Tuning up new stereo system

ascalon

Hi guys. I have been revamping the stereo system in my 1999 Dodge Durango. It'll be Polk mmc6500's for the front components, MB Quart rvf 216's as coaxials in the back, and a pair of Pioneer tsw301r subs in the trunk, sealed box. A kicker zx650.4 4 channel, 120 watts rms x 4 amp runs the speakers, and a kicker 750.1 mono amp will run the subs. My deck is a Pioneer DEH-P3900MP.

I got the mb quarts installed in the back last week, with the kicker amp. They sound good, and seem to be getting better. I'm guessing they need to break in. I already have the subs, but not currently running since I returned my old pioneer amp cus it sucked and heated up too much. So I am currently missing my bass . I've been trying to tune my system properly, but these darn quarts seem to have bass problems.

Since day 1, I've noticed they tend to make a pop/slap sound (a type of distortion I gues), and an overall flat bass. It's bad at anything below 70~65hz. Now, the bass has gotten better and smoother above 65hz the more I've been using them, but things still get bad below that frequency range. This occurs mostly at high volumes. The gain is currently set at one notch past half (the kicker gain control goes from 0 to 11, half point being 6 I guess, and currently set at 7 or 8 I guess). Wish they would use volts as a ruler, but whatever. I'm trying to make the bass response better through fine tuning, at least until I can use my subs again. Some songs are nearly 50% below 80hz it seems, which sucks when the speakers seem adept with only 65~80hz and above.

I've noticed that the HPF on the head unit works/sounds better than the HPF on the amp itself. Instead of using both as I initially was, I turned off the amp HPF, and it seemed to make bass sound better without the distortion effects. At high volumes and low frequencies, the woofers still start making flat distorted bass popping/slapping noises. I've found that I can keep them going at a 50~65hz HPF range minimum, as long as I turn the low part of the equalizer down quite a bit. Strangely enough, I can also increase the "bass" option on my head unit without increasing the occurance of popping distortion, opposite of what happens if I increase the low part of my equalizer. However, increasing the "bass" option also makes the speakers sound less clear, although they pump out more undistorted bass. Both settings should be increasing the bass/low frequencies the same, but their effects are very different. What is up with this?

All in all, can you help me tune up my stuff so that I can get some decent bass at high volume, or should I consider this a lost cause with the MB Quarts til I get my subs back? Thanks a lot.

eloplayspolo

ur not gonna get real bass from coax speakers or mid woofers... and u really cant tune everything untill its all in... once its all installed follow some general guidlines and tune it to how u like it... everyone is diffrent.

ascalon

Everything has been installed and working for about a month now. Works wonderfully, and it does impress people .

This pioneer deck confuses me as far as bass goes. Has anyone used a Pioneer deck, that can describe the differences between changing the low frequency on the equalizer (eq only has 3 adjustment ranges), changing the separate "bass" setting, and changing the separate subwoofer boost setting. They all have different effects that I can hear, but its hard as hell to tell just what's going on with the changes.

ilikesound

what i try to do in that situation, is turn off the sub, crank the h/u up to where i want to listen to it most, boost the bass frequency to where it just begins to distort and back it down a notch. i then add in the sub to where it sounds good. i have no experience with pioneer, but that's just the way i would do it lol.

audiofiend

Ascalon, I had an old pioneer deck for a while and had trouble figuring out the Eq because the user manual is vague at best. I believe this is how it works though:

Your frequencies can be adjusted for BASS, MIDRANGE, and TREBLE.

The frequencies for each range are variable, for ex:

BASS can be set at 40hz, 80hz, 100hz, or 160hz.


The general shape of the curve (or Q factor) at your selected
frequency can also be adjusted for ex:


There are 4 Q settings for BASS

2N= very narrow
1N= narrow
1W= wide
2W=very wide


say you wanted to get rid of a narrow bass peak that centered around 100hz
(WHAT?!, NO BOOM)
use the 2N setting and move the EQ downward


What if you had a wide area in your treble region that you wanted to compensate for?
Use a "W" setting and raise the EQ accordingly

Hope you can make sense of all this , I'm starting to get tired


good luck hope this is what you were talking about

ascalon

Thanks, that helped a lot . I took a look at my manual today, and I had no idea how much the sound could be tweaked on this thing. You were right about adjusting the EQ curves. Would you generally suggest doing the widest curves with the powerful speakers I have? I set the low and mid to 2W (widest) and the high to 1W. Low is centered at 80 or 100hz, mid is at 1khz, and high is at 10khz I think. Sounds really good with that bit of tweaking, but I haven't cranked it yet. I'm really trying to tune my system for the best sound at max volumes.

As far as bass goes, looking at the manual, my understanding is that boosting the low equalizer will boost low tones in a certain range depending on where my EQ is set. The "Bass" option will supposedly boost all frequencies under the low pass filter (which I have set at 100hz now). Using that is a lot better than turning up the sub level. I still do not know what the sub level does under the subwoofer options (next to the sub LPF on the pioneer deck's menu). I have noticed that turning it up can reduce the volume/performance of everything, so I tend not to use it more than +1 or +2, but I really need to know what this setting specifically does.

Also, there is the "Loudness" option. I usually have it all the way up on loud, instead of mid, low, or off. I've heard this should only be used at low volumes? It certainly sounds like crap if it's off at low volumes. However, maybe I should immediately turn it off when I crank my system to the max? Wont that reduce the overall volume, or will it somehow balance things out and increase the quality if I turn it off on max volume?

