Bass Management Basics - Settings Made Simple

[admin]

Is your bass management set up properly on your processor? If you wish to optimize the bass performance of your home theater, read this article. Learn how to configure speaker size, crossovers, delay and more in this basic guide to bass management. This guide is designed to address the numerous questions we receive from new home theater owners who purchase a new system component and don't quite understand the How's and Why's of bass management. More advanced home theater folks may wish to peruse our more in-depth guides available on the site that give a more thorough explanation of this complex and often misunderstood topic.

Discuss "Bass Management Basics - Settings Made Simple" here. Read the article.

 

[utopianemo]

This article, for me, begs the question: What is the point of spending a lot of money on towers for Home Theater when you're not going to be using them below a certain frequency, which is where a lot of the extra money is going?

It's like when Tom Andry reviewed the Emotiva ER speaker package and compared them to the RBH TK-5CTs, and set the crossover at 80Hz. Given that the Emotivas were sufficiently well designed, of course one wouldn't hear a big qualitative difference between the tower and the bookshelf. The advantage the tower had is cut off at the knees.

It seems that when listening to music, towers make a whole lot of sense. Their xover system is designed to have a pleasing transition. But at least for HT, I can't see the point.

 

[Funboy]

equalization

Does any system measure and correct for the slope of the crossover depending on your system - It seems like it would be so easy for something like Audyssey to do it, but instead it measures everything, corrects everything, and then passes over the bass management to the receiver and lets it all get screwed up...

 

[gene]

many of these questions will be answered in a very comprehensive subwoofer calibration article I am finishing up. Fullrange speakers can work in a multi sub system but its very tricky. You are almost always better off bass managing all speakers and using 2 or 4 subs. Having a tower with multi bass drivers allows it to play much louder even if you cross them over at 80Hz so its not a complete waste.

 

[ParadigmDawg]

I can attest to that.

I blew 3 woofers in my Studio 40's trying to hit high volumes in my 8,000 cuft room. Since I changed to the Studio 100's, I haven't blown one.

Having a tower with multi bass drivers allows it to play much louder even if you cross them over at 80Hz so its not a complete waste.

 

[sholling]

Two reasons for towers. Some of us enjoy the pure/direct mode in our receivers and letting the towers deal with music down to their limits. We can still switch back to other modes that use the sub when watching videos. Second reason is efficiency and volume. Towers are still loafing when bookshelves are starting to struggle.

BTW, It looks like 3 of the 4 links are dead.

 

[utopianemo]

I agree with you about towers for listening to music.

A tower isn't more robust just because it's a tower; and there are plenty of high-end "Bookshelf" models--i.e. speakers that need to be mounted as opposed to floorstanding--that have outputs sufficient for large rooms.

I guess what I'm trying to say is that for HT, it doesn't make a whole lot of sense to design speakers that have a lot of extension below 80Hz or even 60Hz when the prevailing logic says the end user is going to filter that extension out anyway. And as a consumer, I'd rather put money into a more robust sub or throw money at a speaker that gives me more output at the frequencies I'm going to be using them for. That's why I particularly like Emotiva's speaker design philosophy--good sound and high output down to 80Hz.

 

[Alittlemonster]

Bass Management

Big vs little speakers? Hard to believe that my Klipsch would be considered "little" with ported, or horn 15 inch woofers (the speakers alone can rattle the room, never mind the subwoofer). So, measured the frequency response with an equalizer/analyser and sure enough--there it was...31.5 Hz at +0.5dB. So, did what the article said anyway and changed the x-over frequency to 80 Hz at 12 dB per octave to let the sub do its thing, and guess what? The bass sounded less muddy. The sound is gawdawful good now and before...well, was considering moving the subwoofer to get less room interaction. Nope, setting the speakers to "little" and the x-over to 80 Hz solved that problem. Neat!

Also, checked the Denon website FAQs and they answered the same question--simply put, unless your system has some really big speakers that can reproduce down to some sort of unreal frequency response and no subwoofer needed, it is best to set the speakers to little.

 

[utopianemo]

Alittlemonster,

Have you tried comparing your current setup (speakers set to 'small' with 80Hz xover) to leaving your speakers on large and turning off the sub?

I know your current arrangement would be able to go louder and probably have deeper extension, but I'd bet using the speakers by themselves would sound reasonably close in overall quality.

 

[Alittlemonster]

Alittlemonster,

Have you tried comparing your current setup (speakers set to 'small' with 80Hz xover) to leaving your speakers on large and turning off the sub?

