How low do does a subwoofer really need to go?

[KEW]

My opinion is if you have a good sub, the value of buying a tower over bookshelf speakers becomes dubious.
Certainly given a normal HT with sub(s) if you only had $1000 to spend on your R&L you would be far better off to buy a pair of Ultra Bookshelf speakers than the Prime towers (Both are $1000/pr).
Many people like the looks of towers, and I get that. Towers are also typically a little more stable, so if you have rambunctious kids or dogs they may be a better choice. The Ultra Towers are $2000/pr. and most of that money is going into getting a FR down to 28Hz (-3dB); however, once you add dual (or more) subs and tune the system, you will probably end up with your crossover around 80Hz which the Ultra Bookshelf will do without a sweat!

 

[Danzilla31]

My opinion is if you have a good sub, the value of buying a tower over bookshelf speakers becomes dubious.
Certainly given a normal HT with sub(s) if you only had $1000 to spend on your R&L you would be far better off to buy a pair of Ultra Bookshelf speakers than the Prime towers (Both are $1000/pr).
Many people like the looks of towers, and I get that. Towers are also typically a little more stable, so if you have rambunctious kids or dogs they may be a better choice. The Ultra Towers are $2000/pr. and most of that money is going into getting a FR down to 28Hz (-3dB); however, once you add dual (or more) subs and tune the system, you will probably end up with your crossover around 80Hz which the Ultra Bookshelf will do without a sweat!

After all the learning I've done I can say I agree with you 100%. It's...... just.... weeelll having 3 Ultra Towers as my F C and R channels looks so dang sexy I just can't resist!!!! I think somehow this makes me a bad person but since I invested so much into the Primes and it's not much more to upgrade in a year well why not? It feels good to be bad! . The only 2 things I can think off as advantages is that on music when I just get home I really don't always feel like turning those dang subs on. So having 2 pretty much full range towers that I can just switch over 2 stereo mode for music is a nice option for me. Plus I do suspect the Ultras 6.5 dual midrange and tweeter arrangement will sound AMAZING for home theater on the midrange highs and most importantly as a center channel for dialogue all panning from left to right as well. I'd almost be willing to bet some money on that! LOL

 

[snakeeyes]

After all the learning I've done I can say I agree with you 100%. It's...... just.... weeelll having 3 Ultra Towers as my F C and R channels looks so dang sexy I just can't resist!!!! I think somehow this makes me a bad person but since I invested so much into the Primes and it's not much more to upgrade in a year well why not? It feels good to be bad! . The only 2 things I can think off as advantages is that on music when I just get home I really don't always feel like turning those dang subs on. So having 2 pretty much full range towers that I can just switch over 2 stereo mode for music is a nice option for me. Plus I do suspect the Ultras 6.5 dual midrange and tweeter arrangement will sound AMAZING for home theater on the midrange highs and most importantly as a center channel for dialogue all panning from left to right as well. I'd almost be willing to bet some money on that! LOL

Think you will be looking at a 3ch amp if you run 3 towers across the front... And I bet you keep the subs on!

 

[sholling]

Here I have to respectfully disagree. According to my spectrum analyzer, acoustic jazz and classical music has a lot going on in the octave from 20-40Hz, and getting that octave right is important to realism.

As always I respect you opinions and your high level of knowledge. Please note that I said " little rock, pop, jazz or classical music has much content that dips much below 30hz" There is a pretty big difference between 30hz and 40hz. Whether what happens below 30hz matters to the listener is going vary by what music they listen to. With exceptions (e.g. electro bass, house, and super bass club music or esoteric organ music) I just don't hear a lot below 30 hz, at least with the jazz and rock or the classical that I listen to. Can you break out the 20-30hz range? I'd be interested to know what percent of music is digging that deep. Bear in mind that I'm a bass lover and have massive subs so I'm interested. I do have a disc that reportedly dips to below 10hz but it's not organ music that you hear every day.

 

[Auditor55]

If you are after sound quality, I would advise you to upgrade your speakers to Ultras before getting separates.
I assume you have read some of the debates about separates vs AVR's. Regardless of your opinion on that debate, one of your takeaways should be that there is an honest debate among people who are obsessive about sound and experienced with audio.
In contrast, you will find no one, and I mean literally no one, who would debate that the Ultra series does not provide substantial improvement over the Prime series! You can use your current Primes as surrounds.
Don't misunderstand - the Primes are fine speakers for what they cost, but if you are going to spend more money, speakers are the place to upgrade! That Onkyo of yours has a solid THX rated 135 WPC amp in it, going to separates will not yield nearly as dramatic of an improvement as better speakers.

True, Ultras are better.

 

[Danzilla31]

Think you will be looking at a 3ch amp if you run 3 towers across the front... And I bet you keep the subs on!

