newbie here and maybe I should be posting this in another forum. I have heard from a few people (not here) that real audiophiles don't use a subwoofer when listen to music. I use mine for both TV and music at this time, but I was wondering how others felt about just using the subwoofer for watching movies and such only.
Well, if you are not going to listen to music with low frequencies below the F3 of your speakers, then a sub is not necessary. If that is not the case and you don't have sub, then your reproduction is not completely faithful.
There are very few speakers available that truly capture the whole audible spectrum. Ones that do are generally beyond most people's budget.
So that makes the case for using a subwoofer. The problem is that it does require a crossover, and the crossover to a sub is generic, with limited possibilities in most cases to precisely splice the crossover. Sometimes it works, sometimes it does not.
I think the thing that gives rise to the notion you are inquiring about, is that subs are far too often implemented badly. A big factor is that subs are so often turned up far too high. In addition like all speakers, subs are not created equal. A lot of subs are over resonant, what we call having a high Q, this really mucks up faithful reproduction.
However properly implemented, a sub is a step towards more realistic reproduction in most installations.
Many know I do not use a sub on my theater speakers. Although this is disingenuous as a huge part of the main speakers are really subs, with additions. The "sub" section if you will is driven with two power amps in each speaker. So in actuality it can be considered an extremely sophisticated LF reproducer that is part of a totally integrated system.
In my other systems I use subs.
