Optimising Bass in your Home Theater

Subcenter2009

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Optimising Bass in your Home Theater

Home Theater Setup..:yahoo:

Location: Dry, Dust free environment. Enclosed cabinet with lots of room around receiver for air circulation. Keep covered with a towel or thick cloth when not in use to prevent dust.

Power supply: I use a 2Kva Electronic Servo Stabilizer by Maxine with 7-20 wiring since I had tubelights flickering whenever I switched on the Amp or TV when I was using a 1Kva power conditioner.

Connections: Component Video, Progressive scan.

Receiver: Yamaha RX-V 450

Speakers: Wharfedale Zaldek 2000 fronts 250 w, Zaldek Center 125 w, Bose 161 side surrounds 100 w, Torvin rear surrounds 80 w/c, Wharfedale SW-150 9 series subwoofer, 150 W 1x10, Reginald dual channel subwoofer 2x8 50-50 at rear of room.
TV: LG30 series 42LCD HD ready.
DVD player: LG DS 8421P (5 years old)
I made sure all the speakers were connected in phase.. though one can never be 100% sure they are. Because they were bought from different manufacturers (which is not recommended.)

Using an SPL meter, which is better than bare ears when it comes to measuring loudness, I played back pink noise on all my channels one by one.

After making sure that all the channels are equally loud, I, having a 20x10 ft room fed in the data pertaining to the distance to the listening position from the various speakers.

I have used here, a way to get the most Bass out of my system:
In setup, I have set as follows: Front L/R: small. Center speaker: Small. Surround L/R:Small. Surround Back: Small. Since my surround backs( the Torvins ) are wired in series as this is a 6.1 setup being upconverted, I had to boost level for that channel. Pl: note that all channels are set to small in my setup. The toggle to choose between Front and Subwoofer for bass is reset to SWFR only. The crossover frequency is set to 90 Hz (80 Hz is too easy on the subwoofer.) I am doing this because my front L/Rs are extremely Bass capable. If you are using sats, then please try 120Hz as the crossover cutoff. The Crossovers of the Subs are way open to the full to prevent double filtering as most of the sound will be below 90Hz. (120 Hz for sats). Please note that setting lowpass cutoffs do not mean that exactly all the information below the point will be diverted. It is more like a curve.
Please leave the receiver on STRAIGHT with all DSPs off but with 2.1 channel output.
Now, the method of the madness: Using any one of the setup discs available, Like AVIA or Digital Video Essentials, or in my case, The APP Soundcheck 2 setup CD, Play back a 100 Hz or 90Hz tone on the loop track mode..
The thing to note here is that when we adjust the distance to the subwoofer in setup, we are actually adjusting the delay.
It, being a gradual cutoff, please listen to the change in level of bass. The distance indicator need not be noted as what we want is for the 2 Fronts and the sub to fire in Phase. It usually varies by 10 feet max. A good SPL meter will show the increase in Bass level when Subwoofer distance is adjusted. The AVR should be playing bass optimally now. Note the values for future references.
I am sure many of you have better methods of Optimising Bass in your systems.
Please do share with us freely your experiences in maintaining your Theater.
Regards,

Subcenter2009[/I]
 
Couple more things you want to add to your post.


Placement of the sub. Speaker configuration, i.e., does your bass management include the L/R + sub or just the sub, etc.? Are you able to adjust the cross over of the center and surrounds? If so put down those values as well.



Optimising Bass in your Home Theate...Subcenter2009[/I]
 
Thanks, Dear Marsilians for your queries.

The SW 150 which I am using can power a 20'X10' room easily. I had kept it in line with the front speakers and was happy with the result. The Reginald sub was lying idle so, I placed it at the back diagonal corner of the room. Being sealed enclosures and only 8", there is no booming but I have bass wherever I sit in the room.

The center channel has an Equaliser to match well with the others but keep in mind that I am using products from 4 different companies and also that the RX-V 450 is all I can afford. I have seen amps like the 2 channel pulz of Mumbai way better than the yamaha in all respects.

I am, as I mentioned before, feeding bass only to the subwoofer as I found that, However big the floorstanders the front speakers are, the bass is stronger and more accurate when you don't feed bass to all 3 speakers. 1 sub will do quite well, and Ive got 3, (the reginald is an old stereo sub) :yahoo:so I'm happy
 
Hi everybody,

I found the Real traps test zone downloadable sample freqs CD on their site in these pages.

Folks can write a cd and use that to calibrate and maintain their systems.

It is free of charge and is less than 4MB in size.

at RealTraps - Test Tone CD

Thanks to HIFIvision.com for giving publicity.

Subcenter2009:yahoo:
 
Hi everybody,

I found the Real traps test zone downloadable sample freqs CD on their site in these pages.

Folks can write a cd and use that to calibrate and maintain their systems.

It is free of charge and is less than 4MB in size.

at RealTraps - Test Tone CD

Thanks to HIFIvision.com for giving publicity.

Subcenter2009:yahoo:

Hi would like to know from where you picked the SPL meter and how much does it cost.
 
Bass Boost max. Know how I did it

Hi.

Sorry for the delay.

Dear Guns,

The Alan Parsons Soundcheck 2 CD with SPL meter was bought from the APP online site by my brother and sent to Chennai by USPS mail.

Dear grk59 and friends..

It is a valuable tool to gauge whether the subwoofer and front speakers are firing in phase as the 90/80 Hz test tone will be boosted if they are.

I feel that if one has a powerful subwoofer, he will benefit by setting Fronts as small. I definitely am enjoying this setting very much.

Remember, I played back the 90 Hz tone with the avr set to straight (or 2.1). with the Fronts set to small like all the other speakers.

I adjusted the distance setting of the sub on the AVR.

The reading peaks when the distance setting of the sub is in phase with the fronts.

Distance setting alters the speaker DELAY..please note this.

It is my finding that if one has a powerful subwoofer, like the SW 150, the bass is truer and smoother if all the bass is sent to subwoofer only, even if the temptation is to send bass to other "Large" extremely bass capable speakers as well,like my Zaldek 2000s.

Hence I have set all speakers as small.

Having gone in for a budget AVR like the RX-v 450, the fact is that I am able to divert more money and buy a world class Subwoofer like the SW 150 of Wharfedale.

I feel that even if one has to compromise on the price of one's speakers, He can benefit from buying a powerful subwoofer and investing more on a sub.

The result is spectacular.

Hope this helps u folks out there..

Drink more coffee as the TV ads say it has the most antioxidants. :eek:hyeah:

Subcenter2009
 
Re: Bass Boost max. Know how I did it

The Alan Parsons Soundcheck 2 CD with SPL meter was bought from the APP online site by my brother and sent to Chennai by USPS mail.

Hi,
I couldn't find any such site. I would appreciate if you can send me the link for the website.

Thank you very much in advance for your help.
 
Re: Bass Boost max. Know how I did it

Hi,
I couldn't find any such site. I would appreciate if you can send me the link for the website.

Thank you very much in advance for your help.

Try the Alan Parsons website..

Follow the link below.

AlanParsons

I consider myself lucky to have 1 of this as it has served me well over the recent past.

Subcenter2009
 
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