Subwoofer Advice

[barmyllama]

First things first.

I already have a BK Gemini II which I have to say does a decent job.

As it stands I can only site a subwoofer in once place in the room due to room layout and keeping the wife happy. Also due to keeping the wife happy the subwoofer is hidden under a wooden box that matches the current furniture.

Spoiler

2021-03-29_06-31-08

The likelyhood is that the living room furniture is going to be replaced at some point in the near future and the box covering the subwoofer will go. This means the small black ash BK Gemini II also needs to go, and my wife has agreed to a glossy black subwoofer in it's place.

This has basically lead me to the BK XXLS400-DF, which is glossy black on the front and both sides. It is also of a similar size to the box covering the existing subwoofer at around 40 x 40 x 46 cm (the box is 35 x 35 x 50cm

Anything front firing is out because she doesn't want a speaker grill on show.

The Monolith and Monolith Plus are too big for the space available.

AV set up is for movie watching only.

The other speakers are 5 x Q Acoustic i7000 and a pair of Dali Alteco heights and are unlikely to change at all due their to wife pleasing size and not breaking the bank.

Amp is Denon X2300. This may change but only to add more two channels for rear heights.


TL;DR

Is there anything else I should consider apart from the BK XXLS400-DF that is:

Down firing, glossy black finish, a footprint of around 40 x 40 cm and preferably less than £600.

Thanks

 

[barmyllama]

Bk wise there is the Double Gem, but is it definitely not possible to fit a Mono + there? Looks like it'd squeeze in there and be a nice extra table looking at the pic!

Double Gem is Front Firing, so that's out.

The Monolith has a 54 x 42 cm footprint. That's 19cm wider than the box that's there, so it just doesn't fit the in the space available.

 

[barmyllama]

Sounds like you need to grow some ******** and put your foot down

More seriously, check out the BK P12-300. It’s 400D x 450H x 400W and gloss black is an option.

Any reason why that would be a better choice? Apart from the lower price. On paper it looks like the same sub with a lower wattage amplifier. Or am I missing something?

 

[barmyllama]

I take it from all the replies so far that there isn't anything from another manufacturer that ticks all the boxes?

 

[barmyllama]

Looks like I'll go for the XXLS400.

See if it can make the wife complain as much as she did when we saw Tenet at the cinema.

 

[barmyllama]

Ordered the BK XXLS400-DF today.

Don't know when I'll get it, didn't even get an order confirmation email. We will see.

 

[barmyllama]

They’re a small outfit. If you don’t get one by the end of today, ring them up. I too didn’t get an order confirmation, just a PayPal receipt, but they sorted it in a couple of days and found it in my junk mail.

Payment is pending on my card, so the order should've gone through.

 

[barmyllama]

Op what is your room size, I'd say a single xls400 will be ok for 4mx4m room anything bigger and want higher end sub, or two xls400.

Room is L shaped, but probably no bigger than 4m X 4m anyway.

Wouldn't be able to place a second subwoofer in the room as it stands, nor would my budget or wife allow for a second sub. You've got to bear in mind this is a living room, not a dedicated cinema room. So comprises to that and keeping the wife happy have to be made.

Although in conversation yesterday, building a cinema room over the garage was met with approval. But that was probably down to the fact she knows we aren't in the financial position of actually doing it.

 

[barmyllama]

Going down the rabbit hole of a second sub is just overkill for a home set up unless you literally just live in that room.

People have lives and enjoy other things. I wouldn't get too obsessed about it. The xxls400 is more than enough on its own. You could get an anti mode or whatever those devices are called these days but it's a lot of money for what they do.

Just enjoy it. Obviously for some people the only thing they have going on is their home cinema so they have ridiculous set ups but an xxls400 is literally better than the subwoofer 99.9% of people will have in their living rooms.

If I ever get it.

Ordered on March 30th. Messaged BK on 6th April. Got a reply on the 7th to say the delay was painting it and they'd chase the painter. Heard nothing since.

 

[barmyllama]

Same happened to me. Like I said previously, mine took more than 4 weeks. But you'll get it.

I don't mind waiting.

But the lack of an order confirmation or even just telling me there's a four week wait is a bit poor.

 

[barmyllama]

I added a sub similar in spec to my sbu13 it definitely made an improvement. Also flattens response.

So I would recommend a second one later down the line.

So you're recommendation, after reading my original post of course. Would be adding two subwoofers to a room, that only has space for one. Which would cost over £1000 and be over budget, to a set of speakers that cost £600?

Oh, and buy some other doodad thingy at an additional cost of £100 or more.

Not exactly the advice I was looking for. But thanks for the input.

 

[barmyllama]

It can be done overtime and yes that doodad is worth it, I use one myself and just got one for brother system.

For £100 it's worth it, flattens response any peaks are flattened.

I assume you don't have avr with room correction?

And yes dual subs are worth it like I said adding sub similar to the xls400 helped mine out.

Sounds like you didn't want advice just wanted confirmation on your choice

Enjoy being bossed by your wife

Aside from the wife swipe. Which is a kind of ridiculous thing to say, when most successful relationships require comprises to succeed.

I've already stated, twice now, that I don't have room for two subwoofers. I don't have the budget for two subwoofers. And even if I had both of those, it's seems pretty pointless spending double the amount of money on subwoofers than speakers. Particularly when most movie soundtracks are mixed with bias towards
the centre channel.

Congratulations on being only the second person to be added to my ignore list.

 

[barmyllama]

I assume he means most speech comes from centre so it's the most important.

Whether I'm taking nonsense or not doesn't matter.

My original post stated that only have space for one subwoofer and my budget was £600.

But hornetstinger chooses to ignore these stipulations and just spouts the same thing, that he has before, in numerous threads regarding subwoofers. Often with a blatant disregard for what the actual thread discussion is about.

If we all followed his advice we'd all need to make space for four subwoofers costing £5000 each.

 

[barmyllama]

The BK XXLS 400 arrived Friday.

Connected it up. Set the high and low level gain to the mid point. Phase on 0, filter to LFE and frequency to 120hz.

Then went through the room correction set up on the Denon amp. Which set the crossover on the fronts 60hz, heights to 40hz and rears to 80hz. I changed them all to 80hz and tried a few films out.

To be honest I was a bit underwhelmed, so checked the levels for the subwoofer, which was on -12db, which is the lowest setting? So I tried -9db and settled on -6db.

To my ears and backside it all sounded/felt pretty good. Generally I didn't feel as if I could localise the bass in the room and it's a definite improvement on the old Gemini II. Even the wife said it was better, less boomy was her words.

Although I'm happy with the product, I do feel as though BK Electronics need to improve their communication with customers. Or at least make it clear there's a three to four week lead time before you order. An order confirmation email wouldn't have have gone a miss either.

 

[barmyllama]

hi, how is life with the xxls400 going?

Great.

Not that the Gemini II wasn't enough for me, but XXLS400 just moves things to another level and I certainly would go back.