I am confused with what is lost with regard to the 950 and Bass. Could someone tell me what I am missing with my setup?

I am running the 950 in fairly standard mode using the Bass management built into it. My front and rear speakers are set to large with the bottom end set to 40Hz in the 950. I have two 15" subs driven by the 950 through a Samson S1000 amp. The input is a Sony DVP-875P which plays both CD and DVD and I have both digital (coax) and analog connections to the 950 (PSC). I am usually listening to either DVD movies in 5.1 or I will listen to CD's in either stereo or 5 channel stereo.

I have read many of the articles about bass and double bass in this forum and I am still unsure how it affects my setup. I guess I am a little slow. :-)

My reason for asking is that my four ESS speakers each with the capability of reproducing sound down to fairly low levels has a tendency to overpower the twin 15" subs with 500 watts going to each and I am trying to figure out if it is the setup or something else.

I have calibrated the system to 72db and the subs run about a +3 db. The room is small for so many speakers, but the drowning out of the subs takes place at everything but really low LFE.

Let me know if you have any suggestions/answers.

Thanks


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MeanGene's Home

I don't think setting the speakers to LARGE will do you any good if you want a crossover at 40 Hz on the mains and surrounds routing said frequencies to your sub.

You need to set those speakers to SMALL and then set to 40 Hz with the crossover, turning on the bass management.

The double bass seems to occur if you don't use the built in 80 Hz analog crossover on the 5.1 analog inputs (for a DVD-Audio or SACD or universal player)

Dan

Mean,

Long time, no read! Glad to see you got those twin 15s settled into your system.

Dan is right. If you set the sats to 'large', you'll only give those subs a workout with LFE heavy DVDs.

Interesting point here...Outlaw maintains that there is a global 120 Hz. filter on the LFE signal, independent of the sat's speaker setting/BM. I say that's hooey. You can test the theory by raising your crossover setting to 120 Hz in the 950 and notice if there is a difference (there will be, I guarantee).

I think the 40 Hz setting, though it doesn't effect the sats because they're set to 'large', is still limiting the LFE output to your sub to 40 hz.

You should really set your sats to 'small' and try a crossover of 60 Hz (which means your sats should be able to go to 30ish) and see if that doesn't work better.

Give yourself some time to acclimate to the difference before you judge either way.

The number one reason to set the sats to 'small' is that of placement of LF speakers. With sats, you have little if any placement options for what is, in effect, 4 subwoofers, when they are 'large'.

Those Twins/Samson can handle the LF in you setup, no sweat...so let them.

Let us know.

Bosso,

The 120 Hz filter is definitely in place for the analog, 6 channel direct input. I don't know about the digital domain. Several of my DVDAs have high frequency content in the "subwoofer" channel. Toy Matinee and Fleetwood Mac: Rumors immediately jump to mind. I noticed this prior to getting my 950 because my sub was trying to play it all. With the 950, all the high frequency stuff is gone, literally, meaning it is filtered out and discarded.

Regards

DB,

I agree with the 6 CH BYPASS situation.

I mean that when in digital BM, the crossover you select for the sats/sub, when sats are set to 'small', dictates the LFE filter also.

For ex., if you set the crossover @ 60 Hz., it also filters the LFE @ 60 Hz, NOT 120 Hz.

Since MeanGene has his crossover set @ 40 Hz, even though his sats are set to 'large', his LFE is being filtered @ 40Hz, and his subs are seing little info, except of LFE heavy DVDs.

If I wanted to keep my front and rear speakers at 40Hz, have them get all the bass they can handle and give the subs all the bass below 120Hz with both analog and digital input (double bass is not a problem with me, the wife on the other hand, well that another story..) What should I do? Get a ICBM ?

I really don't like the idea of reducing the capability of my speakers so that the subs can reach their potentional. I want my cake and I want to eat it too!

