Hooking up my Subwoofer

[caleb2001r]

Hi everyone,
Sorry for the dumb question. I'm wondering how I should hook up this subwoofer.

My receiver back panel:
http://www.yamaha.com/yamahavgn/Images/YEC/AV_Receivers/Views/PV_rxv663_rear.jpg

My subwoofer back panel:
http://store.audioholics.com/shopimages/products/extras/Sub_Amplifier.jpg

Should I use a single RCA cable and hook it up to the Subwoofer 1 on the receiver, and connect that to the Low Level Input on the Subwoofer? If so, which one should I connect it to - R or L (on the subwoofer)?

Or perhaps should I use the "A to Speakers" connections somehow?

Sorry I'm a bit confused, heh. Thanks in advance for any help.

 

[AVRat]

You have it correct. It doesn't matter which input you use. Make sure you turn the x-over freq all the way to 180 on the sub.

 

[caleb2001r]

Awesome; thanks. Why should I turn the x-over freq to 180? (just curious)

 

[JerryLove]

Awesome; thanks. Why should I turn the x-over freq to 180? (just curious)

Because you don't want your Subwoofer filtering out high frequencies: you are going to do that with the settings on your receiver instead.

You'd only really use the X-Over (and therefore set it below 180) with pass-through speaker cables: which are by far the inferior solution in this case.

 

[caleb2001r]

Gotcha; thanks for the advice guys.

 

[caleb2001r]

So I got the speakers up and I've been testing, but I can't seem to get my subwoofer to work. It's not throwing out any bass.

I've connected the one RCA cable to the Subwoofer 1 on the receiver, then on the back of the subwoofer, I have it connected to the low level input (R). I've tried it on (L), but still nothing.

Perhaps it's my receiver that's not giving it any bass? Going up to a 10" Subwoofer I assumed the difference would be amazing, so this can't be setup right can it?

 

[adk highlander]

I have a few othe questions because it is possible with certain sources or speaker settings you may not be sending an LFE signal to the sub.

What did you set the crossover at in your speaker setup?
Check to make sure they are not set to "large" or "full range".
What were you using for a source?
Was it an analog signal or a digital signal with a discret LFE track?

 

[caleb2001r]

I'm very new to this, so I apologize if I give you completely "left-field" answers:

What did you set the crossover at in your speaker setup?
I set it to the max; 180Hz.

Check to make sure they are not set to "large" or "full range".
Where do I check for this option? When I do the calibration (that automatically comes up when you plug in the calibration mic), should I be looking for it in there?

What should floorstanding speakers be set to (if not "large" or "full range")?

What were you using for a source?
I notice the lack of bass when playing movies from a PS3 at the moment. It's what I use as my main DVD player. PS3 is connected via HDMI to the receiver.

Was it an analog signal or a digital signal with a discret LFE track?
I'm sorry; I don't know the answer to this question. Where do I go to get this answer? I noticed the lack of bass in bluray movies, such as "The Dark Knight" and "Wall-E" (two movies I popped in to test things out).

 

[caleb2001r]

I notice I have a few options in my receiver options that allow me to control the LFE Level for the speaker, from -20db to 0db. Should I alter this at all?

I also can adjust the speaker level. At the moment, it's about 3/4 the way to max.

Could the cable I have connecting to the subwoofer be an issue? I'm using an older thin generic RCA cable to connect it. Perhaps I should invest in a higher quality cable?

When I do the test tones, all the speakers sound great but I can barely hear the test tone in the subwoofer. Is that normal?

I'm certain I'm still in the break-in period for these speakers, so should I avoid any big adjustments for a while?

 

[caleb2001r]

Well, this is odd. I popped in Iron Man and the bass is working fantastic. I even had to drop the gain a bit.

Sorry; false alarm? Maybe the subwoofer had to get warmed up. In the EMP insert that came with it, it did mention that the drivers would have to "loosen".

 

[adk highlander]

Well, this is odd. I popped in Iron Man and the bass is working fantastic. I even had to drop the gain a bit.

This is why I was asking what you were using for a source and test material. Iron Man is either Dolby Digital or Dolby TrueHD and this has a descret LFM track so it will send a signal to the sub no matter what you crossover and speaker settings are.

What do you have for speakers? If they are floor standing I would set them to small and set the crossover to 80hz. This way anything below 80hz will go to the sub as well as any LFE portion of the track.

I think your receiver has YPAO auto set up. You should run this and it will set up the crossover and speaker distance for you.

Sorry; false alarm? Maybe the subwoofer had to get warmed up. In the EMP insert that came with it, it did mention that the drivers would have to "loosen".

No this is not the case. "Break-in" is over rated and in most cases it is your ears getting used to the new speakers not some change in the speaker over time.

 

[caleb2001r]

Thanks! On the RX-663 it only allows me to manually change the speakers from large to small, etc, and the bass cross over when I have it setup to have extra speakers. Since I don't, I set this to "None" under the option where it says "Extra SP Assign".

When I do this, it doesn't give me the option to change the speakers from large to small, or vica versa, and also doesn't give me the option to set the bass cross over.

So everything should be setup using YPAO, which is how I got them configured at the moment.

Here's another question: I currently do not have the rear satellites connected. When I do YPAO setup, will it set up everything correctly with just two floorstanding, a center, and the subwoofer?

I plan on setting up the rears later this week (5.1), but I have to run some wires to get it wife-approved.

The system I bought from EMP includes two floorstanding, a center channel, 10" sub, and two bookshelf rears.

 

[AVRat]

Start on pg. 85 for speaker setup. The Bass Crossover affects all speakers set to small, which is how all speakers should be set.

LFE/Bass out = SWFR