Wireing subs > Speaker cable or RCAs?

Turbota

I was looking at the install instructions on my [powered] subwoofer.

It shows where it can be wired either with speaker cable from the amp's speaker connectors or via RCA cables from the amp's line level RCA connectors.

Do you think one way is really better than the other?

Ron,

Fireman99

I would go with the RCA line level input tends to be cleaner then speaker level inputs
Dan

Grimster74

Go with the subwoofer cable. In my opinion its much harder to setup with a SPL meter if you use the speaker level inputs/outputs.

gatemplin

I dont think Ron can use a sub cable. As I recall he has a vintage pioneer amp and Adire rava.

Ron, you could probably split the line out on the preamp first and send the signal to both the power amp and sub. This would mean that all the speakers would now get a full range signal.

Turbota

gatemplin ...

Thanks for the reply. Ya, we have been over this before. I am still in Alabama, and the equip is in Phoenix, so I have yet to make an attempt to hook this stuff up.

The reason I asked about this again was looking at the RAVA site, they show it can be hooked up a couple of ways: With RCA line level or speaker wire. That Pioneer Spec 1 pre-amp does have a set of left and right RCA line level RCA output connectors that I guess could be wired to the RAVA, but I think the Rava only has 1 RCA input connector since it's really only 1 channel. Maybe a Y adapter?

It also shows running speaker wire from either the front or rear speaker outputs on the amp directly to the RAVA speaker inputs, and then the speaker wire from the RAVA speaker outputs directly to either the 2 front or 2 rear speakers. (the RAVA has some sort of filter or something that just uses only the low freq speaker level signals) Then the rest of the frequency goes to your regular speakers.

Anyway, it appears that using either line level or speaker level to the RAVA is ok ... Maybe it makes no difference

Ron,

VR3

Man, YES IT DOES!

I ran LFE cable for almost 2 years, plugged up my subwoofer with speaker cable...

3-4 db increase, blended better, played fuller, sounded overall just better. TRY IT!

gatemplin

Ron, the Rava uses a AVA250 sub amp with line inputs and outputs for both left and right channels so you're fine either way.

Sid, the reason that you had an SPL increase over LFE cable is that the speaker level signal is stronger and you didn't adjust the gain dial on the sub. Boosting the LFE channel by 3-4 dBs in the AVR's BM should have the same effect on SPLs.

VR3

Boosting it 3-4 DB would also lead to Preamp clipping. Not good....

I'm running mine flat, no gain, great sound, plays alot cleaner.

tobwco

Sorry to bring this topic back from 03', but I have similar question. I'm running 2 front speakers off of a 2 channel amp. I have 2 subs (PW505) I would like to run w/ speaker in/outputs from amp to speakers. I'm currently running only 1 set of wire to each sub then out to speakers thus utilizing only one speaker input to the sub. Am I only utilizing half of the sub? Can I simply bridge over to the other side of the sub & bridge as well? I don't want to damage the subs though.
I like to use the speaker wire hook up so that I don't have to constantly adjust the volume. I'm using a 5.1 only as a distribution & don't want to use the sub out.

Thanks in advance.

messiah

tobwco wrote: »

& don't want to use the sub out.

Yes, you do. Get a y splitter and 3 sub cables, problem solved. And why would you be adjusting the volume?

echoofformless

I would say it depends entirely on the purpose. For a home theater or for multichannel music I would vote for running it through as LFE since the processor will be sending the signals as per the way the engineers programmed it to. In other words when you're watching a film, there are LFE effects that are being sent solely to the subwoofer channel which is probably going to render a more faithful and accurate reproduction of the intention of the filmmakers or sound engineers.

But if it's a straight 2 channel stereo system for music, you might consider the speaker lines especially in how much more precise control you'll get over the crossover frequencies. I would think that blending is much simpler and thus more accurate with this method if your sub has a low pass filter frequency dial. Rather than be at the mercy of your processor that will only allow say, 50hz, 80hz, 120hz, etc you can literally dial in in the exact frequency that sounds best to you.

. I can't speak for the dB increase as claimed, but it seems to make sense as speaker level outputs will naturally have a lot more juice than line level outputs. You will get a much more "active" sub that way, at least according to physics.