Perlisten D212 Subs (2) in the house.

Just unpacked my D12’s and love the look, but very different then my JL E112’s, sound and setting wise. I haven’t had time to listen and tweek, but my Focal Sopra 3’s and CR-1 cross over truly go down to 31Hz, and I kinda was a little underwhelmed with the 45Hz low pass with, volume 10.5, trim 1.5, and 24db slope via XLR from the CR-1. I’m high passing my mains at 32Hz, but feel like these have less presents and punch them my JL’s at a similar frequency crossover low pass.

A lot of people pitch Perlisten as a better JL audio, but I feel like at least what I’m hearing is a very different subwoofer sound, maybe closer to a Rell Sound (speed and clarity wise), but these are supposed to be home theatre juggernauts too.

Still way to early to have a clue what I’m hearing.

@skinzy and @james633  sadly day two not off to a good start. One sub has a "Error 03-00" message that I can't clear and power on/off unplugging etc. hasn't fixed it either. Zero clue? So sent an email to Perlisten (we'll see). If anyone has a idea of encountered this please chime in. Not having good luck with subs, one of my JL E112's lost it's high pass filter switch and I haven't had subs in my systems for about 4-5 months.

As for crossover setting and high pass settings I've listen at great lengths and my CR-1 has a bypass for both speakers and sub so you can on/off to A/B compare and honestly the Sopra is a down firing speaker and yeah they're close to the wall, my room is 9' ceilings, 16' X 45' (WxD) essentially, but has some out croppings that widen out behind me in this picture.

With my Sopras I exhaustedly A/B tested the high pass cut off point of my speakers and I could here truncation in very fast, layered and dynamic music (Andrew Bayer's Opening Act is my best example) around 33-35hz point, however I did have the crossover set on the E112's at 60hz (I just took a look at my other system) so you could very well be right as far as moving that up ward. But I need to dB meter my listening cause on the Perlisten I was doing relatively lower volume listening and I would crank my crossover via the Perlisten app to 160hz and volume 12 and I wasn't overwhelmed by overly boomey and bloated bass with the D12's. Again I only had one day of listening and now the Error code.

@skinzy

I 100% agree that high pass filtering mains at 60hz would be too excessive and lose some of the dynamic response. I have frequently hit the on/off / bypass button and can audibly hear bass loss in my Sopras at roughly 33 to 35hz. So I completely agree with you. Two side points being that the E112 crossover feature is an all or nothing high/low pass. Meaning you select a frequency response cut off that truncates your mains and that is the fixed Hz low pass for your subwoofers. You cannot alter the two, which is why I got the CR-1. Your choices are either running your mains full range and low pass filtering your subwoofers, or whatever your high pass cutoff is will also be your low pass for your subs. I am of the opinion that my mains should be high passed at roughly 31-33hz, and then again agree with @james633 ​​​​​that my subwoofer low pass will ultimately be somewhere between 60 to 80hz. However the Perlisten have definitely just a different sound and more there setting for volume and low pass filtering are just vastly different then the JL I'm used to. It's like one preamp that you run the volume at 50% max and yet a different brand you'd be deaf at anything higher then 30% volume max. The Perlisten need to be volumed 80-100% (high then most subs I've had) and filterd 60-80hz for floor standers (near 30hz speakers). range)

@james633 I do agree with you completely along the lines of the audible tweeter hiss/hum when using the high pass / low pass cutoff of the E112. It really bothered me, and I’m one of those people that has to have an absolute zero noise floor when my ear is up to the tweeter. I attribute that to my own neuroticism, but even with slight hiss it’s an audible from the seated listening position. Regardless I did use two humEx in order to minimize that and in my current setup with my system I have zero hiss ear and tweeter. I did have dedicated audio grad 20amp outlets installed and since then have all Shunyata cables and Puritan 156 power conditioning. I could only imagine what a higher efficiency speaker would do given the similar issues I had with 91db efficient speakers. I’ve grown spoiled with my Technics SU-R1000 and it’s absolutely black hole of a background as far as noise floor goes. It truly is a special amplifier for that reason alone, let alone others.

As for subwoofers I presently have nine, I say that partly in shame. Covering six different brands. They all do have a unique sound, not like speakers though (bigger sound signatures absolutely).

​I​ find the aesthetics of subwoofers to be ubiquitous which allows me to try so many, because I’m agnostic to how they look for the most part. But speakers that’s a different story. I have to absolutely be wholeheartedly in love with how the speakers looks before I even would consider buying them. Just because they’re such a physical presence in the room. This does kind of hamstring me though on what speakers ill buy... it is what it is.

I would honestly have the Focal Utopia Maestro’s instead of my Sopra No. 3’s (Focal are you listening?), however I really dislike their absence of the glass tops and bottoms. Seriously for how nice the dark finished beveled glass is on the Sopras, and the covering of nearly all exposed hardwear around the speakers. I just can bring myself to buy the Maestro because of how comparably unattractive the base, plain painted tops and exposed hardware is on the Utopia line (which I love). The Utopia line definitely needs to be updated to the standards of the Sopra as far as esthetics goes.

Here are my current subs.

Perlisten D12’s (main system)
JL E112’s (physical media system)
SVS Mico’s (Family TV/Music Room)
SVS SB-300 (Garage Work Shop)
Kef KUBE 12’s (Work Office)

I did try the Kef KC62 and KF92 subs also.

@james633 Don't knock the JBL's (kidding) I have the L100 75's for my physical media system paired with the E112's. I will never let those speakers go. Also have 4309's for our family room and love them also. Huge JBL fan, honestly my speaker crushes have been with JBL and Focal, but other always peaking my interests from time to time.

And my biggest revelation was with my office where I have the subs to the right and left of me halfway into the room (12'x12' room) the phase adjustment made worlds of difference and that "in to the room right and left placement" for subwoofers I'm sold on. Hope to build a dedicated listening room and move my main system there and have more liberty with speaker and subwoofer placement.

@rwbadley absolutely agree... I have volume set to 10.5. Perlisten did reach out and want me to software down-date to 1.23, but it’s looking to me like a bad amp module in one subwoofer.

@kennyc so now having many subs, both JL and Perlisten and sadly both my JL and Perlisten now have gone bad on me (one sub in each pair)... My thoughts thus far.

Build quality JL

Woofer quality Perlisten

Bass presence and SPL force JL

Bass speed and articulation Perlisten

Features and functions Tie

Customer Service Perlisten

Reliability JL (from my own personal experience)

So essentially a tie, however I would venture to make the case that for me I’d go JL F-12 if I could do it all over again at this juncture. Maybe I’ll change my mind given more time and once both D12's are subs are up and working. But I'm happy to have yet another sub sound in my collection (future speaker pairing and such).

Overall I’m still of the opinion that these are very different subwoofers.

I would liken SVS to JL, and Perlisten more so to REL. Again not that any of these are the same but in a sense of which sound is closer to which.