SVS Sub

[emason17]

Emason17,

I'm posting here late, but have you ever listened to the Definitive Technology Supercube 1. It's about the same price as your SVS sub. It's smaller, and puts out awesome sound. It's gotten great reviews. It performs like a much bigger sub. Good Luck

www.definitivetech.com

http://www.definitivetech.com/reviews/SCubeIAR4c.pdf

Thanks for the advice. Unfortunately, I have decided to keep the sub and deal with the size.
I may sell the sub outright and I will take a look at this one some time in the near future.

 

[mulester7]

.....to you guys who are especially proud of your sub/s....

.....if you listen to your system with the subs taking center stage, your regiment of mains and surrounds will be missed....if your sub/s are in the center ring when you play your system for a friend, he will miss the mains/surrounds act also....

.....I encourage you to give yourself one solid hour of listening to the sub/s set just a hair louder, than only making it sound like it's the mains going to the slab, with the great really low oscillations that are clean....just a hair louder....thinking clean....with a cut to the subs of about 46-50.....

.....guys, you might find yourself walking around the room in rhythm waving a forefinger in the air....

.....FOREFINGER!!!....(disclaimer).......

 

[shokhead]

.....to you guys who are especially proud of your sub/s....

.....if you listen to your system with the subs taking center stage, your regiment of mains and surrounds will be missed....if your sub/s are in the center ring when you play your system for a friend, he will miss the mains/surrounds act also....

.....I encourage you to give yourself one solid hour of listening to the sub/s set just a hair louder, than only making it sound like it's the mains going to the slab, with the great really low oscillations that are clean....just a hair louder....thinking clean....with a cut to the subs of about 46-50.....

.....guys, you might find yourself walking around the room in rhythm waving a forefinger in the air....

.....FOREFINGER!!!....(disclaimer).......

You mean setting the sub up right so you dont know the bass is coming from it. Thats the trick that most do and others are trying to do.

 

[mulester7]

.....Shokhead, I will never forget going to a guy's house one time that had a pair of Cornwalls....he had a receiver, and must have had the bass tone-control all the way to the right, and the treble tone-control all the way to the left....he cranked it WAY TOO LOUD, and asked me if that bass sounded good....end of story....thanks for the response.....

 

[ptalar]

Emason,

Your doing the right thing. Just slowly ease the sub into your life. My wife does not even know the sub is there anymore. Its like it has always been there. I did not realize you have a 50' x 17' room. That is big. My room is only 14' x 20'. You probably needed the plus/2. I wanted something much better than my klipsch KSW-12. Buying another 12" single woofer sub was not a big step up. Going to two 12 inch subs with a 9X amplifier power was.

PT

Phil

 

[ptalar]

You mean setting the sub up right so you dont know the bass is coming from it. Thats the trick that most do and others are trying to do.

I wish somebody would tell me step by step how to perform that trick. I have the AVIA HT set up disk and a Radio Shack SPL meter but I am not sure of the exact step by step process of correctly setting up my sub. It sounds great the way it is, but could it sound better? That is the question. Anybody know how to dial in a sub with these two tools with a Yamaha AVR?

Phil

 

[mfabien]

I wish somebody would tell me step by step how to perform that trick. I have the AVIA HT set up disk and a Radio Shack SPL meter but I am not sure of the exact step by step process of correctly setting up my sub. It sounds great the way it is, but could it sound better? That is the question. Anybody know how to dial in a sub with these two tools with a Yamaha AVR?

Phil

Starting from scratch, as is you have just taken delivery of the sub,

- Put the sub at precisely your intended listening position
- With the Yamaha, set all speakers to small and for sound level, set the sub at approximately -10 dB
- Put the Yamaha on standby and install the interconnect cable from the Yamaha to the sub. Power ON the sub and the Yamaha
- Set the sub's Gain up to one third.
- Select something to play which contains a good amount of bass, and play it
- Crawl on your knees from the side front to the side rear of your listening position and see where the bass sounds best (meaning the bass sound "seems" to be coming from the front speakers and have the best tone to your ear). That should be the location of your sub.
- Transfer the position of the sub to where the bass effect was best, as determined above
- Now you are ready to calibrate. To do so, set the SPL at 70 dB (Weighting at "C" and response at "Slow")
- Play the AVIA DVD and select audio calibration
- Set Master Yamaha volume at -30 dB (or another volume setting of reference) and adjust all speakers for a level that provides a SPL reading of 70 dB, except that in the case of the sub, make your level adjustment so that the SPL reading is 78 dB.
- Replay the AVIA for speaker level testing and with your SPL at your ear level and pointing in front of you, see if the readings are at 70 dB and your sub at 78 dB. Adjust if necessary.

