Well, I just carried my new LFM1 into my house and have started the unpacking procedure. Gonk, if you're reading this thanks for the help so far. I'll continue my story in the LFM1 forum for the remainder. The LFM1 is packed EXTREMELY well. I was a bit worried when I picked it up at my local FedEx office because of a large, deep gouge in the outside box. No worries here, this thing is packed so well that the gouge wasn't even visible on the inside of the outer box; not to mention the inner box which wasn't even touched. More to come.

I pulled the inner box and cotton wrapper off and what can I say....absolutely incredible!! This thing looks like it should cost around $2000! I'm REALLY impressed that $500 and change can buy this product; and I haven't even plugged it in yet! As a long time audiophile who could never afford this type of quality, a big thank you to the Outlaws!!!! WOW.

Spikes are in, connections are made. I set my sub at my seating location as prescribed in the Outlaw manual. I've metered my system from directly above my sub and everything is sounding good. I'll have to re-meter my sub after I move it to it's final location. Now for Digital Video Essentials.

OK, here come the questions. I've set the LFM1's volume to 5 as indicated in the manual. I've set the xover switch to bypass because I'm using the 950's xover. Correct so far? Also, I have the auto-sensing switch set to auto, but with my system turned off I still get a steady green power light. Shouldn't the light turn to red when I turn my system off and only turn green during DD/DTS 5.1 playback? Thanks.

All your settings look correct and the LFM-1 is behaving normally. With the LFM-1 in auto-sensing, it will wait for several minutes after losing a signal at the line input before switching to standby - so when you turn off the 950, the LFM-1 will remain on for some time. This is to prevent nuisance on/off cycling because of passages with little or no low frequency material (which to the LFM-1 look just like the 950 being off, since the subwoofer output is idle in both cases).

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gonk -- 950 Review | LFM-1 Review | Pre/Pro Comparison Chart | Saloon Links

Once again, gonk is correct. The power led turned red after several minutes. So far so good. Now for some serious placement and calibration tests with DVE.

I did the pink noise test from DVE and found that the best sounding (most bass, I guess?) bass response was in the corners of my room. Along the walls was a close second and I was a little bit surprised to find that in the center of the room, even a few feet from the LFM1, there was almost no bass at all. So I placed the LFM1 in the left rear corner of my room. Now to re-meter the system and then I'll watch "The Thin Red Line" in DTS.

[This message has been edited by worldwide (edited August 30, 2004).]

It appears that I've gotten lucky with my placement and calibrations. Everything sounds great and my sub integrates seamlessly into movies without calling attention to itself. Now I have another question. I have the phase switch set at 0 right now. I tried switching it to 180 and back during a movie and didn't notice any difference. Is there supposed to be a noticable difference between the two settings? Thanks.

On mine I noticed some effect, but that's because my mains and the sub overlap in coverage. If the mix has it, a bass note well may show up on all three speakers. In that case the phase switch should have an effect.

I you have you mains crossover set up higher, there may be no overlap in frequencies, in which case phase angle isn't relevant.

I believe it was noted in another thread that if you do a sound meter check, whichever phase setting that results in a louder sound level is the correct one.