Why are subwoofers so polarizing?

Mapman, well said.

While some manufactures are offering more and better subwoofer equalization to aid in subwoofer installation and improve integration with the main system there is still an amount of effort involved.

On the other hand taking the time and making the effort can reward the user not only with a seamless integration but a much better understanding of the relationship between their room and extra low frequency.

So the answer to sub integration is making adjustments by listening. Who knew? Also, note that bass information differs infinitely relative to the recording, so I suggest continued listening and finding a way for easy adjusting. I have an easily accessable Chicken Head knob on my REL's level pot (no need to mess with the range pot...so the chicken head is free of range...get it?) and it is needed for the aforementioned differences. Not much, not aleays, but needed. If you don't think you need to adjust a sub, it's either run at very low level or you don't mind Peter Washington's hotly mixed double bass knocking the paintings off the wall and prompting the neighbor to come over to shoot you (this may even be legal in Florida). A friend just bought a digital room correction gizmo and likes it but noticed he has to turn his sub up when using the gizmo, but then he's not a very mixing intuitive...this (clinically known as Knob Turner Syndrome) issue could be common among many and goes far to explain why some people can't adjust audio parameters easily, and explains why I'm overpaid to mix live music.

When I use a sub, I try to set it so it sounds right with the more bass heavy recordings first. That means it may do little or nothing with other recordings that do not have much going on in the lowest octave. IT seems to be a reasonable and relatively easy strategy to take that works well for me. The goal is to help when appropriate but not try to make something out of nothing if its not there in the first place. Good full range recordings can benefit greatly from a well set up sub, but many recordings may benefit just marginally or not much at all really.

"Knob Turner Syndrome"... named after the famous recording engineer.

For me sub integration was making a detailed primary adjustment to obtain a flat room response, time, phase, Q, etc., using the on board Velodyne DD Plus manual Room Optimization program.

Six subsequent presets are adjusted with slightly different settings to accommodate a few common shortcomings in recordings to my taste. With the exception of phase and gain I don't use the presets that often. Some of those late 70s early 80s poorly compressed recordings can benefit from a little kick in the slats.

Speaking of PA mixing, I live near the Greek Theater at UC Berkeley, one of the most forgiving and acoustically amazing venues on the planet. I'm amazed by how horribly this place gets reinforced time after time.

Not long ago The Fleet Foxes headlined a show there and made mention of the venues acoustical reputation. This was one of the most stunning mixes I've heard at the Greek. I wanted to congratulate their sound crew but there was nobody behind the board during or after the show.