Snakeyes you know me so well already it's almost scary! LOL

 

[Danzilla31]

True, Ultras are better.

 

[NorseMythology]

Perhaps the more apt question is

"How much acoustic energy do you want to experience?"

If you want to experience 10hz, then you probably want a subwoofer that can reproduce 10hz.

Of course that usually requires paying for it, so you have to ask yourself is it worth paying?

Maybe you can find someone or somewhere that has subwoofers capable of such feats and see if it is worth it to you. Good luck!

 

[lovinthehd]

Perhaps the more apt question is

"How much acoustic energy do you want to experience?"

If you want to experience 10hz, then you probably want a subwoofer that can reproduce 10hz.

Of course that usually requires paying for it, so you have to ask yourself is it worth paying?

Maybe you can find someone or somewhere that has subwoofers capable of such feats and see if it is worth it to you. Good luck!

FWIW usually just one sub that may be capable of 10hz in room (at what spl?) may not be significant....multiples of such subs....maybe.

 

[snakeeyes]

10hz, ya it’s possible. You can see the results of 18in ported subs on data-bass.com. Such as Rythmik FV18 in 12hz tuning mode with 90db at 10hz and 100db at 13hz, These are huge subs, like the size of refrigerators.
Not sure chasing 10hz makes much sense but it is cool that it is possible.

 

[William Lemmerhirt]

10hz, ya it’s possible. You can see the results of 18in ported subs on data-bass.com. Such as Rythmik FV18 in 12hz tuning mode with 90db at 10hz and 100db at 13hz, These are huge subs, like the size of refrigerators.
Not sure chasing 10hz makes much sense but it is cool that it is possible.

Seems like we lost the OP lol, but anyway...
Chasing 10hz is usually way more an investment, not only in money but real estate than most HT guys are willing to make. Basically it’s not practical.
In any case, to help answer the OP’s original question, as mentioned above, it matters what type of content he enjoys. Most rom coms need not apply lol, but surprisingly something like isle of dogs goes right on down to 20hz.
https://www.avsforum.com/forum/113-subwoofers-bass-transducers/2763785-ultimate-list-bass-movies-w-frequency-charts.html
This link is a lot of fun, and you can see which movies will punish your subs, or neighbors lol. It also illustrates where your favorite movies stand and can help decide if even flat to 20 makes sense. Some movies are filtered at 30 which sucks, but many are not so to me good subs are worth it for those movies that will deliver. As the thread goes on from the beginning the charts are attached as opposed to being links.

 

[NorseMythology]

Seems like we lost the OP lol, but anyway...
Chasing 10hz is usually way more an investment, not only in money but real estate than most HT guys are willing to make. Basically it’s not practical.
In any case, to help answer the OP’s original question, as mentioned above, it matters what type of content he enjoys. Most rom coms need not apply lol, but surprisingly something like isle of dogs goes right on down to 20hz.
https://www.avsforum.com/forum/113-subwoofers-bass-transducers/2763785-ultimate-list-bass-movies-w-frequency-charts.html
This link is a lot of fun, and you can see which movies will punish your subs, or neighbors lol. It also illustrates where your favorite movies stand and can help decide if even flat to 20 makes sense. Some movies are filtered at 30 which sucks, but many are not so to me good subs are worth it for those movies that will deliver. As the thread goes on from the beginning the charts are attached as opposed to being links.

I am not advocating it necessarily, just saying, whatever you wish to hear/feel is what you should shoot for if you want to spend the money. The difference between 25hz and 10hz will cost a lot extra, just depends how badly a person wants the extension.

 

[William Lemmerhirt]

I am not advocating it necessarily, just saying, whatever you wish to hear/feel is what you should shoot for if you want to spend the money. The difference between 25hz and 10hz will cost a lot extra, just depends how badly a person wants the extension.

Totally agree. Also, the content has to be there, which is kinda why I shared the avs thread. It doesn’t matter if your subs can do 5hz at 150db if there’s no content to play on them. Oversimplified, but a 20hz capable sub won’t play it if it’s not there.

 

[Verdinut]

This thread title is asking a question.
The answer to that question is a another question: "Do you watch action films or do you listen to pipe organ music or bass-drum electronic type of music?"

Then, if your listening taste doesn't fit into any of those, woofers that go down to 32 Herz should be sufficient as there is no low frequency content below that frequency from acoustic instruments if you exclude the concert grand piano or the octobass, a giant string instrument which goes down to 16 Hz.

The Montreal Symphony Orchestra was the first group to get one and is the only one on this planet to have it. There would only be seven such instruments worldwide but the OSM 's is the only one in working order.

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/montreal/montreal-orchestra-octobass-1.3810990

 

[Irvrobinson]

This thread title is asking a question.
The answer to that question is a another question: "Do you watch action films or do you listen to pipe organ music or bass-drum electronic type of music?"

