Bass sensation like a loud car system in home?

The question was simply whether having a powerful sub right next to your seating position will provide a similar effect to sitting in a powerful “ghetto blaster” car systems drivers seat at a more sensible volume then as loud as is comfortable.

This is for electronic and hip hop genres that are designed to be played back on systems with slamming subs.  Great info about subs has been shared but its mostly not relevant to the question.

Go see Yngwie Malmsteen, then ask his crew what they do . Big wall of amps , and what feel like Butt Kickers . Also saw a Sarah McLachlan concert that had significant bass . I think they just had huge sub array across the front below the stage and digital correction . Better start with some big dedicated circuits . Woo Hoo my uvula is jiggling . Regards , Mike .

Hi Yukispier,

I understand you and your question is valid. It’s quite possible to get astounding bass in your home that will surprise you. The devialet Expert Pro 220 with SAM engaged at 100% and DPM on, will produce massive bass response using the right speakers without a sub. Many full-range speakers are capable of prodigious bass, with the right source. In my opinion for bass, vinyl can produce massive and highly resolved bass. As the marvelous and gifted designer Bob Carver demonstrated so many years ago with his sound spectrometer - whatever its called - the waveform of analogue vinyl is different than digital CD or for that matter streaming. The analogue waveform is significantly wider and spread over time than the digital signal. One can hear it listening to a great vinyl system; that big, dense, tonally rich dynamic sound created so easily by vinyl is quite different that the digital we are used to hearing. I remember walking into discos in the late 70s and 80s where the vinyl front end was driving powerful class ab solid state amps driving a number of horn compression driver speakers and bass cabs. That sound would pulse right through you. Fantastic.

you can get an idea of this sound by listening to say house or disco music sets recorded from vinyl decks. Weird. Even though its been digitized, that waveform still comes through and one can hear the analogue vinyl signature.

but for all that, digital and vinyl alike, try a system like Devialet’s Expert Pro with their Digital Power Management (DPM) and Speaker Active Management (SAM) engaged. Even with a sealed box design like Magico S3, the mid bass bloom and richness and massive room-filling bass will be mesmerising.

Make room for a cerwin vega earthquake box. 
They will rattle windows n everything else.

@phusis , I would feel free in saying the vast majority of us do not have the room for subwoofer horns. In my case it would not work anyway. I have to form a line source with them which means 4 or more drivers in most situations. If you put the subs in corners and in a wall floor intersection you do increase their efficiency requiring about 1/4th the power to get the same volume. In this case as a line source 4 12" drivers can do a lot of damage in your typical room. My own system will shortly have 8 12" drivers in 4 sealed cylindrical balanced force enclosures.