Recommend me a sub

Let me know how it sounds! Been reading a lot about the monolith and wondering like you that if I had made the right choice. The size of the mono is scary, it comes on its own wooden pallet! And at 60cm high it is the height of a desk...makes a nice height to put things on I must admit, albeit nothing fragile!

Anyway, it seems that the mono is also quite hard to set up right? And a lot of people are talking about LFE, RWE ? And 80hz cross over and Anti mode.

But £250 for a gadget to set up a sub...excessive?

Does the XXLS400 require the same setting up procedures? I am hoping to put it in the corner, plug it in and let it do it's thing.
 
Raymond Lin said:
Let me know how it sounds! Been reading a lot about the monolith and wondering like you that if I had made the right choice. The size of the mono is scary, it comes on its own wooden pallet! And at 60cm high it is the height of a desk...makes a nice height to put things on I must admit, albeit nothing fragile!

Anyway, it seems that the mono is also quite hard to set up right? And a lot of people are talking about LFE, RWE ? And 80hz cross over and Anti mode.

But £250 for a gadget to set up a sub...excessive?

Does the XXLS400 require the same setting up procedures? I am hoping to put it in the corner, plug it in and let it do it's thing.
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Most subs require some setup if you don't want them to sound boomy, by far the most important factor is its location in the room. If that's not changeable then all you can look at really is electronics like the antimode to minimize problems.
 
The Antimode is a DSP EQ box that works with any sub that doesn't already have some form of room correction. None of BK's subs have this built in (unlike posher expensive sub such as those by Paradigm or Velodyne).

You see, the room has a massive effect on how a sub will sound. More so than normal speakers, because the wavelengths of sub frequencies are measured in meters. At a given frequency the length of the wave will match that of an axis of the room. This creates a standing wave which depending upon where you stand in the room will mean it will get significantly louder or quieter. It can make a huge difference when listening to music, certain bass notes will disappear or others will be boomy and too loud.

The Antimode tries to compensate for these peaks and troughs in the frequency response at your listening position through an automated parametric EQ. It runs a series of sweeps through your sub and then uses a built in mic which you place at your listening position to evaluate your rooms impact on your subs performance. Once the sweeps are complete the Antimode leaves your sub mostly sounding bloody amazing. With my old REL the difference was as marked as buying a new sub, it was phenomenal.

So whilst you scoff at it costing £250, in certain cases it's worth every penny and then some. With my current listening room and Monoliths, it's not quite as marked a difference. That said would I be without it? Nope. :)
 
Raymond Lin said:
So you only need to use it once? Not something you leave plugged in? Then why don't we "rent" it from each other? :p
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You do leave it plugged in, it works like an EQ after its figured out what's needed and is constantly there trying to attenuate the peaks and boost troughs it detected during the sweep.

There are other options to do this for less cost, Room EQ Wizard and a Mini DSP would probably be the next best. This is just as effective as an Antimode but is nowhere near as plug and play and requires a fair bit of know how and tinkering to set up.
 
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Well she has arrived and pretty chuffed with it. Not whacked it right up yet and still trying to set it up right so there is a nice background depth rather than tinny sound then booms. Anyone got a good setup guide?
 
I got my 5.0 (waiting for my sub) set up too !!! Actually, just a centre short of 7.1 lol

Even 5.0 it sounds pretty good ! can't wait for the sub :)
 
To set it up properly you need a SPL meters that has a C weighting and slow response. You simply position it where your head would be, then fire pink noise through each channel individually until each matches one anothers level. If you want to go further you can 'calibrate' it to your receivers display with a known level, for example 0dB on your meter reads 85dB at your listening position.
 
Lowe said:
To set it up properly you need a SPL meters that has a C weighting and slow response. You simply position it where your head would be, then fire pink noise through each channel individually until each matches one anothers level. If you want to go further you can 'calibrate' it to your receivers display with a known level, for example 0dB on your meter reads 85dB at your listening position.
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The pioneer comes with a Mic and I went through the MCACC thingy, put the mic on the tripod at head height and it fired weird noises around the channels.

One of the reason I went for the Pioneer :)


I'll run through it again once I get the sub.
 
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OK wasn't quite sure what to make of my sub initially after trying a couple of movies. Then I put Cloverfield on... :D Now I know exactly what to make of it hehe.
 
-BA- said:
OK wasn't quite sure what to make of my sub initially after trying a couple of movies. Then I put Cloverfield on... :D Now I know exactly what to make of it hehe.
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How is it now? (I don't have Cloverfield)

I've been watching movies non-stop and you know what i love most with surround sound so far?

Concerts! The crowd all around is the best bit. Most movies seems a bit samey, dialogue comes from the centre but the rear is tiny bit of background noise.

I need something where things fly around all over the room lol
 
Raymond Lin said:
How is it now? (I don't have Cloverfield)

I've been watching movies non-stop and you know what i love most with surround sound so far?

Concerts! The crowd all around is the best bit. Most movies seems a bit samey, dialogue comes from the centre but the rear is tiny bit of background noise.

I need something where things fly around all over the room lol
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Saving Private Ryan - opening scene - then you know whether it works or not!!! It's quite amazing with full DTS and bullets and bombs going off all over the place!!
 
Also try Transformers, those are made for bluray/surround shame about the actual films!

The scene in toy story 2 where they try to cross the road is great too
 
booyaka said:
Saving Private Ryan - opening scene - then you know whether it works or not!!! It's quite amazing with full DTS and bullets and bombs going off all over the place!!
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How do I select DTS? I can pick Dolby Digital but it doesn't say DTS.

I can select THX Cinema though.

p.s. it's working :D
 
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DTS and Dolby Digital are just different formats, DTS is Dolby Theatre Surround, some films will have DTS and others with have DD, same with the HD formats, DTS-HD MA and Dolby TrueHD.
 
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