Full-Band Setting

The point of using a subwoofer is not only alleviating the floorstanders of bass but also to better reproduce bass in a more ideal location as well as more efficiently. First of all, do not do double bass as in set your speakers to large and run your subwoofer in the same bad. This will cause cancellation issues and phase issues at the LP (peaks and nulls). Usually where your floorstanders are positioned is not ideal for bass reproduction and thus this is where the subwoofer comes in. You can place the sub in a more ideal location to reproduce the lowest frequencies best.

Your floorstanders woofers roll in around 125hz so if you set your XO to 80hz your floorstanders will START to roll off at 80hz. Remember crossovers are not brick walls so the fronts will still be reproducing frequencies below the XO. If you're running a movie setup, I would recommend setting the sub at 80hz to handle the midbass frequencies to create the "chest bump" effect and slam. Your floorstanders won't be as adequate to handle the LFE effects as your sub would be.

Nailed it!!!

dbKiller wrote: »

In the end that is why is set mine like I have it. The floorstanders seem to sound better and the bass sounds better with lower frequencies from the sub only. But like I said a few minutes ago, I am still learning.

A sub which is made to be dedicated for reproducing the lowest of the low frequencies would be better suited than most mains to reproduce frequencies <100hz if its setup properly and EQ-ed. It takes a lot of time and effort to properly setup a sub into a system. It's not as easy as hooking it up and setting it down in the most convenient location. It's experimentation and time. This is where people usually falter and become dismissive of subs

My mains could do 30hz easily in room but they certainly don't do it as well as my sub or as efficiently. By using a sub you can get away with just EQ-ing the sub channel. In the end, it's personal experience that has shown me what a sub can actually do. Sure graphs are great and all and they give you a keen insight into what's happening but if you don't like the sound then what's the point. But I have never heard anyone poo poo getting rid of nulls and peaks. A flat response is a different issue as well as some people might prefer some midbass bump. But smoothing peaks and nulls are a no brainer.

As far as measuring devices go, it can lead to unorthodox and counterintuitive solutions. I as many others have issues in the bass region and the best solution was to set the high pass XO at 80hz and the low pass XO at 50hz leaving a 30hz gap. Again XO's aren't brick walls and this actually yielded the best and smoothest response and I have honestly never heard bass this tight and defined once I got rid of all the peaks in that region. Placement of the sub also helped plenty and again measuring it allowed me to quickly and accurately judge each position with my ears and the aid of a graph.

I'm not familiar with that firmware upgrade but changing settings in the Auto-calibration process WILL change the volume you get at the same setting either louder or softer.

On my system, when I calibrated what was very loud at 67 was not as loud...it lowered my settings all around so that if I wanted to push the sound rather than running it a 67 I'd go to 73-4 or more on the Onkyo scale after the calibration.

I would imagine the "opposite", which is what you are describing, is also possible!

cnh

That's because it is a good place to start. Raise the fronts to at least 65, center and surrounds 70 or above.

dirtydenim86 wrote: »

What do you think about having my fronts at full band for home theater? A no no when using a sub?

If your speakers and amplification can handle the fronts at full range it should be fine. Just set your subwoofer to kick in where your fronts start to roll off. If you like the results then go with it