I know your current arrangement would be able to go louder and probably have deeper extension, but I'd bet using the speakers by themselves would sound reasonably close in overall quality.

Great question--thanks for reminding me. Sure have tried that, and you are right, the big Klipsch sounded wonderful for even the very best music on an SACD--like the 1812 (the room just shook!, why even use a sub?), but they miss the boat on really low frequencies that can be heard on something like the Das Boot DVD. Not sure if the amp is running out of power trying to push the speaker woofers or the woofers simply can't do "it". It's probably a mixture of the two--have no idea what kind of ohms are coming up when the woofers get into really low frequencies causing the final amp to simply run out of oomph, but it looks like those frequencies are best handled by the sub. I think Das Boot can get to 10 Hz (as I've been told), and don't think there is any way that the Klipsch can reproduce that--the sub, on the other hand, doesn't seem to mind getting to its 12 Hz cut off, so.......

Incidently, room acoustics and build quality of the house are the single biggest problem that I have with LFE. This new house, doesn't cut the mustard. If the Klipsch can rattle the room and by that I mean the room walls and floor actually move, then you can guess what the sub does to it. Lesson learned here--next time, buy or build a more solid house. As for now, gonna listen to the xperts on this subject and in this case, turn the woof down a bit to get a more acurate sound.

 

[sholling]

Incidently, room acoustics and build quality of the house are the single biggest problem that I have with LFE. This new house, doesn't cut the mustard. If the Klipsch can rattle the room and by that I mean the room walls and floor actually move, then you can guess what the sub does to it. Lesson learned here--next time, buy or build a more solid house. As for now, gonna listen to the xperts on this subject and in this case, turn the woof down a bit to get a more acurate sound.

You can make up for most or all of that rattle with treatments. I had that problem myself and by adding attractive room treatments, and not so attractive bass traps and a subwoofer isolation pad the rattle is all gone and the bass is super tight.

 

[mnnc]

Is your bass management set up properly on your processor? If you wish to optimize the bass performance of your home theater, read this article. Learn how to configure speaker size, crossovers, delay and more in this basic guide to bass management. This guide is designed to address the numerous questions we receive from new home theater owners who purchase a new system component and don't quite understand the How's and Why's of bass management. More advanced home theater folks may wish to peruse our more in-depth guides available on the site that give a more thorough explanation of this complex and often misunderstood topic.

Discuss "Bass Management Basics - Settings Made Simple" here. Read the article.

My confusion with BM is what do I set br player to, Oppo83 in my case via analog outs, and what do I set prepro to which is a NHT Controller. Furthermore, which overrides which. Logic tells me that the final end, prepro in my case, would make the final decision...? Wrong...correct...close...or haven't a clue. I have fine gear and want to make best of it. I use the Controllers spkr wizard feature which has settings for Nht spkrs which I use all around. This sort of thing makes me want to return to 2ch...aargh. Thanks for reading/input.

 

[genvirt]

crossover and speaker difinition settings

Hello!

Greate issue - I have cleared my minds now
But I still have some questions:
1.Settings speaker to SMALL it's the right step for home cinema set up, but does it already right for music listening too?
2.I have a Boston Acoustics VR975 main speakers that has inner subuffer each.
So should I have to put configuration to SMALL anyway? (I haven't additional sub)
3.On my Pioneer LX82 AV receiver I can set the crossover 50,80,100,150 and 200 hz, I use a 50hz setting - does it the better value for my setup?

Thank You!

 

[gene]

But I still have some questions:
1.Settings speaker to SMALL it's the right step for home cinema set up, but does it already right for music listening too?
2.I have a Boston Acoustics VR975 main speakers that has inner subuffer each.
So should I have to put configuration to SMALL anyway? (I haven't additional sub)
3.On my Pioneer LX82 AV receiver I can set the crossover 50,80,100,150 and 200 hz, I use a 50hz setting - does it the better value for my setup?

If your speakers have built in powered subs, connect each of the subs line level to the subwoofer out of your receiver. You can use a y-splitter if your receiver has only 1 sub out.

 

[genvirt]

Here isn't a problems with connection to AV.
Here a questions about settings...

 

[MatthewB.]

