Stereo Subwoofer Pairing

rjb1101,

     If you set it up just so, you could become the first human in the history of our species to be able to hear deep bass in stereo.  
     Where'd you get the idea that stereo subs would be a good idea? Or even discernable.  
     Sorry, stereo deep bass is a myth so it's probably best to keep your expectations very low to avoid the inevitable disappointment.
It's not too late to save some time and money and abandon this nonsense.

    Tim

I'm not expecting to here bass in stereo.  I just want a dedicated speaker per channel input so that the signal doesn't overlap.  A speaker can only play one analog signal at a time.  If you input two signals the speaker is only playing one of them. Whether it is a digital or analog summation of the two signals, I would rather have a 1:1 input output of the bass signal.  Even if it isn't a huge difference.

Hi rjb1101,

Recording engineers understand that human hearing is very good at perceiving the directionality or where in their environment mid-range and treble sounds are emanating from but very poor in perceiving the directionality of deep bass sounds.
This is why they often combine all the bass at or below a specific frequency and record this combined deep bass only on the left channel. So, even if we could determine the directionality of deep bass frequencies, the vast majority of recordings do not have deep bass on both l+r channels when played back by home stereo systems. Configuring one’s stereo playback system with separate subs for each channel, therefore, is not a very good method of achieving good bass response in a home environment.
The best method I’ve thus far discovered for very good bass response in virtually any room is the distributed bass array method sold commercially as the Audio Kinesis Swarm or Debra systems that sell for about $3,000 for a complete system. These systems are almost identical and consist of 4 (3’Hx1’Wx1’D) subs and a 1,000 watt sub amp. Here is an Absolute Sound review of the Swarm system:
www.theabsolutesound.com/articles/audiokinesis-swarm-subwoofer-system/
I have no financial interest in either system but I am a very satisfied user of the Debra system.
I suggest you’ll achieve much better bass response in your room with one of these systems than ’stereo subs’ are capable of.
Good luck,
Tim

What you want to do is set up a distributed node subwoofer system using  multiple subwoofers in different locations in the room this will smooth out bass nodes and peaks. You can use any brand to do so no real need to match manufacturers just frequency range phase and match levels.            http://www.gedlee.com/Papers/multiple%20subs.pdf

noble100

Where’d you get the idea that stereo subs would be a good idea? Or even discernable.

Use of multiple subs can minimize rooms nodes so, depending on the room, it can be an excellent solution to achieving flat in-room low frequency response.

... stereo deep bass is a myth ...

Not exactly. Depending on the phase of the LF signals, it is absolutely possible to hear bass in stereo.