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Subwoofer. Great one song. Not so great the next song.

I'm not a subwoofer guy. Played around with one in my primary system (Aerial Acoustics 7Bs, Proceed 250w amp, AR LS-16 tube preamp). Big B&W powered, not sure which. Didn't think it added anything. Ditched it.


Recently got a pair of Aerial Acoustic 6Ts for my secondary system. They have no place to be but right up against the wall. Maybe a foot out. Can't decide if they sound better with a sock in the rear facing bass port or not. Its a wash. Overall they sound pretty dang good though.


But, I played around with a JL Audio e110 sub. Pretty nice unit. Put the socks back in the bass ports.

On some songs the combo with the sub just sounds stellar. On others it sounds boomy and thumpy. My audiophile hang up is taught, clear, concise bass. I do not like boomy and thumpy at all. I can get up and turn the output on the sub down a little and it sounds okay again.

But I don't want to do that every time a different song comes on.

Now, on this sub you can change crossover frequencies, phase and also a polarity switch. I don't know _anything_ about that stuff. I've got it set on the more or less default settings in the manual. The only thing I've messed with is the polarity switch and for reasons I don't understand it sounds better on 180 than 0. I have not messed with the crossover frequency and phase dials.

Is there any chance that changing any of those settings would allow me to reach a sweet spot where I don't have to change settings on the sub frequently? I may or may not keep this sub. If I can't find that sweet spot I'll let it go as alone the 6Ts don't sound bad by any measure.

Thanks,
George


n80

Showing 2 responses by kr4

kr4's avatar
kr4
3,719 posts
 
One possibility is that, because you haven’t done any PEQ, some frequencies are being reproduced at the (mostly) correct SPL while others are too loud and overwhelming. The e110 doesn’t have any PEQ functionality built-in so you’d need to add an outboard PEQ device.
Good advice.
Also, in order to optimize the subwoofer integration, you should be connecting your pre-amp to the e110 inputs, and the e110 outputs to your speaker amp, which is then connected to the speakers. This ensures the e110’s crossover is applied.
There is no crossover in the e110, so there's really no point to doing this.
Turn the FEQ, all the way down, Counter Clock Wise.
What's an FEQ?

My suggestions are to consider a preamp with bass management, an external crossover and/or an external DSP for equalizing the sub in your room.
kr4's avatar
kr4
3,719 posts
 
Let me apologize about my posts.  I was thinking about the f110 and spoke, in error, with regard to the e110.

I have asked the moderators to delete the posts.
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