Here's a break down of what went on at the GTG. This the expanded version.
We placed all of the subs in the same relative spot with a little bit of leeway for the the biggest cabs. We got things as close as we could. The sub position was up front by the left main as seen in the pics. Brandon's room I felt was fairly hard to drive compared to some other rooms (more on that later). It's decent sized, oddly shaped and open too. The subs were next to the doorway to the kitchen and there's a big closet in the room. Also as mentioned...With all of the people and equipment in the room it got real stuffy quickly, which led to us opening the windows sometime after the Shiva (I think?). I thought that the low bass noticeably dropped in level with them open. At least where I stayed all day.
We ran the commercial subs first for simplicity, followed by the DIY subs and lastly the PRO's. This would also build up our output levels throughout the day towards the more powerful subs.
Everything used a 100hz x over from Brandon's receiver with Brandon's Athena mains. The commercials were run as is. The DIY's and PRO's were all run from a single channel of one of the Crest 8002's (850w rated 8ohm, 1400w rated at 4 ohm, 2000w rated at 2ohm per channel) except for the LMS and XXX which I ran bridged on the same 8002. The Worx TL118S we ran on 1 channel of Robert's IT8000. The Danley TH50 Ivan decided to kick up a notch and run a channel of the PL9.0 into it.
Ivan and myself would both get a quick measurement of the subs when they got placed in position. Then we set the levels. We ran the 2 channel music tracks first to check for tonal issues and we ran the same ones into each sub. We mostly just stuck to the first minute or 2 of each track. Then we switched to the movies and did those scenes. Taking notes in the meantime. Unplug the sub, move the new one in place, wash, rinse, repeat. Occasionally throughout the day we started skipping certain scenes as we learned which ones were the best to use.
Here is the 2 channel track list and a description of why I decided on that track.
1.
Vast: The Last One Alive
This has a slow build up with a lot of solo bass up in the x over region which builds into some lower tones and finally a beefy kick drum.
2.
Tool: Prison Sex
This track is well recorded and the bass and drums are mixed very thick, but are full of nuance in both at the same time.
3.
Primus: DMV
This is really punchy drums hits and has a lot of slappy stringy bass sounds all throughout the x over area. If any one note sticks out it's apparent.
4.
Cake: The Distance
The bass is sort of funky low-fi but at the same time covers a lot of range and is fairly hot in the mix. Look for any one note that sticks out too much or is MIA.
5.
Bass I Love You
I put this on there to see if I could blow up anyone's sub. Seriously it starts out with a mean 30hz note and also has notes at 25hz, 16hz and even 7hz. The 16hz separates the men from the boys. Ivan liked this one and thought maybe it was Danley demo material.
6.
Bass Mekanik: Toccata and Fugue
A rip off of Bach's famous work injected with mad bass. Huge 16hz notes, ascending and descending scales and quick changes.
7.
SoundGarden: Fresh Tendrils
There is a lot of bass work in this that is just not there on a sloppy or un-even system.
8.
Rush: Tom Sawyer
If I need to explain this then it's probably not worth trying to explain anyway.
9.
Mudvayne: Trapped In The Wake Of a Dream
This is a heavier bit of music but it has punchy drums and a thick down tuned B string bass that is really well played and recorded. The bass guitar is all over the place and the song has both lighter less cluttered sections and denser heavier sections with fast kick drum hits.
10.
The Baroness: Wailing Wintry Wind
This ended up as one of the better tracks IMO not just for drums but for overall system performance. It's a slow build with a floor tom and various stereo guitar effects and the drums come in with a very well recorded live sound and build up on the toms and snare before finally kicking in with a lot of bass and very textured bass guitar work and fat drum sounds.
The movie tracks were in this order. I'll not explain these because most people reading this are familiar with them. I think I have these right...
1.
THX Trailer: Amazing Life.
This and Bass I Love You were the real torture tracks in the line up. If a sub got overdriven or fell on it's face it was with one of those 2 tracks nearly every time.
2.
Pearl harbor: 50cal machine gun blasts.
3.
U571: depth charges
4.
The Matrix Revolution: Neo talking to the machine
5.
Kung Fu Panda: Thai Lung escape scene
6.
The Incredible Hulk: Sonic Cannons
For some reason this just didn't have any real umph to it. Not like when I watch it at my place. It just seemed like it was lower in level than the others and would've needed about 6db more to be the same level as the others. Not sure what happened. That movie is very hot in the sub bass, but it just wasn't there on the disc.
7.
Master and Commander: opening cannon battle.
8.
Die Hard with a Vengeance: F22 attack scene.
9.
War of The Worlds: Pod Emergence.
I felt like this one was similar to the Hulk and was just not near as hot as it is on disc. Still bassy but it didn't have that disgusting hotness in the ULF that it is legendary for, while M&C and Die Hard 4 did.