How many on ASR don't runs subs of any kind.? & why.....

[Digital_Thor]

The problem with multiple subs is mono bass, time domain issues, the inability to use linear phase crossovers, and being limited on crossover frequency. I prefer 2 co-located subs (or even better 2 real full range speakers ). While sharp dips in the LF response look bad on a graph they are not very audible. The other issues are to me more audible.

Still, I haven't heard a good presentation deliver any audible benefit from linear phase, even though I would like to.
I just split my 4 subwoofers in 2 groups, 2 for each side - no overall mono, maybe kinda stereo - except for measurements.
Then I overlap like Earl Geddes do and worry a lot less about fanzy software.
Bass is quite good here, even when moving around my apartment while cooking or whatever.
True, you can really do awesome things with modern hardware and software... But is it really THAT audible?

 

[Oddball]

Funny wording. It's definitely still a science and in this case literally an ART.

Lol, semantics aside it it not a science any more nor it requires excessive effort or time.

But for sure it is the death of the the shamans that do the circle dances around the subs to make them work better and then share their mystic experiences with the broader public that will try the same.

 

[Blake Klondike]

i have a pair of genelec 8020s and would love to use a 7040 sub with them, but we live in a two-family house and i don't expect my downstairs neighbors want to hear 24 hour steely dan and genesis with a sub through the floor. if i had a million bucks to buy a house then it would just be a question of having enough space to set everything up, which is another problem in apartments.

 

[Ropeburn]

Lol, semantics aside it it not a science any more nor it requires excessive effort or time.

But for sure it is the death of the the shamans that do the circle dances around the subs to make them work better and then share their mystic experiences with the broader public that will try the same.

Must you insult proper shamans so needlessly?

 

[levimax]

But for sure it is the death of the the shamans that do the circle dances around the subs to make them work better and then share their mystic experiences with the broader public that will try the same.

ART is another "black box system" where you don't know what exactly it is doing so practically speaking it is "magic". I have played around with DLBC a lot and have had mixed results. It certainly can create "smoother" graphs than I can manually but it also often makes weird choices which can usually be worked around but on balance I currently prefer manual sub filters with 2 subs even though they are not as smooth measuring.

Having said that as soon as ART is offered for PC I will pay the upgrade and try it. I have played around with setting up a DBA system but haven't had much luck so since I have 6 subs and currently only using 2 I am curious to see what ART can do. Some of the graphs I have seen look very impressive as far as reducing room ringing go. Unfortunately, you have to sum to mono which deletes information and causes other issues so it will be interesting to see how less ringing vs less information plays out in my system.

 

[Oddball]

Must you insult proper shamans so needlessly?

Needlessly? I do think that they are outlived by now. They can retire in peace and grace and let the life move forward.

 

[Oddball]

ART is another "black box system" where you don't know what exactly it is doing so practically speaking it is "magic". I have played around with DLBC a lot and have had mixed results. It certainly can create "smoother" graphs than I can manually but it also often makes weird choices which can usually be worked around but on balance I currently prefer manual sub filters with 2 subs even though they are not as smooth measuring.

Having said that as soon as ART is offered for PC I will pay the upgrade and try it. I have played around with setting up a DBA system but haven't had much luck so since I have 6 subs and currently only using 2 I am curious to see what ART can do. Some of the graphs I have seen look very impressive as far as reducing room ringing go. Unfortunately, you have to sum to mono which deletes information and causes other issues so it will be interesting to see how less ringing vs less information plays out in my system.

Looping in @kawauso and hope that she will share with us the graphs from her atomic setup. There is the thing they say - if you want to do it right do it in Japan. I am just an redneck from Europe, so half the job is good enough for us.

EDIT: Btw I also come from 2x2 DBA which was admittedly not perfect, but that is really so far from ART. Waweforming from Trinnov recommends 8 subs in very specific locations (note - not all on floor) to get to something like ART.

 

[Keith_W]

EDIT: Btw I also come from 2x2 DBA which was admittedly not perfect, but that is really so far from ART. Waweforming from Trinnov recommends 8 subs in very specific locations (note - not all on floor) to get to something like ART.

For one listening position in a small area, that is probably true. But for a large listening area, like a home theatre, I don't know if that is true or not. I have not seen any examples of ART being able to optimize for a large listening area. In theory, Waveforming is superior. But it is also more expensive.

 

[Oddball]

For one listening position in a small area, that is probably true. But for a large listening area, like a home theatre, I don't know if that is true or not. I have not seen any examples of ART being able to optimize for a large listening area. In theory, Waveforming is superior. But it is also more expensive.

