Has anyone heard the Totem Acoustic's Wind?

For counterpoint, once my sub was set up properly I would never go back to a system without it - only a handful of speakers sound as full as what I have now, and at that point there are cost and aesthetics starting to creep into it. IMO coherency issues are indicitave of an improperly set up system.

Sonance, I think you might change your mind if you hear a *properly* dialed in musical subwoofer from the likes of REL or Totem. I get the strange feeling your experiences have been with home-theater subs.

I agree w/ both Sonance and Ghunter.

A quality true full range speaker will be better for music than a poorly setup speakers + sub combination. However, if you're looking at subwoofers such as Velodyne's Digital Drive series, Revel B15, Ultima30, Rel Stadium, etc..., you'll see that a well placed and executed subwoofer will work as well and in most cases, better than a "full range" speakers w/o a sub.

For example, Totem Hawk + Velodyne DD12 combination will produce a very flat frequency responce from below 20Hz to 20kHz. I highly doubt you can find a true full range speakers (Wind goes down to 24Hz supposedly) that can do the same for the same price.

The important question to ask is, do you really need a truly full range (20Hz-20kHz) sound? If the answer is yes and you love the LFE on movie tracks, I think a subwoofer will make a huuuge difference in the experience and more than worth the investment.

It all comes down to personal preferences and needs, but w/ today's quality subwoofers, we really don't need to worry too much about the integration with main speakers. The subwoofer matching technology has come a long way and I believe they've gotten it right now.

Sorry to stray off the topic a bit, but for me, if I had the money, I'd add a quality subwoofer even if I had the Totem Wind loudspeakers.

Spacekadet,

There are subtleties in the musical bandwidth that are below what most so called “full-range” speakers cannot produce. What I found with most Digital Drive or Rel setups properly implemented is texture, texture, and more texture.

I do agree that it is possible to have a good pairing of a sub and speakers which dont go as deep as "full rangers." As I noted in my original post, it is possible. When I said it takes experimentation, I did not mean just finding a seamless hand-off from speaker to sub, I also meant something about the quality, timbre and speed of the sub. As we all know speakers and character and color to the sound of a system. If 20hz - 20khz fully described the capabilities of speakers, we'd all buy store brand speakers that met the above criteria and be happy at the end of the day.
By 'experimentation' I meant having to try subs in your house and your system until you find one that *truly* matches your speakers in your room and your system, with your available placement options. Some speaker makes have good matching subs, such as Thiel for their line and Martin Logan for theirs. Others, well, not so much. Sure everyone and their grandfather sells subs, but some just don't have that magic integration with music, especially in real world systems not setup professionally.
I am not against subs, and I'm not saying they can't add something to your setup, I'm just saying it's not always simple - in fact getting bass right is one of the hardest parts of speaker / system setup. I have heard REL subs, in response to an earlier post, and they are good subs, but I would not agree that they are a good match for every setup. Rel is a company that does focus on matching subs to stereo systems, rather than just an HT focus that other subs can sometimes have.
The other factor here is that with something like the Winds vs. the Hawks, the Winds have far more to them than extended bass. Their increased resolution and end-to-end tonal balance, their superior presentation of instruments and separation are beyond what the Hawks can do. No amount of money sunk into subs will make a pair of Hawks into a pair of Winds. That was the original question.

Thanks Sonance, that was exactly the answer I was looking for.