Does anyone here have any experience with Bag End subwoofers? All of the reviews that I have read sound amazing, but I have never heard them. I happened to see the Infrasub-18 online for about $1100.00 the other day, and it started to get me thinking about upgrading... Will this hobby/lifestyle ever loosen its grip on me (and my wallet)?


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Benjamin King
benjaminking@yahoo.com

Bag End subs have an extremely good reputation with the cognescenti that I know. Though I've never used, or even heard one, based on the respect it gets from people whose opinion matter to me, I'd guess that Bag End is a good company to buy a subwoofer from.

Jeff

That's exactly the impression that I get. I guess I need to find one that I can audition. My biggest question is whether or not that single 18" can keep up with my 2 15" DefTechs.

The InfraSub-18 is probably the most musical sounding sub I've ever heard. (Sounds good with movies too - supposedly flat to 8Hz!)

Demo'd the sub plenty. Don't own one yet, but hopefully soon (since I used my home theatre mostly for music listening).

Best,
Sanjay

I once read a test of the Infrasub 18 that claimed the harmonic distortion at the low end was as much as 10%. I can't for the life of me remember where I saw it. :-( Compared to servo-controlled subs that can be < 1%, it's a pretty big difference. However, it's not clear to me that most people find some amount of distortion on very low end sounds subjectively unpleasant.

I've only heard Bag End gear in professional (i.e. club) settings, and I generally thought the base sounded pretty good.

THD is primarily directed at uneducated consumers who "shop the numbers". These are the folks who look at a composite table of gear, and trail their fingers down a column looking for the one with the most watts or the least THD or the highest resolution.

It's easy, but very misleading. A lot of products can have very good-looking numbers, but be crap. For instance, my old Pioneer receiver (now owned by my girlfriend) has a better advertised THD number than my Lexicon MC-12. Care to guess which sounds better?

A former coworker of mine was looking to buy a television. He insisted on looking only at the resolutions supported and ignoring all of my advice on the subject. I can only hope he chanced upon a decent set anyway.

Jeff

I A/B/C demo'd a Infra-18, the Infra-12, and a Velodyne HGS-10 in the same room about a year ago at my pro-audio dealer...spent two or three hours dinking with them. I was really interested in the Infra-18 at the time as it seems like a lot of sub for the dollar.

Surprisingly I came out liking the Infra-12 a bit bitter than the 18, if only because it was a bit tighter and similar in the amount of "depth" you get from the bass associated with large-cone woofers, but neither had the sharp response of the velodyne (though the 10" didn't compete with output). For music at moderate levels though, I'd say the BAGEND's are just dandy as they do indeed go quite low on the frequency sweep. The Infra-12 is quite amazing though and takes up a lot less room...that Infra-18 is huge...I'd give the 12 a demo if you have the option.

Cheers,

-Derek S.

Keep in mind that subwoofers, like any other speakers, are subject to placement issues. It's possible that the smaller sub was better, true, but it's also possible it was just placed in a better location.

Jeff

That's true. In this case the Infra-18 was in the center of the room about 3-feet out from the wall, with the 12 sitting directly next to it on the floor. I put the HGS-10 on top of the 12 which resulted in some interesting floor-plane effects compared with the BAGEND's.

BTW, I forgot to mention that the Infra-12 supposedly has the exact sample amplifier module / ELF circuit as the 18...including the power ratings. They may be driving it a bit more.

Cheers,

-Derek S.

For what it's worth, Bag End also manufactures a variety of cabinets for pro bass rigs (I'm a bass player), and they tend to get good reviews and plenty o' respect in the bass community as well. I don't have any direct experience with either the subs or the bass gear tho...