go directly up the stairs. I may be losing some output because of this I don't know.

2.) I used the radio shack meter that came with the sub but if I adjust the speaker levels to be equal the sub seems way, way too low. I initially set the sub gain at 1/3 and my Denon at -6db.... moved Denon up to 00db and it sounds better. Should I be bumping up the sub's gain or the Denon?

3.) Playing music their isn't enough bass. Is it normal to manual turn up the sub's gain when playing music to get more thump? What about HT? IS it normal to keep the sub gain at 1/4 to 1/3?

4.) I haven't touched the PEQ on the sub. Will this help? Should I start plugging ports as well?

My previous sub was a Sound Dynamics 12" sealed w/150W amp. Not to say it was close but I'm not seeing the difference I was expecting.

HELP! Any advise is greatly appreciated.

Howdy. Let's go through your list of questions.

1. It is ok to place the sub outside the mains as long as the crossover on the receiver is not set too high. 80hz is a typical starting point for the crossover setting. Keep the crossover on the sub set to off or as high as it will go.

2. You can bump up the gain either way, but I would not go over 0 on the receiver.

3. Bumping up the volume for music is not normal. It is more usual that folks sometimes bump it up for movies. The reason that you feel the need to bump it up for music is that in your room, you may be putting out plenty of very deep bass, but are not properly reproducing some of the mid-bass frequencies common in music. That is causing you to miss out on the "punch" or 'kick". This could be caused by phase problems, wrong crossover settings, less than ideal placement, or poor room acoustics. Do a google search on setting up a subwoofer and follow some of the advice given. You need to find and restore those missing frequencies. Your sub is capable of reproducing them.

4. The PEQ can help to reduce a single peak or hump in the frequency response, but is not very helpful unless you know where that peak is. Plugging ports will give you deeper extension, but is unlikely to give you the punch you are looking for in your music. That you will get by flattening out your overall bass response.

Consider trying RoomEQWizard software which you can download for free elswhere on this forum site. Follow the instructions and learn to plot the frequency response. You will then be able to pinpoint the parts of the sound you are missing.

[Sonnie]

Hi MJ and welcome to the Shack!

Congrats on the new sub...

I own a pair of these in my very small HT room tuned to 16Hz... along with a diy sub and I run them all about 10db hotter than my mains for movies and music.

mojomike has given you a lot of good advice there.

I would certainly check out REW... we have a lot of help for that. Then you can probably see what you need to do to get where you want to be. The PEQ may be enough to help you achieve that as well, if not, you may need to consider a BFD. Acoustical treatment is also a viable option for mid-bass on up.

[robbroy]

oil99,

Not a whole lot to add to Mike or Sonnie's posts, but I would also direct you to http://www.robbroy.net/HT/SubwooferErrors.cfm to see if anything there might be limiting your output.

As to music, I don't know how common it is to bump it up, but I know it is not entirely uncommon for folks to be disappointed with bass on music. They listen to movie bass and music in cars with extremely hot, extremely loud bass, and then try it on a calibrated home system and feel it is not living up to expectations.

If you wanted to adjust bass on the fly, I'd use the receiver. The reason is you can calibrate the sub with the Denon at -6, and if you move that to 00, you can always go back to -6 and be calibrated again. If you adjust the sub's gain, then you need to break out the meter again to calibrate (not to mention you won't know just how hot you have it).

-Robb

Interesting problem. I know the crossover for this sub is somewhat low. At the moment, I only have tiny satellite speakers that go "down" to 150 Hz (Planning to upgrade soon). Would this present a problem for me? I don't want to have my sub sound weak on music. Most of the music I listen to has bass in the 30-60 Hz range. Even 30 Hz is pretty low for music (mostly on Hip-Hop and R&B). Once in a while, I'll pop in a bass CD for stuff down to 20 HZ and below, though that range is usually saved for movies, unfortunately. More artists should start making music with lower bass (25Hz and below) to feed massive subwoofers like the F113 and Plus/2 that can reach that low...

[mojomike]

There are really very few natural musical instruments that play any deeper than about 32hz. Pipe organs are the obvious exceptions. Other than that, deeper bass would have to be synthesized and only certain kinds of music will benefit from that. In a lot of music it would sound artificial.

Let's face it, today's subs play as deep as they do in order to reproduce LFE. Good ones can play music equally as well.

I've found it somewhat common to bump bass up for music. I don't do anything for movies which have much more in the way of LFE. As for music it depends on the source and the recording. With most CD's I rarely have to adjust anything but with the compressed music off of XM I have to bump it up considerably. You didn't say what you were listening to exactly, but I wouldn't be afraid to bump it up some.

Bill3508

[SierraMikeBravo]

Hi!

Yes, it is normal to keep the gain on your sub at 1/4 or 1/3. My HSU sub is only turned 1/4 gain. However, I am not sure how much "kick" you are looking for. If you're looking for your chest to explode, that isn't realistic. However, you could be sitting in your main room mode. As a result, you will lose the lowest frequency that fits your room perfectly. If you are sitting 12 feet away from your front wall, you are likely sitting in the worst possible place you can be. Try moving the sub around, the crawl technique, or use Room EQ. Otherwise, get another sub (you do have a big room), or go with some Buttkickers. Also, try your sub directly behind your seating area.

[Captain Crunch]

I metered the out of mine.......but in the end I just put it to what sounds good to (my ears). I mean that's what's it all about right! Do what sounds good to you.
I'd have to say most people I know run there subs.....hot I know I do......why
1. cuz I can.
2. cuz it's sounds good.
3. cuz I'm a show off lol