Get rid of sub and move to floorstanders?

[corysmith01]

I've been thinking about this for the past few days and wanted to get everyone's input. I've noticed that I rarely, and I say rarely I mean like twice in the last month, get to use my sub. I have a Velo SPL800II. It's a little beast. And as such, I rarely get to use it b/c I'm in a small apartment in New York...you know the kind. Thin walls. Neighbors to the top, left, and right. All around me basically. So, out of courtesy, I rarely use fire it up, unless I'm absolutely sure none of them are around, which happens from time to time. So, I got to thinking; I wonder if I'd get better performance, or be better off, if I were to sell my fronts and sub and use the proceeds to go towards the purchase of some nice floorstanders. I'd get more of the low end frequencies without it being too obnoxious...that sub, in my size of room, really makes its presence felt. Also, when the environment was right (a house down the road), I'd want to purchase a new sub anyway as that SPL is probably best suited for smaller rooms.

Like I said...just mulling it over. But it seems logical. It seems like I could get better all around sound by going with some floorstanders, and using the sale of the sub+fronts to augment that. Just curious. I feel bad that my sub, which I think is a great sub, sits unused so often. Opinions? Thanks.

 

[gnagel]

I'm in a similar situation.

I keep my sub at about 1/100th of its maximum volume setting. Even then, my receiver has the sub set for -15dec in order to maintain the sound meter readings at a comparable level with my other speakers!

My B&W ASW1000 sub is overkill for my 11x13' room. And, my neighbor below me would not appreciate it if I turned the sub any louder.

 

[mtrycrafts]

... if I were to sell my fronts and sub and use the proceeds to go towards the purchase of some nice floorstanders. I'd get more of the low end frequencies without it being too obnoxiousOpinions? Thanks.

I don't think so. You probably have that sub going more than you think but at low levels. The floor speakers with a low driver will do similar bass and could be a problem. The bass region will travel to the neighbors if you hear it, no matter what the speaker is. Maybe you have a room issue and some of the frequency is over boosted by the room? Maybe you need to do some measuring first?

 

[corysmith01]

Yeah, you could be right about the bass travel...I know it's the biggest culprit when it comes to creating an intrusion for your neighbors. I definitely have the level down low. I guess what I was thinking...and maybe I was wrong here...is that having floorstanders, and running them large, would allow me to get down into the the low 40's/high 30's comfortably, and I guess I was thinking that, with the sub getting into the low 30's/high 20's (barely), that this was somehow more obnoxious...that the floorstanders, since they didn't go quite as low, would somehow be less bothersome. Maybe I'm way off on that. And, I was thinking that at low volumes, running large (floorstanders) could somehow give me more of the spectrum. But again, I openly admit that my theory could be way off here.

 

[emorphien]

I'd stick with the sub because you have the benefit of more flexible placement than with floorstanders. As a result you can put it in the best place possible for bass and turn it down more than you could the bass on floorstanders to match it.

At least that seems a likely scenario from some similar situations I've see.

 

[jcPanny]

Sub downgrade

How about a little HSU or Onix X-sub that will cross over with your mains and provide clean base down to the 30 Hz range? The limited 30-80 Hz bass will be better than what you have now with the sub off.

 

[emorphien]

I thought I had read of in-room responses reaching 20Hz from the X-sub, but not at extremely high SPL (good fill in for music).

 

[j_garcia]

Normally, I would say NEVER to your question, but I have a friend in the same situation and I would not see a problem with no sub in cases like yours. The X-sub is not a bad idea too. I've used a small sub that had less extension just to support the low end of some bookshelf speakers and it worked very well.

 

[agarwalro]

Place a piece of high density foam about 2 - 4" thick under the sub and move it closer to your primary listening position. Raising the sub off the floor will reduce the vibrations transmitted through the floor and moving it closer will allow you to play it at lower volume and still hear the bass.

That said, placing the sub in a corner helps increase the perceived volume due to 'corner loading' effect, and generally yields better FR than other locations.

 

[Sheep]

Place a piece of high density foam about 2 - 4" thick under the sub and move it closer to your primary listening position. Raising the sub off the floor will reduce the vibrations transmitted through the floor and moving it closer will allow you to play it at lower volume and still hear the bass.