Play music and see if you get a good blend. Play a movie with good LFE content (Flight of the Phoenix being a good one) and see if you get good results. If necessary, you could slightly increase the sub's Gain for the perfect setting to your ear. In my case the Gain is now set at close to one half up.

 

[ptalar]

Thanks Mfabien,

I will try your method and report back.

Phil

 

[shokhead]

Starting from scratch, as is you have just taken delivery of the sub,

- Put the sub at precisely your intended listening position
- With the Yamaha, set all speakers to small and for sound level, set the sub at approximately -10 dB
- Put the Yamaha on standby and install the interconnect cable from the Yamaha to the sub. Power ON the sub and the Yamaha
- Set the sub's Gain up to one third.
- Select something to play which contains a good amount of bass, and play it
- Crawl on your knees from the side front to the side rear of your listening position and see where the bass sounds best (meaning the bass sound "seems" to be coming from the front speakers and have the best tone to your ear). That should be the location of your sub.
- Transfer the position of the sub to where the bass effect was best, as determined above
- Now you are ready to calibrate. To do so, set the SPL at 70 dB (Weighting at "C" and response at "Slow")
- Play the AVIA DVD and select audio calibration
- Set Master Yamaha volume at -30 dB (or another volume setting of reference) and adjust all speakers for a level that provides a SPL reading of 70 dB, except that in the case of the sub, make your level adjustment so that the SPL reading is 78 dB.
- Replay the AVIA for speaker level testing and with your SPL at your ear level and pointing in front of you, see if the readings are at 70 dB and your sub at 78 dB. Adjust if necessary.

Play music and see if you get a good blend. Play a movie with good LFE content (Flight of the Phoenix being a good one) and see if you get good results. If necessary, you could slightly increase the sub's Gain for the perfect setting to your ear. In my case the Gain is now set at close to one half up.

Dont you set the master volume at 0db for speaker level setup?

 

[jmgillespie]

I figured I would go ahead and put my question in this thread. I am about upgrade to a new subwoofer. I have a yamaha 5660, Paradigm legends fronts and rears, and a Paradigm cc270. Subwoofer was a jbl northridge series from previous set up. I use my hometheatre system for 65% movies and 35% music. Movies are mostly high action and Music rock and rap. Which svs subwoofer would you suggest out of these: cylinder 16-46 pci, cylinder 20-39 pci, or the pb12-isd? What would I gain and lose from each one?

 

[mfabien]

Dont you set the master volume at 0db for speaker level setup?

Maximum volume for my Yamaha is 0 dB. Much too much. The range is -70 dB to 0 dB. There are other a/v's with a different range whereas 0 dB is not maximum.

The idea in calibrating speakers is to equalize level of each speaker for your listening position. Before using the SPL, speaker levels were set close to their maximum or 0 dB. By setting master volume at -30 dB, all speakers were above SPL 70 dB. The final result in Level for each speaker at my listening position became:
Main Left = -1.0 dB, Center = -6 dB, Main Right = -4 dB, Left Rear = -5 dB, Right Rear = -3 dB and SUBWFR = -5 dB (to give the sub 78 dB at the SPL).

Note: It is a good idea to note the sound level setting for each speaker. If your receiver loses power, because of an outage, it may lose this from memory.

 

[mfabien]

I figured I would go ahead and put my question in this thread. I am about upgrade to a new subwoofer. I have a yamaha 5660, Paradigm legends fronts and rears, and a Paradigm cc270. Subwoofer was a jbl northridge series from previous set up. I use my hometheatre system for 65% movies and 35% music. Movies are mostly high action and Music rock and rap. Which svs subwoofer would you suggest out of these: cylinder 16-46 pci, cylinder 20-39 pci, or the pb12-isd? What would I gain and lose from each one?

All three use the same Bash 320 watt amplifier

The 16-46 pci Cylindrical gives 90 dB at 16-57 Hz, see chart at:
http://svsubwoofers.com/subs_1646pci_response.htm
then there is a gradual decrease to 87 dB up to 100 Hz.

The 20-39 pci Cylindrical gives 20-39 Hz above 90 dB, see chart at:
http://svsubwoofers.com/subs_2039pci_response.htm
with a gradual decrease to 85 dB from 42 to 100 Hz

The PB-12 ISD box gives 20-30 Hz over 95 dB, 30-55 Hz at 95 dB, see chart at:
http://svsubwoofers.com/subs_pb12_isd_response.htm
and a gradual dB decrease from 56 Hz to 100 Hz down to 92 dB.

