I didn't see anyone mention Defintive and their subs. They have small, very affordable ones and then you move up to the newer Supercubes.

I have a pf15TL+, for $650.00, and the Spercube 1 for $1,200.00

The 3 10" woofers in the Supercube, coupled with the 1,500 watt amp kills the 15" 500 watt 15TL+.

Both are actually quite musical, with the Supercube being the better of the 2 in that regard.

I auditioned the smaller SuperCube 2, and that little thing kicks some ass as well. I guess we all have our brands we latch onto, and mine is Def Tech.

If you want excellent low frequency response, the Supercube is rated down to 13Hz. I have run the 20Hz test tone several times and it picks it up without breaking a sweat

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Play it LoUd!!

But remember, there's a difference between good bass and loud and deep bass. There aren't that many subwoofers out there that can do both, at least not compared to the garbage that's out there.

I'd say M&K is probably your best bet for subwoofers. I'd also consider the Sunfire and the Sunfire Junior, Atlantic Technology, B&W, and if your budget's high enough, Aerial.

Some day ... not today, but someday ... I'm moving up to an Aerial 20t system!

Jeff

The advice is helping. I surfed the Paradigm site and their speakers look good. The dealer locator on their webpage was not working when I tried, but they replied promptly to my e-mail and have located a couple local (40 & 80 miles away) dealers. The one I spoke to seemed knowledgable. From what I saw on their website I like the Reference Studio 40 for my front left & right, and possibly the SA-25 in-walls for my side surrounds. One of the big benefits is that the wife is happy so far with the appearance and size of the Paradigms. She gave me the "where in the %$&* are you going to put that" when I showed her how big the SVS subs were. Apparently women don't appreciate the benefits of bone shaking bass.

PS: Just finished watching Jackie Chan in Tuxedo. I bet James Brown would sound better in 5.1 or 7.1 surround. Man, am I getting tired of my olde stereo.

If you think that's bad, show her this sub (http://music.bizrate.com/Harman%20Kardon%20subwoofer,mpoi__cat_id--11560000,prod_id--5006407,rf--wgg.html) and then tell her that I have two of those, and am in the process of getting yet another subwoofer from Rutledge Audio Design.

Jeff

If you could afford them, the M&K 150s would kick some serious butt! I've heard them before and for movies it's a very impressive set-up. Like most speakers, M&K's do sound the best when you're in the sweet spot. However, they do have very good off-axis response also. It's mostly because of the crossover they use and the dispersion pattern of the speakers themselves.

Think about this one. You could get a decent, small subwoofer to provide nice bass for the system. M&K, Sunfire, plus many others make subs that, while not neccesarily shaking the room, they do provide a nice solid bass response. Then, you could add a tactile sound transducer for under your seating and presto, earth-shaking bass that you can't tell where it's coming from.

Yeah, TTs are an investment I'm definitely planning on making at some point soon. Talk about "bang for your buck".

Jeff

I still say if she likes the looks of the studios, it shouldn't be to hard to sneak one of the PW2200 or the Servo 15's into the house. The PW2200 does go about 6hz lower the the servo (I was able to demo the two at my dealer using the B&K Ref 30's Hz generator. The servo 15 was able to drop down to about 26hz before we got noticable distortion. The PW2200 hit 19hz before it started to distort. Both seemed pretty accurate for the demo material I was listening to. In fact the PW2200 pretty much beat ever subwoofer with the exception of the SVS that I tested at home. (It went head to head with the top offerings from M&K, and Velodine but was half the price. (The demo was based partialy off of the B&KHz tones to find the "absolute bottom" of the sub, and material from episode I, the matrix, and Titan AE DVD's, the Organ Blaster CD and Koyaanisqatsi DVD-A's for response and overall sound.)

I'm telling you man, Find out what finish she likes for the paradigm's and then sell here on two "end tables" or matching "foot rests".

Jason

I like the look of the M&K and their set of bookshelf and in-walls look like they would be a natural. I am having trouble making contact with a retailer. I called the closest but there was never an answer. I also contacted the factory rep. in Georgia, but have not received a reply as yet. Because of the reports I have heard about the M&K 150s being so focused I would like hear them for myself and see how large the sweet spot is.

I'm not too worried about the subwoofer with the wife unless I go with SVS. She has grown accustomed to seing my 12" 250watt Acoustic Research sub sitting in the corner, so a box of any reasonable size will not be too much problem. The wife does like the look of the SVS SS which they can match the wood to our floors and cabinetry, but at $5'000 that's a fair bit more than I want to sink in a sub.

I thought of building a tactile transducer (TT) into the floor during construction. It would be perfect. I've got hardwood floors and my main seating area is about mid span on the 24 foot long floor trusses so the floor should move quite nicely. I left it out to keep the house budget on track. It can still be added later since I just have a garage down below. If you have ever seen the EFX show at the MGM out in Vegas you know how much fun a TT can be. There is nothing like a thousand TT's working in addition to the speakers (oh, the tall drink with a 151 floater didn't hurt either).

Why do I keep thinking of the scene from Howard Stern's Private Parts? Ya know, the one where Howard encourages one of his female listeners to lay her floorstanding speakers down on the floor....


Bad Jason, Wicked, Bad, Naughty Evil Jason.

Sorry Gonk....didn't mean to put words in your mouth.

Jason