Best subwoofer to complement my system.

Can't give you an A/B comparison, but just researched this topic and bought a Velodyne DD18 that I have not yet hooked up.

Any article/review that I found written since the DD's have been avaiable have included them as a serious player and some folks on here have integrated them with some very highly respected speakers.

Jazzy123,

First off, let me say that I have not had the greatest experience trying to integrate subs into 2 and 3 way full range speakers for the purposes of critical music listening.

Back when I had Wilson Watt/Puppy 7's I had two Wilson Watchdog subwoofers in my room and even though it was all Wilson there was a lack of seamlessness which I always heard. And I have a purpose built treated and calibrated listening room and the locations for my speakers and subs was carefully computed to be optimal.

Then when I switched to my Dynaudio Temptation speakers the integration challenge worsened because the Tempts are much faster and resolute down low to about 35-40 Hz. Whatever I gained in the lower octave with the subs in, was taken away by having to put up with less resolution. Anyway, I gave up and now just listen to my Tempts without subs.

I do not mean to discourage you! Just sharing one man's experience. I did switch to Rel subwoofers and I do believe they integrate better than the Wilson Watchdogs so the Rel is certainly a sub that should be on your short list.

Good listening.

I recommend Martin Logan Descent sub. This sub is very fast with deep controlled bass. I use one with my Summit's.

I'd have to agree with Earflappin.

Sub integration for music is not that easy...and very room/speaker placement dependent. Why?...because of all those reflected and standing LF waves from three sources: two speakers and a woofer.

I went for a corner placement for my sub (along the speaker wall and aligned with the speaker baffle edge). This keeps the phase alignment with the speakers and I suspect only works because I have few room resonance problems (large odd shape room and no obvious related multiples in dimensions).

I still needed to use a notch filter in the DSP for the 40Hz mode which was about 6 db too strong but there are no major suckouts with my corner position. I got major suckouts (up to 15 db) when I tried other sub room positions.

In summary, adding the last lower octave may bring a host of problems with it [unless you are willing to renovate or go for extensive acoustic treatments].

I am also considering the same thing though not sure yet. Apart from the companies mentioned above, you may want to check out Thiel's smart sub.

Actually, I don't think it's very difficult to implement a subwoofer into a system but it takes a little planning, experimentation with the sub placement, room size, and dialing in the proper configuration for crossover, volume, etc..

Perhaps most important is a little known secret about syncing up a subwoofer to the main speakers. Some to many interconnects and speaker cables (regardless of price) induce time smear to a small or large degree.

Of course the ideal is to acquire ics and scs that induce little or no time smear. To minimize any disjointedness between the main speakers and the subwoofer, it is imperative that the ics and scs apply similar design methodologies.

For example, if the interconnects to the subwoofer induce much time smear but the speaker cables to the main speaker minimize this time smear, the subwoofer will sound syrupy, wooly, ill-defined, slow, etc. whereas the main speakers' bass will be tight, fast, full, well-defined, controlled, etc.. And there is little or nothing that can be done to remove this disjointedness regardless of tuning, tweaking, and placement strategies you apply.

But when I say it's not difficult, every situation and every room is different, and every sub and speaker match is unique. But there are certainly several things you can apply that will minimize your grief.

-IMO

Thanks for all who responded. Bottom line is I need to do some more research!

Velodyne make the SMS-1 to help integrate a subwoofer [or subwoofers] into a system. I don't own one, but I am intrigued and would really like to try one sometime.

The real key to easier sub integration is either using a speaker with bass which runs to only around 60hz,or using a high pass crossover on your speakers to cut off bass below this level.I'm not saying this will help in every situation but it is a general truth and one which is rarely seen in domestic speakers but common in pro systems.
This seems to be especially true for electrostats or panels.
Also I have found that large coned down firing subs positioned between the listener and the speakers[coffee table style] often work better than forward firing in the line of or near the speakers.