Large listening area is also an option for ART. It will just not provide such focused results.I have not done work there as just bedazzled by the single spot results.

I don't really consider waweforming as option for mortals. I am not poor, but one of the reasons might be that I did not go wave forming. That is an option for a dedicated HT room and if you don't want to break what you have, means new dedicted room.

There is so much evidence for ART effectiveness that people should look at that. It is a bit strange that this happens years after ART was released, but I guess the Storm community that had exclusivity for a long time is not really about sharing and caring. We had some insights from select beta testers but that was all (special thanks to @TimoJ).

 

[Hear Here]

Interested in the thoughts of those who don't run subs in their systems & the why of it. I already get enough data on the reasons to do it but not much on reasons not too.

I'm replying after reading only the opening post but will read the subsequent ones later.

Buy good quality and carefully chosen (for the room) full-range main speakers, set them up properly and pay attention to the room's furnishings, etc and subs are not necessary.

What's more, the added difficulty of getting 3 or 4 speakers (usually of different brands with different amplification) set up and working in perfect harmony is almost impossible to most of us.

We have invited this difficulty by adding the complication of subs and we often resort to chucking a digital signal processor at the problem in the hopes it will resolve matters. On the contrary, all DSPs can ever do is mess up the nice flat signal response we expect from our expensive amplifier! We hope that the poor speaker response will be precisely compensated for by a contrary poor amplifier response. Result - perfect sound. No such luck! All unnecessary processing of the precious signal is bad for the signal, despite its initial apparent attractiveness.

Better to keep things simple - buy speakers capable of delivering decent bass, feed them a nice clean signal and enjoy the music, even though there may be a few wrinkles in the measured response at the listening position - as there would be in your concert hall seat at a live performance.

Others may disagree!

 

[Keith_W]

We have invited this difficulty by adding the complication of subs and we often resort to chucking a digital signal processor at the problem in the hopes it will resolve matters. On the contrary, all DSPs can ever do is mess up the nice flat signal response we expect from our expensive amplifier! We hope that the poor speaker response will be precisely compensated for by a contrary poor amplifier response. Result - perfect sound. No such luck! All unnecessary processing of the precious signal is bad for the signal, despite its initial apparent attractiveness.

Your ignorance is astounding.

Better to keep things simple - buy speakers capable of delivering decent bass, feed them a nice clean signal and enjoy the music, even though there may be a few wrinkles in the measured response at the listening position - as there would be in your concert hall seat at a live performance.

"Few wrinkles". Like a +/- 20dB dip in your frequency response?

 

[levimax]

I'm replying after reading only the opening post but will read the subsequent ones later.

Buy good quality and carefully chosen (for the room) full-range main speakers, set them up properly and pay attention to the room's furnishings, etc and subs are not necessary.

What's more, the added difficulty of getting 3 or 4 speakers (usually of different brands with different amplification) set up and working in perfect harmony is almost impossible to most of us.

We have invited this difficulty by adding the complication of subs and we often resort to chucking a digital signal processor at the problem in the hopes it will resolve matters. On the contrary, all DSPs can ever do is mess up the nice flat signal response we expect from our expensive amplifier! We hope that the poor speaker response will be precisely compensated for by a contrary poor amplifier response. Result - perfect sound. No such luck! All unnecessary processing of the precious signal is bad for the signal, despite its initial apparent attractiveness.

Better to keep things simple - buy speakers capable of delivering decent bass, feed them a nice clean signal and enjoy the music, even though there may be a few wrinkles in the measured response at the listening position - as there would be in your concert hall seat at a live performance.

Others may disagree!

I agree for the most part but some careful DSP amplitude cuts of room modes below Schroder can be very helpful and if done correctly and will do no harm.

 

[Flaesh]

I have played around with setting up a DBA system but haven't had much luck

Can you tell more about the setup and the criteria for the amount of luck?.

 

[levimax]

Can you tell more about the setup and the criteria for the amount of luck?.

It wasn't a very serious attempt because I only had 4 subs to work with and from what I have read you need a lot more than that.... 8 minium and more would be better. I was inspired by a thread by @Keith_W which I can't find right now, maybe Keith can post a link, where he used a limited number of subs in a DBA and got some measurable results. I tried to see if I could get some measurable attenuation of a strong 30 Hz room mode by placing 2 subs co-located with the mains on the front wall and two subs on the back wall running out of phase with a delay. I couldn't really get any reliable and repeatable measurements and read about ART and since I had DLBC already I decided to wait for ART. While not really a serious attempt I did learn a lot which tends to be true of most DIY projects, even unsuccessful ones.

