Have a pair of REL S3 HO and they don't produce enough bass


Hi all-

Just picked up a pair of REL S3 HO subs to work with both my 2 channel system and my home theater. The high output speaker connections on the subs go to my 2 channel system and plug into each mono block amp. The LFE connection from each sub hooks into my Anthem 720 receiver for home theater. 

For the 2 channel system it seems to work well. Nice low bass helping out my Focal Kanta No. 2 speakers. 

However, for the home theater system, they just don't produce enough bass. I have to turn them ALL the way up using the sub's LFE volume control, AND turn them all the way up in my Anthem receiver settings to get any semblance of home theater bass. I know this isn't normal, so something has to be either wrong, or the subs just aren't meant for home theater use.

I was using a pair of SVS 12" subs and man those things rocked. However, I picked up the RELs so I could integrate them with my 2 channel system as well, something the SVS' could not do.

Any idea what could be the problem? 

A side note: I have NOT run Anthem's ARC program again since buying the RELs. Perhaps that could be the issue, but I didn't think it would make that much of a difference. However, I could obviously be wrong. :-)

Thanks!
sadcaper

Showing 1 response by bcwang

Did you have any conclusion to this?  I also had the same problem with an S3 non-sho version. At max volume it barely output anything with my receiver maxed out. Even though I had a T9 that could be run 1/4 of the way up and it was louder already. I thought the S3 was defective but when Rel got it, they measured that everything was to spec. So definitely there is something fishy. In any case, I ended up using the high low level inputs instead of the 0.1lfe input and now it has enough gain to be used for HT. However, I can’t use the speakon in parallel this way so can only use it as a dedicated HT sub this way.