Is a Sub worth the bother?


I have a small, simple system that pretty much meets my listening needs. It's an NAD C715 (all-in-one deal) with a pair of Epos EL3 bookshelf speakers. I've been kicking around the idea of getting a cheap subwoofer with the idea that it would add a little oomph to things. This is strictly a music system, not home theater. I guess my questions are: 1) would a sub help that much or am I just limited because of the EL3s? 2) If a sub would help, would a cheap one be okay (I'm thinking along the lines of the Dayton sub 100, perhaps an Energy Take Classic 8--$100 at Costco these days). My room is roughly 12 x 20, but again, I'm not looking to bring down the house/neighborhood.

Thanks in advance for your thoughts.
comfortstarr
I have some ERA 5 Ds. First, what wonderful speakers. I've thought of sub as well, for little more eumph. I've used a new Yamaha YST 50w cheapo. What could I expect from a better quality sub, and suggestions? Thanks. rh
truth be told, that $100-at-costco little energy take sub is damn good--very musical and bereft of the boominess of most cheap subs. it won't plumb the depths like a big velodymne or rel, but give your little monitors some low end, it'll do ya just fine.
Yes! You can find a good M&K sub on ebay if you look for them. Try one with at least 100 watts of power. You're also going to have to decide how to hook it up...using a crossover, or directly wired.

A crossover will take the stress off your speakers and allow the amp to dedicate its power to just the mids and highs, and it will sound better!

Your system will be much more enjoyable.
Yes a powered sub will help - your main speaker will not "try" to do things it can't. The sub doesn't have to be a state of the art one...any powered sub will do.
IME, subs do 3 or 4 things by design (depending on how they're implemented) and a fourth by default:

1) They provide sub bass below 30hz (some say 20hz, as a practical matter I'll say 30hz). To buy a sub that does this well is a very expensive proposition - I'd argue that it's well above your budget. The good news, for a music only system, you don't need this. Even pipe organ recordings have little meaningful info down here (at least the ones I own). By the way, even the subs providing sub bass poor performance (i.e. 30+% distortion which is pretty common at these frequencies) may provide a sense of enhanced sounstage. It's a bit of a mystery to me, but I noted this effect even when I used subs that were "bad" for sub bass.

2) They can provide bass below 100hz. You can actively cross a sub(s) to replace the bottom octave of your monitors. A good one will probably improve this portion of the frequency range. This, of course depends on the monitor in use.

3 - maybe) Depending on the main speaker, even a bad sub will remove the bass load from your main speaker and allow it to perform better, if you actively x-over high enough.

4) A sub allows bass placement near the walls, (and/or digital room correction for some models) which will almost always provide smoother bass performance than even a super expensive speaker placed out in free space.

!) The thing subs do by default is create a real task to achieve smooth integration. There are tools to help you get this result, but they're way over budget.

Bottom line: At $1K (if you're careful with your choices) and (way,way if you like) up, a sub can do great things. At less than that budget, they're much more likely to do harm than good.

IMO and IME.

Marty