The gory details; not for the faint of heart ;-)
macca350, thanks for the response. I appreciate you taking on this advanced level question that did not generate any other responses (as opposed to questions like "Help me decide which speaker/ subwoofer/ receiver/ amp/ cable to get", which generate a deluge of responses
).
The main difference is that the Denon passes signal to the sub pre-out in "Direct" mode but the Yammy did not. So keeping that in mind, here goes...
agarwalro said:
3) With the Yammy, crossover was set to 80Hz at subwoofer, speakers getting full signal.
Now that I think of it, that may not be 100% accurate. In the interest of being brief, I left out something. I used the Front L, R preouts and a Y splitter to get full range signal to the sub. The crossover on the sub was enabled and set at 80Hz. The mains got Full range signal since they were set to large and all other speaker were set to small with crossover in the receiver set at 80Hz as well.
Meaning (ignoring roll off);
During 5.1 movies, Mains got full signal, all other speakers got signal 80Hz and above, and sub played 80Hz and below.
During 2.0 music, Mains got full signal, all other speakers got no signal and subwoofer played 80Hz and below. Effectively 2.1
Perfect, I got everything the way I wanted it. The only reason for having this counter-intuitive bass management scheme was to have 2.1 audio when listening to 2.0 recordings.
agarwalro said:
4) With the Denon, crossover set to 60Hz in the receiver and bypassed on the sub, all speakers set to small
Now the Denon's sub preout works in the "Direct" mode. Meaning, I dont have to have seperate configurations. So a blanket setting covers all needs while allowing 2.1 audio when listening to 2.0 recordings. 60Hz was chosen since the Mains have -3dB point at 35Hz or so.
agarwalro said:
5) With the Denon, for 2.1 music, cross over set to 60Hz, Mains get full signal. Yet, I have to touch the sub to tell that it is playing, even at high volumes
The Denon allows different crossover config for 5.1 and 2.1 audio (did I mention I love this receiver). So the only difference between the 5.1 and 2.1 setting now is (ignoring roll off);
During 5.1 movies, all speakers including mains get 60Hz and above, sub plays 60Hz and below.
During 2.0 music, Mains get full signal, sub plays 60Hz and below. Effectively 2.1 audio.
Now the conundrum... I can't localize the sub when it plays music. That tells me the 60Hz crossover for the sub with mains getting full signal for 2.1 audio is working great. But, during movies, I CAN localize the sub. That tells me the 60Hz crossover for 5.1 audio with mains crossed over as well is not working. What gives...