My impression, because it can only be that, is that the PB-12 is more powerful and more constant level of dB's throughout the 18 Hz to 100 Hz range.

Other than that, if you have a preference in the looks of a Cylinder, then go for it because and you still have great power to satisfy you. The 16-46 pci could give you the most punch between the 2 Cylinders.

Note: The fact that the box is heavier, I do not consider this a problem. I asked the UPS delivery man to give me a hand in bringing the unit downstairs...well he should me a neat trick: I was about to lift the bottom of the 87 lbs box (PB-12 weighs 78 lbs) and start working my way down the carpeted stairs. He was holding the top part of the box and said, just let the bottom of the box sit at an angle to the front part of the stairs and we will guide it in its slide down the stairs. It worked very well and required no effort on either one of us. This would have been effective on non carpeted stairs as well.

 

[shokhead]

I went with the one inbetween,the 20-39 and its plenty enough,for sure. The 16 will get abit lower but not quite as loud as the 20 is to the 25 but they all have enough db's unless your in a 25X25 open room.Some will order the 25-31 and ask that it be tuned to 22 and have been very happy with that. E-mail SVS and tell them what your setup is,what you listen to and your room size and they will set you up right. They are real cool about it.

 

[shokhead]

Maximum volume for my Yamaha is 0 dB. Much too much. The range is -70 dB to 0 dB. There are other a/v's with a different range whereas 0 dB is not maximum.

The idea in calibrating speakers is to equalize level of each speaker for your listening position. Before using the SPL, speaker levels were set close to their maximum or 0 dB. By setting master volume at -30 dB, all speakers were above SPL 70 dB. The final result in Level for each speaker at my listening position became:
Main Left = -1.0 dB, Center = -6 dB, Main Right = -4 dB, Left Rear = -5 dB, Right Rear = -3 dB and SUBWFR = -5 dB (to give the sub 78 dB at the SPL).

Note: It is a good idea to note the sound level setting for each speaker. If your receiver loses power, because of an outage, it may lose this from memory.

Well when you do the test tone on your Yamaha,where does it set your volume to go through the TT's? 0db?

 

[mfabien]

Well when you do the test tone on your Yamaha,where does it set your volume to go through the TT's? 0db?

It does it at the current Master Volume level, in fact, during the test tone for a given speaker, I can adjust the tone's volume level. However, for calibration, I preferred using the AVIA DVD test tones and again, these tones are in direct relation to master volume current level.

 

[ptalar]

mfabien,

After reading the latest dialogue I understand that I need to calibrate the test tones from the AVR to the test tones from the AVIA disk. They need to match in SPL? Is that the end game?

Please advise.

Thanks,

Phil

 

[mfabien]

mfabien,

After reading the latest dialogue I understand that I need to calibrate the test tones from the AVR to the test tones from the AVIA disk. They need to match in SPL? Is that the end game?

Please advise.

Thanks,

Phil

If you have the AVIA DVD, I find it more effective. And using the AVIA, you can use the a/v's remote more effeciently by immediately selecting a speaker and doing the level adjustment (instead of trying to do two things at the same time with the a/v's remote).

 

[Reignman]

Yes the SVS is a beast in every sense, size, bass quality and bass extension. I'm lucky enough to have the size room to put it in (w=5.2m d=6.5m).

I recently played 'The Incredibles' DVD...whoa fantastic mix laid down on the audio tracks... the SVS rolls effortlessly with every punch...scary stuff...

My only regret is that I wish I had the cash to go the 'Ultra' at the time of purchase... now that would be something again. Maybe in a few years...

For anyone that hasn't had a listen to this sub I recommend you place it on your short list. I took the gamble not hearing this unit but in all honesty, it is probably the smartest purchase I have ever made into my system.

which of the ultras were u refering to when you posted this?

 

[dropbear]

which of the ultras were u refering to when you posted this?

Well as I have the PB12/2 Plus the model http://www.svsound.com/products-sub-box-plus2.cfm I was referring is the PB12 Ultra/2. http://www.svsound.com/products-sub-box-ultra2.cfm

 

[Sonnie Parker]

I just setup one of my two PB12-2/plus subs last night in an 1800 cubic foot of space... pretty good straight out of the box. I'm thinkin' my eyeballs are gonna pop-out with two. That was just watching Fantastic Four and without any taming from the BFD (which it needs a tad).