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Will a subwoofer add depth and clarity to my system, or just bass?

hi folks,
I just purchased a set of Focal Aria 906 speakers with stand, powered by a Bluestream PowerNode (not my ideal system but I had a limited budget).  I think it sounds really good, but am wondering if an upgrade to a subwoofer is worth it, and if so, what would pair well with this system -- my audio guy recommended the JL Audio D110 10" Dominion Subwoofer, but that's out of my price range.  Perhaps a SVSPB1000, for $499?  My room isn't very big, and I don't use the system for movies, just listening to mostly jazz and rock (and classical).
Thank you!
jazz99
audiokinesis
2,772 posts
 

@noble100 , thank you for taking the "leap of faith" in the first place, in spite of your totally reasonable skepticism.  And thank you for posting your experiences here.

I try to promote the CONCEPT of a distributed multi-sub system (which I learned from Earl Geddes), rather than specifically "my way" of doing it.  Obviously I put some thought into "how to do it well" at my chosen price point, but a distributed multi-sub system is a cat which can in more ways than one be skinned. 

Anyway I think it's great that you find Jim Romeyn's DEBRA to exceed your expectations and continue to make the magic happen for you over the years.  His subs arguably have a bit more practical footprint than mine do, as his hug the walls better.  

Duke 


millercarbon's avatar
millercarbon
12,531 posts
 
Repeating a bit here but all my experience trying to get really good accurate low bass had me pretty well convinced it was impossible. Yet this experience wasn't all wasted. It resulted in a solid base of understanding from which to evaluate alternative approaches.

Because of this, when I happened across Geddes/Swarm/DEBRA it was immediately apparent this held promise. It still took a lot of reading to confirm. Fortunately between threads like this and the articles and reviews it led me to there is no shortage of information out there. Hard to overstate how disappointed I am that so few people are interested. Equally hard to overstate how happy I am that Duke and Tim are interested enough to share and help. Thank you guys. Bigly!

On that score, can't help but note that reading about the DEBRA setup Tim uses part way down the page it states, "Conservatively rated by designer Duke LeJeune for 113dB output @20Hz" and  “Room Gain Complementary” tuning (Duke LeJeune)." http://jamesromeyn.com/old-pages/home-audio-gear/dsa-1-0-distributed-subwoofer-array-5-pieces-4k-usd...  So DEBRA or Audiokinesis  http://www.audiokinesis.com/the-swarm-subwoofer-system-1.html either way you are getting Duke. Which I was all set to buy, its almost a no-brainer, except I had all these sheets of MDF just taking up space in my shop! Lol! 

Way back in 1980 an article by Roger Sanders in Speaker Builder explained the challenges of bass reproduction clearly enough to compel me to invest what was for me then not inconsiderable time and money building a set of his transmission lines. With zero personal feedback from anyone having used them. Based entirely on my understanding of the principles. Worked out far better than I ever dreamed. 

Didn't see it as a leap of faith then. Don't see it that way now. More like a slam-dunk. Thanks to you guys.
audiokinesis
2,772 posts
 

Millercarbon wrote: "Hard to overstate how disappointed I am that so few people are interested."

The following is just my guess:

One of the things that is an awful lot of fun about high-end audio is, pride of ownership in a piece of equipment that has astonishing and enthralling characteristics. In a subwoofer, "astonishing and enthralling characteristics" usually have to do with how powerful it is, how deep it goes, how much air it moves, and how impressively it renders highly challenging program material such as cannon shots, pipe organ, depth charges, and dinosaur footfalls. That stuff is as engaging and entertaining as understanding and appreciating what’s under the hood of a sports car and how it translates into raw, adrenaline-jolt performance.

With a distributed multi-sub system, your budget is spread across (typically) four subwoofers, so the individual subwoofers will fall well short of what you could have in a single sub for the same price. It’s like you can have four Toyotas or one  Lamborghini. And it is not at all obvious that those four Toyotas used properly might be able to do something really cool, something even better than that one Lamborghini.

The IDEA that four (relatively) small subs can successfully address what is arguably the most important issue (room interaction) rather elegantly is competing against far more widely-accepted, and frankly far more self-evident, ideas about "what really matters" in a subwoofer system. Thank you for helping it to do so.

Duke

noble100's avatar
noble100
2,419 posts
 
millercarbon,

       I'm glad you're becoming a believer in the distributed bass array concept but I'm a little confused, have you decided to buy an AK Swarm or Debra?  Or have you decided to build your own custom DBA?
     Whatever you decide, I'll be happy to help you out. 
     I set my Debra DBA system about 3 yrs ago and I'm still grateful every day that I did because I truly believe the bass response in my room is state of the art for music and ht.  
     As Duke and I've said before, there's really 3 good methods you could use to set up a DBA:  1. Buy the Swarm, 2. Buy the Debra or 3. Buy 4 subs of your choice and setup a custom system.  Both the Swarm and Debra are excellent bass systems and come with everything you need except for a interconnects and speaker wire.  But if you want the ultimate DBA, you could buy 4 top of the line subs and just follow the positioning procedure.
     I have little doubt a custom DBA with 4 top of the line subs would outperform either AK DBA but it would likely cost at least 3 times as much and the subs would be larger and more intrusive.
    Let me know if you'd like my assistance either on this thread or pm me.

Thanks,
 Tim     
millercarbon's avatar
millercarbon
12,531 posts
 
noble100

I was all set to buy the Swarm and almost did. But towards the end of the research phase came across the idea of building my own. At first it was just to use up some MDF taking up space in my shop! Using the first suggested drivers it looked a lot cheaper too. But then I came across this Morel driver https://www.parts-express.com/morel-ultimate-uw-1058-10-subwoofer--297-130 which is a lot better and comes with a free cabinet. While I wanted to use up my MDF the thought of the sawdust alone was enough to jump on this deal. Good thing too, they are now sold out!

UPS delivered drivers and cabs, ports, terminals. Pretty impressive looking drivers! Amps aren't exactly lightweights, either. 

Duke has been kind enough to provide some really valuable insight and encouragement. Frankly everything is available on-line but its still so nice to be able to confirm you are on the right track with someone with experience. 

So the plan is four subs. Two sealed, two ported. The ported enclosures will be the Denovo freebies expanded out to the larger volume the ported enclosure requires. Parts Express has a page where you plug in some numbers and it spits out some more numbers. I know they are accurate because they're the same as Duke pulled off the top of his head! Lol! Seriously, the guy is that good!

Every enclosure however good it is still has its own sonic signature inevitably imparted, unavoidably audible. Splitting the 4 into two shapes helps break that up. My plan is to go even a bit further, using a bit different or thicker material on at least one of them. Got this idea from one of the other DBA builders. 

Haven't even built them yet but already pulled out the old wire drawer and found power cords and interconnects for the amps, speaker cable, cones... looks like everything should fit.

Will need to build something to hold the amps. My main question or problem would seem to be, the sub amps require line level inputs but my integrated has no pre-out. It does however have a couple unused inputs. Figured I would just re-wire internally to connect the volume output to one of the input RCA. Could also hard-wire direct but the internal re-wire will look better, work better, and make changing interconnects a lot easier.

Probably not the kind of assistance request you were expecting. Lol! Oh well I'm sure I will be able to figure it out somehow.




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