Just got few days ago my second SVS SB-1000 and I thought it would be nice to see what's inside the box and "how it works". This one is the black-ash (MDF with sort of melamine foil on the outside) and the "old one" is a black-gloss (MDF with veneer glossy on the outside).
The MDF cabinet has a thickness of 1.5 cm and the four inner walls are covered on the inside with 5 cm thick acoustic absorbent pollyfill. Quite a generous amount of damping material I'd say, although I've added one more piece myself between the electronic parts and the driver, just to be sure the reflections will get lowered inside even further (not quite a recommended modding and probably not necessary, but usually the rear side of the sub might need some sort or damping).
The SMPS power supply delivers 53.3 to the black-melamine subwoofer and 53.9V to the piano-black one, so the last one is more powerful.
It doesn't seems to be a dual power supply as I can only see a red and black wire connected from PSU to the amp's PCB. There is also an additional dual +/-7V rail to power up the digital control parts (DSP).
The amplifier itself is a SVS proprietary SLEDGE STA-300D able to deliver 300 W of RMS power, with peaks up to 720 W.
The connection from the speaker to the amplifier seems to be bridged, so the two pairs of cables are paralleled on the driver side, then it's getting to separate PCB plugs. Cables are really thick, probably 1.5mm2 each one of them, so really good thing.
Between the back plate, also used as heatsink, and the PCB there's a piece of rubber/foam used to electrically isolate the PCB from the back plate, but also to damp the internal sound-waves.
On the amplifier's PCB I can identify:
- One TL064C quad operational amplifer made by ST that probably deals with the two stereo inputs from RCA and Speakers-Out.
- An AKM5358AET A/D converter, probably used to get the analogue inputs from the above opamp into the DSP.
- One STA309A multi-channel digital audio processor with DDX® (https://www.st.com/en/audio-ics/sta309a.html) that should take care of the Low-Pass Filter and all the necessary DSP corrections, based on the volume setting and frequency response. It should be programmed this way to correct imperfections of the subwoofer and provide a clean and proper bass response.
I can't see what type of Class-D power amplifiers are under the heatsink, but given the 36-pin I thought it might be TDA7498, but looking to https://www.st.com/en/audio-ics/class-d-audio-power-amplifiers.html#products I realized that there's no chip there able to be powered from 53V, so it should be some chip from https://www.st.com/en/audio-ics/digital-audio-power-amplifiers.html#2. Probably STA516BE seems to be able to deliver in mono-BTL configuration 400 W into a 3 Ω load with THD = 10% at VCC= 52 V, based on the datasheet.
SB-1000 and PB-1000 share the same speaker driver and my DMM shows a DC-resistance of 3.5 Ohms, so based on the above I'd say that the 300 W RMS power provided by the manufacturer is a real number and that's probably achieved with a THD definitely lower than 10% (probably more close to 1% than to 10%).
On the SMPS power supply board can be seen:
- One TL494L made by UTC
- Couple of MOSFET transistors (can't see the model, probably hard to find ones).
I subjectively think that the SMPS inside is the weak link here, it just doesn't looks to be able to sustain the power that the bridged chips could deliver when used in mono-BTL. Of course, the heatsink is not the best one too for a closed-sub that lacks real ventilation inside, but in the end power supply & amplifier & speaker/driver seem to blend pretty nice to the final specs of the entire subwoofer.
I find the sound as being fast and accurate, maybe not the best punch ever, but given that I'm speaking about a closed-sub that can almost shake an apartment or even a small house down to 24 Hz, then it's good enough for my small home too, especially in a dual configuration like I'm using. In compare with my Mackie MR10Smk3 the output power is higher, the sub-bass is more present and the kick & slam is bigger as well.
In my living-room setup, with a stereo set made of Yamaha A-S701 and CANTON GLE 496 with two woofers per speaker, I'm pretty comfortable with the final kick and slam with the low-pass filter on SB-1000 set to around 75-80 Hz and the volume to about 12 o'clock. When getting over 100 dB of SPL the kicking is really good and the chest is getting the right amount of "vibrations", well...at least when listening to some hits like "Cardi B, Bad Bunny & J Balvin - I Like It" or "Minelli - Mariola" or any contemporary hit that has a huge amount of sub-bass.