Then, if your listening taste doesn't fit into any of those, woofers that go down to 32 Herz should be sufficient as there is no low frequency content below that frequency from acoustic instruments if you exclude the concert grand piano or the octobass, a giant string instrument which goes down to 16 Hz.

The Montreal Symphony Orchestra was the first group to get one and is the only one on this planet to have it. There would only be seven such instruments worldwide but the OSM 's is the only one in working order.

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/montreal/montreal-orchestra-octobass-1.3810990

My spectrum analysis software says different. There's non-trivial action going on in the 20-30Hz range with music CDs.

 

[sterling shoote]

As always I respect you opinions and your high level of knowledge. Please note that I said " little rock, pop, jazz or classical music has much content that dips much below 30hz" There is a pretty big difference between 30hz and 40hz. Whether what happens below 30hz matters to the listener is going vary by what music they listen to. With exceptions (e.g. electro bass, house, and super bass club music or esoteric organ music) I just don't hear a lot below 30 hz, at least with the jazz and rock or the classical that I listen to. Can you break out the 20-30hz range? I'd be interested to know what percent of music is digging that deep. Bear in mind that I'm a bass lover and have massive subs so I'm interested. I do have a disc that reportedly dips to below 10hz but it's not organ music that you hear every day.

Here are two recommendations with the lowest bass I have in my music library: Diana Krall's Love Scenes Album (SACD) and Kayne West's song Love Lockdown (CD). Of course the Diana Krall piece is all about bass violin and the Kayne West piece it is about synthesized bass. I don't think the Diana Krall work gets much below 60Hz but the subwoofer does deliver a more impressive performance than with mains alone set at 60Hz.

 

[Verdinut]

My spectrum analysis software says different. There's non-trivial action going on in the 20-30Hz range with music CDs.

Then that non-trivial action as you say going on in the 20-30Hz range has to be generated by a synthesizer which can produce frequencies below 20 Hz.

If you peruse the several subwoofer reviews on this site, you will find reference to quite a few of albums with low frequency content which may interest you.

 

[Irvrobinson]

Then that non-trivial action as you say going on in the 20-30Hz range has to be generated by a synthesizer which can produce frequencies below 20 Hz.

If you peruse the several subwoofer reviews on this site, you will find reference to quite a few of albums with low frequency content which may interest you.

Your first statement is not necessarily the case. A 22" or 24" bass drum used in many drum kits (sometimes called a kick drum) produces frequencies below 30Hz, so do 9' grand pianos. A common 40" concert bass drum produces a sound spectrum that includes sub-30Hz frequencies. All of these instruments also produce frequencies that recording engineers sometimes call "residual noise", which also goes below 30Hz. Until I started looking at RTA displays I admit to skepticism that these frequencies were important to realism, but I've become more open-minded since I see evidence of them in so many digital recordings.

It is true that many electronic instruments, especially keyboards and electric basses do use subharmonic augmentation. Some fusion jazz recordings are full of subharmonics; it's the only thing that could explain the frequency distributions I see. I think some of the big name fusion jazz groups may be using subharmonic synthesizers on acoustic drums and even pianos, because that's the only way to explain what I'm seeing and hearing. And the equipment is so low-priced that I suspect every recording studio has them. (A rack mount DBX 120A retails for about $200.)

 

[mattlach]

I find it really depends on application.

For two channel music - unless you like the modern style of rap/hiphop/dance music that relies heavily on deep sub-bass - you can get usually away with something that goes down to ~35hz. That's why towers usually don't require subs in two channel configurations.

Home theater it depends too. With many styles of movies it doesn't matter. If you like action movies, you are going to want a sub that goes really deep. Human hearing is usually rated as 20-20,000hz, but it varies from person to person. Many will argue that for home theater you want to go even below that, and have authority down to 16hz, as it adds vibrations to the room (and your butt) that add an element to these films.

They even sell amplifier driven seat vibrators that mount to the bottom of your chair/couch if you want more butt shakes.

Got to have the butt shakes

 

[mattlach]

Then that non-trivial action as you say going on in the 20-30Hz range has to be generated by a synthesizer which can produce frequencies below 20 Hz.

If you peruse the several subwoofer reviews on this site, you will find reference to quite a few of albums with low frequency content which may interest you.

Yep, modern rap/r&b/hip-hop and dance music often uses the deep sub-bass synths. You won't find it much in recordings made before ~2010.

Some people find the deep sub bass annoying and bothersome and don't really like it, for others its a must.

I don't listen to that style of music often, but I came across it in the opening track to the Trolls movie soundtrack, called "Hair Up". (I didn't measure the frequency range, just judging by what I heard)