Aiyima T9 - Does the bass control basically double as direct subwoofer control?

[tomkatt]

Been playing around with my new subwoofer (Jamo S808) on my Aiyima T9 (paired with Wharfedale Diamond 220s) and no matter what I set it at it sounded kinda off like the sub and the speakers wouldn't blend quite right. I tried dialing the sub in at multiple points between 60 Hz all the way up to around 140 Hz, but either there was a hole or there was too much overlap making the bass boomy and bloated.

Finally, I said screw it and dialed it up to full LFE, and suddenly, it's just... working. Bass seems to be fully controlled at the speaker and sub with a perfectly fine blend using the bass control at the Aiyima, no more fiddling with the subwoofer controls, other than to dial in the volume level on the sub.

I thought something with dedicated subwoofer controls was needed for using LFE, like a full on receiver or something with actual dedicated sub controls like a Fosi BT30D. Does the bass dial on the Aiyima act as a subwoofer control specifically? Not that I'm unhappy, but I'm confused as to why this is working like this.

 

[DVDdoug]

A "proper" setup has a crossover that filters the higher frequencies out of the subwoofer signal and filtering the lower frequencies out of the main speaker channels. That's one of the things that "bass management" on an AVR can do. So everything should blend smoothly.

Finally, I said screw it and dialed it up to full LFE,

I don't know what that means... LFE usually refers to the "point one" low frequency effects channel on a DVD or Blu-Ray. The other channels contain the regular bass (like musical bass) and the LFE contains extra for 'booms & explosions".

If your regular speakers can reproduce bass the receiver can be configured to send the regular bass to regular speakers and ONLY the low frequency effects go to the subwoofer. For example, if you play a stereo music file in a setup like that, nothing comes out of the subwoofer.

But most home theater setups have smaller main & surround speakers that can't put-out deep bass, so bass management is used to route ALL of the bass away from those speakers and to the subwoofer, along with the LFE channel.

But it doesn't (usually) work the other way around. The point-LFE channel can't be routed to the other speakers so if you don't have a subwoofer the LFE not used at all. And, if you play surround sound on a stereo setup the LFE is not included in the downmix.

 

[tomkatt]

Nah, this isn't a home theater setup, just a 2.1 speaker setup. Thing is I wonder if it's treated as such because the sub doesn't have high level inputs, and same goes for the T9, it plugs in via 3.5 to RCA mono. I dunno. The sub only has a low pass, but I don't know if setting is is actually affecting the range the speakers play or not. I've never messed around with subwoofers musically much, just set LFE in the past and forgot it because they were always part of home theater setups. This is the first time I've had one in a setup just dedicated to music.