Here is my setup:

Soundstream D'artagnan 5.1 (4x65@4ohm, 1x400@2ohm)
1 Infinity Kappa Perfect 12.1D (@2ohm)
Mb Quart RSC216 Components
Mb Quart DTC169 6x9s

My amp has two settings for bass adjustment. Hawkins Bass Control and Sub-sonic. From reading the documentation, both these setting act as a high-pass XO for the subwoofer channel. The subsonic filter can be adjusted to kick in anywhere 13-30Hz and the Hawkins Bass Control can be adjusted to kick in anywhere between 30-70Hz. Also the Hawkins Bass Control allows for dB adjustement from the starting point of high-pass XO. I have my low-pass on the sub channel set to 100Hz.

My questions are:

Is the dB gain on the Hawkins made to make up for the natural loss of dB of the sub at low frequencies since it is a scaled dB gain rather than a constant dB gain (as frequency gets higher, it lessens)?

Am I really going to miss much music (techno and classical) if it filters out everything lower than 30Hz?

What is the proper way to tune this subwoofer setup?

Any other suggestions?

Thanks in advance.


[Modified by 1BlackHatch, 4:27 PM 2/7/2003]

 

Surely someone can give me some advice here.

 

1. Yes, it also has to do with the sound curve of human hearing known as the Fletcher-Munson curve.

2. The average human ear can't hear anything lower than 40 Hz, so I would say no, less rattling. Rattling is the only way you can localize anything lower than 100 hz.

3. PROPER tuning would require special CDs with pink noise/white noise, etc, as well as special sound meters. I have had good luck with the Alpine PXA-H510, it has a parametric Eq and digital time delay etc built in.

4. I would just use the Sub Sonic. Without knowing the plot response of your sub enclosure, the other one may sound better or worse.

 

Thank you. That is a finger in the right direction. Exactly what I was looking for.