 

[Keith_W]

It wasn't a very serious attempt because I only had 4 subs to work with and from what I have read you need a lot more than that.... 8 minium and more would be better. I was inspired by a thread by @Keith_W which I can't find right now, maybe Keith can post a link, where he used a limited number of subs in a DBA and got some measurable results.

It was a VBA, not a DBA.

And BTW, I have reconfigured the system so the mains are now equalised to full range. I now have four bass sources that can go down to 20Hz, spaced 1.5m from each other (2 mains + 2 subs). This should be ALMOST enough for a plane wave configuration, if we ignore the vertical sub requirement. I will have another go at it, but I have no time at the moment.

 

[dlaloum]

Large listening area is also an option for ART. It will just not provide such focused results.I have not done work there as just bedazzled by the single spot results.

I don't really consider waweforming as option for mortals. I am not poor, but one of the reasons might be that I did not go wave forming. That is an option for a dedicated HT room and if you don't want to break what you have, means new dedicted room.

There is so much evidence for ART effectiveness that people should look at that. It is a bit strange that this happens years after ART was released, but I guess the Storm community that had exclusivity for a long time is not really about sharing and caring. We had some insights from select beta testers but that was all (special thanks to @TimoJ).

Lots of feedback from the Storm community in the Storm Forums... I would refer you to the very very long thread here:

https://www.avsforum.com/threads/stormaudio-processors-official-thread.3152188/#replies

Lots of good experience with ART in there.

However - the Storm platform has substantial ability to tune/tweak in addition to and on top of ART.... nevertheless there is a heap of excellent experience with ART that has been published on there.

 

[Flaesh]

cause I only had 4 subs to work with

I still have 4). Link in the signature.

 

[levimax]

I still have 4). Link in the signature.

Don't want to go off topic but what delays and what frequency range are you using for the DBA linked in your signature?

 

[kawauso]

For one listening position in a small area, that is probably true. But for a large listening area, like a home theatre, I don't know if that is true or not. I have not seen any examples of ART being able to optimize for a large listening area. In theory, Waveforming is superior. But it is also more expensive.

It’s true that the deviation becomes larger between the main listening area and spots further away.
However, even when measuring at a completely off-axis position — near the door, with the mic placed higher than the listening height — the variation still seemed acceptable to me.
The spectrum also showed that ART’s decay control was clearly working even in such an extreme location.
When standing there and listening, the bass was slightly stronger, but still had a dry, pleasant character rather than being boomy.

Maybe you should get yourself a Denon someday, Keith — you really need to experience ART firsthand.

 

[dlaloum]

A few thoughts...

Our constraints:

Most of us do not have a dedicated HT / Listening room... it is part of our living space and shared.
We therefore have space and positioning constraints.
Some of these will be appearance/lifestyle based (WAF...).

To achieve even basic immersion we need to position the base layer speakers as well as possible for the midrange and the imaging / location identification frequencies - that will pretty much define the Front L/C/R - to a somewhat less critical degree the surrounds (and heights).

Subs are big and bulky, in many (almost all) cases, the optimal position (in acoustic, room structure, terms) for a sub won't be available - so we compromise, we place subs where we can, and then try to tweak in various ways to compensate.

One position almost universally available for "subs" is the front L / R speakers - this location is already reserved for speakers.... getting slightly larger speakers with "subs" built in, overcomes a bunch of the other (non audio) impediments!

In terms of sub locations - more and varied locations tends to provide better results, even if each individual position is a less than ideal one. Using full range speakers (those with "built in subs") gives us at least 2 subs, in 2 differing locations.
If using 4 base layer full rangers, then we have 4 subs in 4 locations... or 6...
Having a bass capable center gives us another one potentially.

Yes in an ideal world, we would all have dedicated custom built auditoriums, with subs positioned ideally to manage room modes.

But in our less than ideal reality, we can have our setup with full range speakers effectively giving us multiple subs in multiple locations and a substantially improved immersive experience!

Further - bass localisation is part of the immersive experience - this means that we want the base layer speakers (ideally ALL speakers) to extend down to 60Hz so the localised bass in the individual channels can be properly reproduced, and not transformed into a monotone unlocalised bass "room pudding" - most "full range" towers will extend to to 40Hz, some will go substantially lower. (or alternatively we want to colocate a sub with each base layer speaker)

Yeah there are damn good objective reasons why a non sub setup can potentially outperform many sub based setups...

Just because you have chosen to split out your woofer from your midrange/tweeter into a seperate box, does not make it inherently better (or worse...)