Floorstanders & subs question

Ian Carter

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Hi,

For those of you that use your AV amps to listen to music how do you do it?

Is it possible to listen to music just using the fronts and having bass sent to them, but when watching films have in bass sent to the sub and the fronts set to small? Or do you have fronts set to large and have bass sent to both fronts and sub??

Very confused.
 
If you set your speakers to Large (and you should if they're floorstanders), you'll probably find the sub will have very little (if any) effect on music; you'll only notice it during films when there are deep rumbles, explosions etc.

I'm assuming this is the effect you're after?
 
Originally posted by Rojo Habe
If you set your speakers to Large (and you should if they're floorstanders), you'll probably find the sub will have very little (if any) effect on music; you'll only notice it during films when there are deep rumbles, explosions etc.

Not neccessarily. Many people, including myself prefer having floorstanders set to small. It allows more headroom from your mains by allowing your sub to take care of everything below your crossover point. If you engage THX all speakers get automatically set to small anyway.
Again some people find this a thing of preference.

Ian, I've only ever had two AV amps so I can't speak for all the ones available. In my experience the only way of having no sub is to select 'no sub' and selct mains as 'large'. This may differ on other amps.
I think some amps may allow for different settings in different modes.
 
But if you knew that you wanted your bass to be sent to the sub, and not the floorstanders, surely you would buy sats, rather than spending the extra cash on floorstanders to offer the bass you won't be using...?
 
Thanks,

I have a modest Eltax sat/sub setup at the moment and want to upgrade the front soundstage first - still modest but better than I have now. I was thinking of picking up some M73i's and the corresponding centre and using them for the time being with the Elatx sub and rears.

My amp is a Yamaha a595a. As the M73's are floorstanders I was considering using my Dvd player as a cd player and loosing my ageing hifi. I didn't know how the sub would cope with music hence my question about bypassing it.

Am i right in thinking that most audio cd's won't go low enough to 'activate' my sub if I have fronts set to large then?
 
If you have a variable crossover on your amp you should set the sub to kick in where your speakers bottom out. In my experience cutting the frequency to larger speakers dosnt work and defeats the object of having larger speakers. It takes a very good sub to make up for the LF on upto seven speakers. Also not many subs are as agile in the bass department as full range speakers. When Tag calibrated my room we tried with a 80HZ crossover and with crossovers at the speakers respective frequency cutoffs and the later sounded far superior with better controlled bass and more of it. This is because the sub isnt having to work its ass off.
 
I have my amp set to direct/bypass on the cd input so when i listen to a cd no sub just the fronts.I would say if you can do this with your amp its the way to go.
 
Originally posted by bob1
I have my amp set to direct/bypass on the cd input so when i listen to a cd no sub just the fronts.I would say if you can do this with your amp its the way to go.

Hmmm that sounds interesting - wonder how I can find out?
 
Yor amp may or may not do this but if i select direct or 2ch stereo on mine the sub is not used, also it remembers the settings for different inputs so when i switch between inputs the format changes.
 
For music I switch my Pioneer into a Direct Stereo mode (no sound from the subs or surrounds), well this is when I'm in my purest frame of mind. Other times, I listen to music in a surround mode (such as Neo) in which case I get some surround and subs action (and of course I can raise or lower the gain on the subs depending on the effect I'm after).

My front floor standers are set to large with no problems and my subs (SVS PB2-Plus at 900w each) can cope with anything thrown at them.
 
You may find your eltax sub is not that much lower than a set of decent floorstanders. Many cheaper lifestyle systems don't go lower than 30 -35hz which can be the same as a set of decent floorstanders. You could, in effect, ditch the sub altogether. Which model is it by the way?

I have some eltax floorstanders set to small and my Servo15 sub switched on all the time. And it makes a huuuuuge difference on music. If it gets a bit too much i can just turn the level down a bit. But its nice to make the floorboards pulse once in a while.

chris
 
Absolutely Chris.

I find the idea of switching off the sub to listen to music very odd indeed. If it's there then I want to hear it.

On music it takes a hefty pair of main speakers to handle even bass guitar with any real sense of ease.

If you haven't listened to a good sub that goes down deep completely effortlessly then you haven't heard music reproduced as it's meant to sound.

It is fairly well established that adding a decent sub to a stereo hifi system brings many benefits. Like warmth, increased image scale & depth.

Not to mention how much fun it adds to listening to any music with a solid bass line. Why would anyone want an SVS 16-46 except to listen to music? :devil:


Nimby
 
Originally posted by Chris Lamle
Which model is it by the way?


chris

Its an A60 it think - maybe an A80, its part of the Eltax stargate X1 system.

In answer to the last post, thats what I'm getting at - I don't think my sub is tight enough for solid bass reproduction in music, but can't afford to replace it. So replacing the fronts with floorstanders that were more bass capable could be an interim measure but I still want the sub for Movies.
 
hi all i have dynaudio 62 floorstanders +vx10 sub, i have set fronts to small +sub, if using denon 3802 in direct mode 2 channel sterio ,

i was under the impression that the denon in direct mode treats the front speakers as (speakers) regardless of small/large settings.???

using bw cdm1nts i had + sub for 2 channel direct mode the sub was more noticible, with the dyns going lower to about 44hz +sub, the sub is less noticible as vx 10 goes down to approx 36hz.

the 3802 sub crossover settings only allow for 80/100/120 so 80hz is the nearest match to dyns.

not tried this yet , but would i get better sterio by by setting 3802 to fronts large /no sub thank you
 
Mick23

Give it a whirl. All i can say from my own experience is that I prefer the sound with the sub on. Plus it gives the fronts less work to do.

chris
 
if you don't use the multi channel in (6 ch input) plug 2 phonos from the dvd's analogue outs into the Front L and R inputs and when you select 6ch input the amp will only put sound through front Left and Right and full signal would be sent no matter what!
 

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