Gene your idea of using rca connections to powered subs in towers is nice but in some cases oh so wrong. I have Def Tech BP7001s and would never consider hooking them up via RCA cables. First off by doing this, you are now feeding those tower subs a full range bass signal and trust me even my 7001s should not be sent a full range bass signal. DT claims they go down to 18Hz (maybe when pigs fly) but I know they drop off sharp below 30hz. By also using RCA cables you are not using the high end crossover that the DefTech engineers carefully designed that tower to do. As most people who own DefTech have found out that the easiest solution is the best and that is to just use speaker wire and let the towers built in crossover handle the upper and lower frequencies.

I have my 7001s set to small and crossed at 40hz and I get great mid bass out of the towers and let my SVS subwoofer handle everything below that. I also found that with my other smaller DefTech speakers that by adding small mid bass subs to them and also crossed over at 40hz that my room gets the benefit of both worlds. My SVS handles everything from 20-40hz, my multiple mid bass subs handle 40-80hz and the samd with the built in subs in my 7001s also crossed at 40hz to the SVS and internally crossed to the upper portion of the towers at 80hz.

By doing it this way, I am in no way stressing out any of my speakers because they are not being asked to handle any lower frequency they can't handle, the majority of mid bass that you can actually hear is being handled by the towers built in subs (being used as mid bass drivers) and my outboard mid bass subs. Finally my SVS has all the power it will ever need only having to send out frequencies below 40hz and not having to use alot of it's power to drive mid range bass. So again the best of both worlds, mid bass and lower bass, but your advice to send any powered tower subwoofer a full range signal is way off.

 

[Theresa]

everyone has their opinion

There are many approaches to this. I personally am using the crossovers built into my pre/pro for the bass to the upper bass (upper bass being over 80-120Hz for me). I use miniDSPs for crossovers between the midbass (meaning combined upper bass-midrange in one driver, as this is the definition I learned) and the tweeter. I'm not so big on bass that I need several drivers handling it per channel. Two 90 liter subwoofers (20Hz to 80/120Hz depending on which speaker is being powered) are more than enough for me. I appreciate the lack of any crossover transition between 80Hz and 1700Hz. The Emotiva pre-pro is very versatile as it allows the crossover between sub and mid-base on a speaker to speaker basis. But my subs are home built and provide all the bass I need (not that someone else doesn't want/need more). A lot depends on your listening space. I have to make do with the living room of my small condo and I must always be concerned about disturbing the neighbors. When I lived in houses I could play music and movies as loud as I liked but that is no more. Keep researching and listening and you will come to your own conclusion as to what suits you.

 

[LexiconRV8]

Crossover settings

I have the Lexicon RV 8 AV receiver. Monitor Audio S 8 for L/R, and small approx 3" drivers Denon satellites for surrounds. I currently have the L/R xovered at 60, the sub xovered at 60 and the satellites xovered at 100. My question is, the freq bet. 60 and 100 for the satellites is going to the L/R right? Thank you in advance. Brian

 

[ashfaq]

Crossover for multiple speakers.

My question is if i have 5.1 system with two large floor standing speakers with the frequency level of 35 hz to 24khz center 50hz to 24khz surronud 50hz to 24khz, my woofer goes down to 20 hz. what crossover should i set? is it 10 hz above the main speakers like 45hz or 60hz according to the center and surround speakers? please can anyone advise me?

 

[timoteo]

If you can only set a global crossover (one crossover value for all speakers) then you take the speakers with the highest F3. In your case it's your surrounds/center. If they are -3dB at 50hz then you cross the system over at half an octave above that 50hz point. So 75hz is where you should be set at. But since most receivers don't have a 75hz crossover, you should play with the two closest to that. Most likely your receiver will have a 60hz & 80hz crossover option. My guess will be that 80hz will sound the best but your ears will have to be the judge of that.

As far as your subwoofer, have it set somewhere above the crossover you decide on for the speakers. You want an overlap so you don't miss out on frequencies. I'd say set the sub to 100hz-120hz & leave it. If you set it lower than the speakers then you'll have a hole in the sound.

Example: if your speakers are set to 80hz & sub is set to 60hz then theoretically you will have a 20hz gap. So I recommend setting the sub to its highest available crossover level.

FYI: the THX standard is 80hz for a reason. They have done extensive research & found that 80hz is best for the majority of systems. It happens to be the crossover that best fits most speakers I've owned as well. My current Yamaha allows me to set different crossover points for my center/main/surrounds. So I have mine as follows: Mains-60hz, Center-80hz, Surrounds-90hz, Sub-120hz.