Subwoofer Positioning & settings

In my similar setup I have the phase setting at zero which sounds best. It was noticeable when I was experimenting during setup.

I also have the sub's crossover adjusted at the 40hz minimum after much experimenting.

 

Wow, I could never run with that high a low pass and my mains are Rega Rs1’s which are on the lightweight side. Room I suppose. Phase 180 degrees seems to work best for me.

 

Center of the wall positioning is recommended by many subwoofer manufacturers. It yields a more even response than corner placement. If between the speakers doesn't work then one can put the sub in the center of any other wall within the room and it will integrate and sound just as good (as long as you have enough cable!)

 

Center of the wall should yield a more even response than corner placement, unless the sub was designed to be placed in a corner (I'm not aware of any that are).

The majority of subs have an XLR input and most AV Receivers and processors have a LFE channel that features an XLR out for the sub. Those who need longer runs than about 15'-18', may want to consider using an XLR cable for longer runs, as a balanced connection provides better shielding than a standard RCA interconnect.

If you sub is located not between the mains, and in another area of the room, it should be crossed over at the lowest possible usable frequency to prevent localization.

One mistake that I often see, is people crossing over the subs at too high of frequency and getting boomy or muddy bass. This is usually due to having the sub playing into the same lower frequencies as the main speakers.

If your crossover frequency is too high and you position your sub somewhere else in the room, your ears will be able to locate the location of the sub.

 

Thanks to the replies I've had, today I've altered the settings and going though the same vinyl records and cd's I used yesterday.m

I've significantly reduced the frequency from approx 90Hz down to 60Hz.
I have also increased the gain slightly (half a notch).

I'm noticing a deeper bass than before, it's well controlled with plenty of grip on the bass.

Also this setting has less influence on the upper midrange than the previous at 90Hz.

I'm now comparing if midrange and harmonics are as good as they were without the subwoofer in use, I think I'm getting there.

 

It's been an interesting time getting the subwoofer to work as effectively as it can in my music room, with my existing equipment.

Interestingly, during my time with the subwoofer, I have taken photos of the settings at various intervals. As I look back over these photos I've noticed I've settled on a crossover frequency of approx 55 Hz. At the beginning of the set up I was preferring 90Hz but began to realise that this was too high and was adding some unwanted harmonics and distortions in the upper mid range. I've gradually reduced this and now seems to work really well at 55hz.

Also, the gain has reduced significantly too, it is now working at just under 9 o'clock on the dial, whereas before it was set much higher.

I've learned that the subwoofer just needed to support the bass that was already been produced by my main speakers, this fills out the lower end nicely, adding greater scale to the sound with improved soundstage and depth. With these settings I've also been able to maintain the midrange that was present before adding the subwoofer, which is really important too.

I've also learned quite a lot about my system and the music room I have and how any change I make alters how the bass responds, whether it's the settings of my system, my listening position or the positioning of my system.

After countless changes to the settings on my subwoofer, altering completely my speaker position in the room & hours of listening I'm very positive that the benefits of adding a subwoofer to my system is worthwhile.

I'm now settled on my subwoofer settings, and am looking forward now to a longer audition of the equipment for the next few months. I will however have to invest in longer speaker cable, since moving my speaker position completely has resulted in one of the cables being to short. It is temporarily going diagonally under a rug to the speaker. So there will be further tweaks to the settings once the new cable arrives I guess.

Here are my subwoofer settings now.

 

nicely done, it takes time to where you can just leave it alone. took me about 6-10 months or so because as the sub broke in its sound kept changing subtly and it played louder, which needed very slight gain reductions as time went by.