That said, placing the sub in a corner helps increase the perceived volume due to 'corner loading' effect, and generally yields better FR than other locations.

Yeilds deeper extension, not a flatter FR.

Cory,

I'd stick with your current setup. I used to have floor standers, and then I added a sub. I hated the way they blended, always seemed to have alot of overhang.

SheepStar

 

[mike c]

I agree with agarwalro, move it closer ... lower the volume. the sub can be moved around much easier than moving floorstanders. plus the fact that the SPL is a great sub, im sure it's spectacular with music (or at least blending with speakers)

 

[Nuglets]

The only thing you can do is turn it down. If you get floor-standing speaker's you will still bug your neighbor's if you turn it up too loud. In my opinion the most annoying noise that neighbor's can make with their stereo's is loud middle range bass resonating so loud you can't hear anything else. Where every song sound's like the same from my side of the wall. I would be happier to hear low frequency bass at a lower volume than that. Either way you go, I think you will get decent result's as long as you control the volume, on the sub especially. Don't do both though. Based on experience, trying to blend a sub with floor-standing speaker's is not much fun. I ended up selling my Paradigm PS-1200(which is a great sub for a small to medium sized room) when I got my tower's because it just couldn't keep up with 6 x 8" woofer's and it created frequency response issue's.

 

[emorphien]

The only thing you can do is turn it down. If you get floor-standing speaker's you will still bug your neighbor's if you turn it up too loud.

My neighbors downstairs do that

I got fed up and threw a loud DVD-A on my home theater and fired back lower and louder.

 

[corysmith01]

Thanks for all the input everyone. Yeah, I guess maybe I'll stick with the sub/bookshelf combo. I'm not too broken up about it...I really do like that sub, and it really is great for music. I went from an SVS PB10-ISD to it due to size constraints and it hasn't let me down. I do have it in a corner, so with room gain, maybe that's why I'm feeling it is pretty loud. It may not be so bad at all. I'm sure I could put it down a few clicks still though. Thanks again for all the suggestions/opinions.

 

[Tod]

Do you like or talk to your neighbors? If you and even one of them were comfortable with it, could you put on some fairly constant music at a pleasnat to loud volume, go over, and just see how it sounds? Maybe???

 

[ctwed]

The preceeding posts are very interesting, almost unanimous. I however have a different perspective. I recently did just what you are contemplating. After the change I have all the base I will ever need for video and my music has improved dramaticaly. I will never go back. The difference seems to be that I am a 85/15 music over video kind of guy. Be aware bass capacity of the floorstanders you audition. My new speakers (Legacy Audio) are rated 20-25hz, equal to or better than alot of subs. This is definately what made the difference for me. Good Luck.

 

[jcPanny]

Sub issolator

Another idea, check out the Auralex sub isolator pad. It might help reduce the vibration that is transferred into the neighboring appartments.
Also, you might be able to find one of those inline RCA filters that is a 30 Hz High Pass so you can reduce the <30 Hz info without losing 30-80 Hz.

 

[Nuglets]

The preceeding posts are very interesting, almost unanimous. I however have a different perspective. I recently did just what you are contemplating. After the change I have all the base I will ever need for video and my music has improved dramaticaly. I will never go back. The difference seems to be that I am a 85/15 music over video kind of guy. Be aware bass capacity of the floorstanders you audition. My new speakers (Legacy Audio) are rated 20-25hz, equal to or better than alot of subs. This is definately what made the difference for me. Good Luck.

No offense, but a response from 20-25Hz isn't good lol. I think I know what you mean though, but if you had a sub in the past and it didn't compete with your current floor-standing speaker's, then it was probably a placement issue, or the sub just wasn't capable of what you expected of it. My full-range speaker's also hit as low as 22Hz, but there are very many sub's that reach that low without a problem and they have built in amplifier's on them so they don't require an Pre-amp/amp combo to get the most out of them..

 

[MACCA350]

ctwed, what model do you have? Some of those Legacy's look very nice, though I've never listened to any. Found the Legacy Audio Helix system while browsing. Not just a, plug in to your receiver, speaker

cheers