subwoofers and panels don't mix

hi duke:

hearing is believing. if someone can demonstrate a stereo system with panel speakers and cone woofers which blend seamlessly, i'll change my opinion on the subject.

i will not be at the rmaf. i will be in las vegas in january. might i see you there, again ?

Mrtennis,

I will not be exhibiting in Las Vegas in January, though I plan to ogle & schmooze so we might bump into one another in the hallway. That show is geared towards manufacturers and dealers finding one another, and frankly I'm not looking for dealers. Besides RMAF is less expensive and imho a better show.

Duke

the issue is not localization of bass but rather the timbre.

i would suggest that you listen to dave grusin, "keep your eye on the shadow", on sheffield. i have a cd called PRIME CUTS, and it is track 8.

panel bass and cone bass sounds different, just midrange reproduced by a cone and a planar driver also sounds different.

Lightminer,

I would suggest that Shefield Drum track will highlight most of the reasons panels and subwoofers don't mix. Drums are some of the hardest sounds to reproduce convincingly, although other percussion instruments (like the piano) will work well too...Dave Grusin is a good choice.

My guess is you need a critically damped subwoofer which generally means a very large motor magnet structure within a sealed box and not the usual boomy kind (known for total movie noise capability). This means the woofer goes directly to the rest position when the signal drops to zero without any overshoot or additional resonant oscillations. Remember the panel will have good transient capabilities in the sense that it has very little stored energy...