It has been years since I auditioned the SUB1200, but the thing that really blew my mind was how it handled the "Live. Die. Repeat" intro.
What I am talking about is how well it attempted to play the signal! If I had not heard a better sub play that sound, I would have never known that the SUB1200 was not doing exactly what it should with the signal.
Another way to say that is there was no port noise, no bottoming out of the driver, and no clipping of the amp ... or any other indication that the sub was stressing itself to play this content.
...Or you could say it was not stressing itself, because it wasn't really attempting to play the full blown content! It somehow parsed out some combination of overtones/harmonics that it was capable of and played that cleanly!
For further comment on this, Jman made the following statements in his review (linked after qoute):
www.hometheatershack.com
I assume that the amp must have some sort of limiter to prevent the sub from shitting all over itself when content like this is presented.
Aside from giving a redundant (but deserved) kudos to DA for this sub, my real question is "How did they do that?"
If I understand correctly, clipping is likely to damage the driver even at low frequencies, so it is not simply a matter of finding an amp that does not have too much power (I would also expect an amp maxed out would need some recuperation time after being pushed to its limit, so there would be some type of audible drop-out effect).
So what did they do? Is there a DSP module that applies some type of limiter/filter?
Is there a way to replicate this in a DIY sub?
I have generally thought that were I to do a DIY sub, I would be certain to use a very robust driver and design such that in the end my ears are the weakest link in the chain - IOW there is enough over-kill such that I would never push its limits!
But if the budget did not allow for a robust sub, is there a way for a person with normally available hardware to have this type of casual performance through "destructive" content? Would a miniDSP do it? If so, is it reasonable to expect to set it up correctly without having to damage your driver to find the limits (something DA could reasonably do during design while most of us would not)?