I also discovered another little sound tweak. When playing a CD, and pressing function on the deck, you can adjust a compression or BMX setting (it doesn't say what BMX stands for). It says the compression balances the output of louder and softer sounds at high volumes. It says the BMX controls sound reverberations to give playback a fuller sound. I dunno what the hell that does. You either have both off, or you can increase one or the other by a factor of 1 or 2, but you can't use compression and BMX at the same time. Any insight?

MacLeod

ascalon wrote: »

Would you generally suggest doing the widest curves with the powerful speakers I have?

Not necessarily. It will depend on a bunch of things. Just experiment.

Using that is a lot better than turning up the sub level. I still do not know what the sub level does under the subwoofer options (next to the sub LPF on the pioneer deck's menu).

Use the sub level. All this is, is basically a fader for the sub channel. You usually dont want to boost the EQ any more than 3 db. Any more than that and youre **** with the overall sound. When you boost say 500 Hz by 3 db youre demanding much more power from the amp to reproduce that 500 Hz but it could be pulling away from 800 or 1000 Hz. Cutting is better than boosting.

Also, there is the "Loudness" option. I usually have it all the way up on loud, instead of mid, low, or off. I've heard this should only be used at low volumes? It certainly sounds like crap if it's off at low volumes. However, maybe I should immediately turn it off when I crank my system to the max? Wont that reduce the overall volume, or will it somehow balance things out and increase the quality if I turn it off on max volume?

Turn it off. All the loudness does is boost the levels of certain frequencies like the bass. Just like I mentioned above, this makes an unnatural sounding curve in your EQ. The reason why it sounds better at low volumes is because its boosted the low frequencies which will make it sound better but once you start turning it up, itll sound worse. Leave it off.

I also discovered another little sound tweak. When playing a CD, and pressing function on the deck, you can adjust a compression or BMX setting (it doesn't say what BMX stands for). It says the compression balances the output of louder and softer sounds at high volumes. It says the BMX controls sound reverberations to give playback a fuller sound. I dunno what the hell that does. You either have both off, or you can increase one or the other by a factor of 1 or 2, but you can't use compression and BMX at the same time. Any insight?

I dont know what this does either but generally Id say leave it off as well. Set up the crossovers, levels and EQ to get the best sound. Stay away from all the fancy things head unit manufacturers put on their decks to sell em.

ascalon

MacLeod wrote: »

Not necessarily. It will depend on a bunch of things. Just experiment.


Use the sub level. All this is, is basically a fader for the sub channel. You usually dont want to boost the EQ any more than 3 db. Any more than that and youre **** with the overall sound. When you boost say 500 Hz by 3 db youre demanding much more power from the amp to reproduce that 500 Hz but it could be pulling away from 800 or 1000 Hz. Cutting is better than boosting.

Wow, ok. So the sub level functions like a fader? That's why I notice a reduction in volume when I turn it up (as if the other speakers aren't getting as much power)? If that's the case, then the main thing I'd want to use is the "bass" option and low end equalizer instead of the sub level. That way I wont take away from the output of my front speakers, and the bass option will/should boost ALL the low frequencies being directed to the subs.

audiofiend

Thanks Macleod, you summed evrything up like a champ. saved me a lot of typing.

Just wanted to say to ascalon that I found wider settings on the EQ to be better for me especially for mid to highs but sometimes I liked to use a narrow setting for bass to control the boominess.

I like to think of the sub level feature as a level matching function to blend in your subwoofer.

Loudness sucks.

If you have to resort to using quirky functions on your deck you probably have a problem somewhere else. I agree with avoiding them.

Dont know anything about BMX or compression functions


How well are your amps gain settings adjusted? that can make a significant difference in quality sound. gains are level matching devices and not volume knobs and only have one optimal setting.

hope this was helpful

ascalon

Thank a lot. You may be right about my gains. I think I may have set them with loudness on, which is apparently incorrect. I guess that must be the reason it seems like it's too far to the left (higher voltage). I imagine I'll be able to set the knob farther right without the loudness and maybe get the same or better volume? The darn kicker amps don't detail voltage on the gain knob, it just has useless numbers 0-11. Anyone used a kicker amp that can comment on how voltage correlates to their gains knob? I know my old pioneer amp made it easy and marked the knob with voltage.

audiofiend

Hey ascalon, I found a site or to that have been helpful to me


gain setting: www.subwoofertools.com/forum/setgain.asp

general info: www.bcae1.com/


I think general practice is to use a 1Khz tone recorded at 0 dB for your mids and highs and a 50Hz tone @ 0 dB for subs to set gain with a multimeter

ascalon

Thank you. I think I've been getting even better results simply by raising the crossover frequency. I just don't think high power/high db producing speakers are really capable of cleanly producing much below 100 hz when cranked to the max. The speakers I've seen with rms power handling above the typical 125 watt threshold usually seem to have a frequency range response of about 100~120 minimum, which makes sense. Heck, the speakers are only 6.5". When you pump that much power into them, no way the woofer can produce bass that loud and that low. After raising the crossover, raising the gains to about the same level as my subs, and turning the loudness option on the head unit down to medium, I don't seem to be getting any distortion at 5/4~5/6 the volume on my head unit (40~45 out of 50 on the head unit. The head unit starts clipping right about at 45, so I'll never go that high). These really are some loud **** speakers when tuned up right, even when not :P . I'm also liking the crossover much much more since learning how to broaden the slope. Bass is working much more nicely since I learned the difference between the 3 bass related options as well . Proper tuning truly is just as important as the quality of the equipment.