As a low-light, worth mentioning that after 90 dB SPL these subs are vibrating on the floor, so either the SVS shock absorber feet needs to get purchased, either some carpet needs to be placed under the default original feet (that's what I did).
The SMPS power supply delivers 53.3 to the black-melamine subwoofer and 53.9V to the piano-black one, so the last one is more powerful.
The amplifier itself is a SVS proprietary SLEDGE STA-300D able to deliver 300 W of RMS power, with peaks up to 720 W.
The connection from the speaker to the amplifier seems to be bridged, so the two pairs of cables are paralleled on the driver side, then it's getting to separate PCB plugs. Cables are really thick, probably 1.5mm2 each one of them, so really good thing.
Between the back plate, also used as heatsink, and the PCB there's a piece of rubber/foam used to electrically isolate the PCB from the back plate, but also to damp the internal sound-waves.
On the amplifier's PCB I can identify:
- One TL064C quad operational amplifer made by ST that probably deals with the two stereo inputs from RCA and Speakers-Out.
- An AKM5358AET A/D converter, probably used to get the analogue inputs from the above opamp into the DSP.
- One STA309A multi-channel digital audio processor with DDX® (https://www.st.com/en/audio-ics/sta309a.html) that should take care of the Low-Pass Filter and all the necessary DSP corrections, based on the volume setting and frequency response. It should be programmed this way to correct imperfections of the subwoofer and provide a clean and proper bass response.
I can't see what type of Class-D power amplifiers are under the heatsink, but given the 36-pin I thought it might be TDA7498, but looking to https://www.st.com/en/audio-ics/class-d-audio-power-amplifiers.html#products I realized that there's no chip there able to be powered from 53V, so it should be some chip from https://www.st.com/en/audio-ics/digital-audio-power-amplifiers.html#2. Probably STA516BE seems to be able to deliver in mono-BTL configuration 400 W into a 3 Ω load with THD = 10% at VCC= 52 V, based on the datasheet.
SB-1000 and PB-1000 share the same speaker driver and my DMM shows a DC-resistance of 3.5 Ohms, so based on the above I'd say that the 300 W RMS power provided by the manufacturer is a real number and that's probably achieved with a THD definitely lower than 10% (probably more close to 1% than to 10%).
On the SMPS power supply board can be seen:
- One TL494L made by UTC
- Couple of MOSFET transistors (can't see the model, probably hard to find ones).
I subjectively think that the SMPS inside is the weak link here, it just doesn't looks to be able to sustain the power that the bridged chips could deliver when used in mono-BTL. Of course, the heatsink is not the best one too for a closed-sub that lacks real ventilation inside, but in the end power supply & amplifier & speaker/driver seem to blend pretty nice to the final specs of the entire subwoofer.
I find the sound as being fast and accurate, maybe not the best punch ever, but given that I'm speaking about a closed-sub that can almost shake an apartment or even a small house down to 24 Hz, then it's good enough for my small home too, especially in a dual configuration like I'm using. In compare with my Mackie MR10Smk3 the output power is higher, the sub-bass is more present and the kick & slam is bigger as well.
In my living-room setup, with a stereo set made of Yamaha A-S701 and CANTON GLE 496 with two woofers per speaker, I'm pretty comfortable with the final kick and slam with the low-pass filter on SB-1000 set to around 75-80 Hz and the volume to about 12 o'clock. When getting over 100 dB of SPL the kicking is really good and the chest is getting the right amount of "vibrations", well...at least when listening to some hits like "Cardi B, Bad Bunny & J Balvin - I Like It" or "Minelli - Mariola" or any contemporary hit that has a huge amount of sub-bass.
As a low-light, worth mentioning that after 90 dB SPL these subs are vibrating on the floor, so either the SVS shock absorber feet needs to get purchased, either some carpet needs to be placed under the default original feet (that's what I did).
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