P.S. I have set my subs up at 4ohm (they were at 8ohm DVC with no problems - I think the S1000 is about to "tilt") on each VC to get a little more umph. But the house circut breaker is tripping at anything near 0db. So I'm still in a testing kind of mode. A good time to make some changes.

UPDATE: I have set all my speakers to small and now get good bass through the subs (just came back in from resetting the breaker :-), but the main speakers don't get enough bass. It appears that switching from large to small is really turning on and off bass management, it almost seems like small mode means you totally rely on the sub woofer for all bass and large means you have no sub woofer at all. Not sure what to do at this point.

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MeanGene's Home



[This message has been edited by MeanGene (edited December 17, 2003).]

You are essentially correct with your observation. Setting any speaker to SMALL turns ON the digital crossover function. Setting to LARGE disables digital BM for the channel chosen.

Analog BM is a wholly different animal. IMO, the 950 never should have tried to include an analog BM solution because the current one is terrible.

Since you say you don't mind 'double bass', I suggest you do pick up the ICBM. I use one with my 950. Once you get it, you would set all your speakers to LARGE for digital BM and turn OFF the analog BM.

You will then be able to control all bass from the ICBM. The ICBM will also allow you to redirect bass back into your front speakers AND subs at the same time, which is what it sounds like you want to do. The 'Recombine' switch on the ICBM is what you will use to accomplish this.

This will give you exactly what you want for all inputs except the analog 5.1. On the 5.1 analog input you will get the dreaded DOUBLE BASS which, hopefully, you won't mind. Good luck!

[This message has been edited by Slee_Stack (edited December 20, 2003).]

Let us say that my setup is in this configuration: I am not using the 6 channel inputs only the digital inputs, neither DVD player has 6 channel output. I have Analog Bass Management turned off. All speakers are full range floor speakers and are set to small at 40Hz for the Xover.

I am still a little unsure about what's going on with different configurations. Below is some information gathered from various threads in the Saloon. Maybe it will help.

(Quote from Bossobass)
I personally think that the problem arises from the way digital BM works, creation of a duplicate signal for each channel, 1 that's HP filtered and the duplicate that's LP filtered (selectable triple crossover), volume adjusted and sent to the summing block to be combined with the LFE signal, which has a global, 120 Hz LP filter applied.

Analog BM is a simpler 80 Hz HP/80 Hz LP Linkwitz/Riley active crossover.
(End Bossobass Quote)

(Quote from Gonk thread)
•6-channel analog input
o bass management off: full-range speakers receive full-range signal, subwoofer receives LFE signal plus information below 80Hz from the other five full-range speakers ("double bass" condition); subwoofer also has a filter that discards material above 120Hz on the LFE input signal (material that subs typically can't reproduce well)
o bass management on: full-range speakers receive all information above 80Hz, subwoofer receives LFE signal plus information below 80Hz from other five full-range speakers; subwoofer also has a filter that discards material above 120Hz on the LFE input signal (material that subs typically can't reproduce well)

• Stereo Bypass Mode
o Mains set to LARGE: Left and right channels receive full-range signal with no processing, subwoofer is off
o Mains set to SMALL: Left and right channels receive full-range signal with no processing, subwoofer receives information below specified crossover from left and right channels ("double bass" condition)

• Digital bass management
o Applies to all digital inputs and all stereo analog signals that do not use the "stereo bypass" mode
o Any speakers set to large will receive full-range signal with no data sent to the subwoofer (crossover setting is ignored)
o Any speakers set to small will receive all information above the specified crossover and nothing below the crossover; data below the crossover is sent to the subwoofer
o subwoofer will receive the LFE channel of multi-channel soundtracks as well as any re-directed bass from small speakers
o If there is not a subwoofer (sub turned off in the menu) and the mains are set to "LARGE," then information redirected from small speakers will be sent to the mains and the LFE channel of 5.1 soundtracks will also be sent to the mains

(End Gonk Quote)

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MeanGene's Home


[This message has been edited by MeanGene (edited December 21, 2003).]