New to me PSW450 - some questions

BentMike

Hi All,

I am new here, and grateful for any advice...

I got an OK deal on a PSW450 with a bad amp.

I have been reading about it and it is not that well thought of in the gen pop.
Any idea what the valid beefs are with this subwoofer and amp?

Is the cabinet just wrong for the driver?
Why do I see people favoring sealed cabinets?

If the amp is a weak point I have the opportunity to fix that. I was thinking of dropping in a gainclone if there is something basically wrong with the OEM amp.

If it matters, this will be used in my garage. Not an audiophile setup, I just want the air to move on certain music, and to hear something over power tools and other noise of work. Right now I have a Crown D75 and 2 Polk 5's. There are also a couple tinny, but interesting Sansui SP-3500 - the sub woofer might be what they are missing. It is clearly a not too well thought out experiment.

BM

tonyb

Valid beefs ?

The psw line was really more so for Home Theatre applications than music. The lower notes could get boomy or a tad sloppy if you will. Which is why we usually don't recommend them for dedicated music listening.

cnh

Welcome to Club Polk!

Those early subs are passable but nothing to write home about. However if you're just going to use it in a garage for bass slam it should do that well enough. Sounds like you need a new plate amp though?

The cab and 12" in there are OK. According to Polk the original amp was 150 watts continuous/300 watts peak @ 4 ohms? So maybe you can find something comparable for not too much coin at http://www.parts-express.com/cat/subwoofer-plate-amplifiers/332 and see if that's cost effective.

The PSW450 is an older sub so I'm not surprised that the amp is out!

As far as ported and unported subs, it's really more about the design and quality of the power that is important in either kind!

cnh

BentMike

I wrote the original post before receiving the SW. An eBay purchase for $48 - allegedly with a bad amp, but it works!

I am liking it. If I play with the volume and low pass I can keep it from booming too much, but when you ask it for a lot of power it is there, but boomy.A little limiting, and I keep fiddling to see what I can get. Not a great listening space, but now I can tell what is going on when I am out side painting or something.

I have a lot of control over it, the line out of the DAC is split, then goes to the RCA jacks on the SW, and to the pre. I can control the signal to both from the PC, or the other speakers and SW separately.
I may try out the high pass filter just to see how that goes.

Tonight I came in and I'd apparently switched the phase while it was not running. It was as if it was on full volume with no volume control, very not listenable, but when I switched back to 0° it was fine. There is something amiss there.

I have a gainclone about half done and may try it out just to see.

Looking at the SW amp it seems underdesigned. I hope to locate a schematic of it. Anyone know where to find it?

[Deleted User]

Hello,
If you contact Polk's CS department at: polkcs@polkaudio.com they can provide the schematic.
Regards, Ken

BentMike

I have written twice to tech support and gotten no answer. I guess I will try CS next.