How Much Bass is Enough

[Kingrex]

Some other threads were touching on speaker voicing, in particular, BASS.
It appears modern speakers of the Audiophile pedigree are focused to flat frequency reaponse.
Horns, while probably technically playing flat, present bass far different than dynamic drivers.

Then there are subs. I'm intrigued with bass at the moment as I just added a horn loaded subwoofer. Its only a 10 inch driver. But wow does it play. With a 19.5" x 19 5" mouth, aimed at a wall that is 19.5" away to make the boundary part of the horn, the power is impressive. I have had a Velodyn as well as a couple 10" Rel in my system. Neither do what a single 10" horn sub can do.

Anyhow. What about bass and how much we allow into our systems. Young people like bass. Automotive enthusiasts like a lot of bass. A lot of newer music is designed for a prodigious amount of bass. Is anyone using bass to deliver power and foundational deep power? Are people using it to find higher clarity in the midrange. What and how much do you use.

My sub is very audible. As in, its doing work the main speakers were not doing. I have heard a lot of people say you shouldn't hear your subs. You only notice them when you turn them off. I'm probably moving in that direction. I can hold the subwoofer amp/crossover in my lap. Shockingly I have this sub darn good just sitting hear dialing around the volume, phase, and slope. I have not messed with the crossover yet. I do have some software I was told to load on my phone to help with that. So far I would say its been a complete success. I would never be without a sub in this system again.

Rex

 

[Another Johnson]

I judge bass based on recordings of my now passed friend (Bob Bowen) who played double bass with Royce Campbell. I sat next to Bobby in intimate spaces (practice rooms, jazz workshops) and listened to his instrument and style often enough to know his sound well.

If the system presents Bobby’s double bass sound convincingly, I’m pretty much satisfied.

Bass is so strongly influenced by the room of reproduction, that I find it impossible to make assertions about specific speakers or subs. It’s literally an organic experience, and what works in one system may not be as good in another.

I’ve got some of David Wilson’s favorite bass test tracks too. Those can be useful … but they’re not the music I would play for enjoyment. Playing real music that you’re interested in playing because of its stimulation and performance is the best way to judge bass in your system.

 

[bonzo75]

Horns, while probably technically playing flat, present bass far different than dynamic drivers.

There is no one way, there are many designs. Leif’s horns are playing 15 Hz to 75hz at 92 dB. There are people using normal subs below 80hz, can work fine.

 

[bonzo75]

If the system presents Bobby’s double bass sound convincingly, I’m pretty much satisfied.

I agree with this. Lower Mid bass quality is more important than bass for realistic weight.

If someone wants to reproduce club sound, just buy club speakers and electronics should be easily available in the current market

 

[morricab]

Some other threads were touching on speaker voicing, in particular, BASS.
It appears modern speakers of the Audiophile pedigree are focused to flat frequency reaponse.
Horns, while probably technically playing flat, present bass far different than dynamic drivers.

Then there are subs. I'm intrigued with bass at the moment as I just added a horn loaded subwoofer. Its only a 10 inch driver. But wow does it play. With a 19.5" x 19 5" mouth, aimed at a wall that is 19.5" away to make the boundary part of the horn, the power is impressive. I have had a Velodyn as well as a couple 10" Rel in my system. Neither do what a single 10" horn sub can do.

Anyhow. What about bass and how much we allow into our systems. Young people like bass. Automotive enthusiasts like a lot of bass. A lot of newer music is designed for a prodigious amount of bass. Is anyone using bass to deliver power and foundational deep power? Are people using it to find higher clarity in the midrange. What and how much do you use.

My sub is very audible. As in, its doing work the main speakers were not doing. I have heard a lot of people say you shouldn't hear your subs. You only notice them when you turn them off. I'm probably moving in that direction. I can hold the subwoofer amp/crossover in my lap. Shockingly I have this sub darn good just sitting hear dialing around the volume, phase, and slope. I have not messed with the crossover yet. I do have some software I was told to load on my phone to help with that. So far I would say its been a complete success. I would never be without a sub in this system again.

Rex

What make/model is this horn sub?

 

[DasguteOhr]

Have you tried installing side panels on your open baffle? Simply cut two 30cm wide boards. If you extend the baffle to 1m, you can easily get 10-15Hz more. For me, -3dB at around 28-30Hz is perfectly sufficient. My option is for normal rooms.
This prevents the early acoustic short circuit in the bass.
Thats the cheapst way to get a good fast deep bass the bass driver neds help under 45hz

 

[andromedaaudio]

Some other threads were touching on speaker voicing, in particular, BASS.
It appears modern speakers of the Audiophile pedigree are focused to flat frequency reaponse.
Horns, while probably technically playing flat, present bass far different than dynamic drivers.

Then there are subs. I'm intrigued with bass at the moment as I just added a horn loaded subwoofer. Its only a 10 inch driver. But wow does it play. With a 19.5" x 19 5" mouth, aimed at a wall that is 19.5" away to make the boundary part of the horn, the power is impressive. I have had a Velodyn as well as a couple 10" Rel in my system. Neither do what a single 10" horn sub can do.

Anyhow. What about bass and how much we allow into our systems. Young people like bass. Automotive enthusiasts like a lot of bass. A lot of newer music is designed for a prodigious amount of bass. Is anyone using bass to deliver power and foundational deep power? Are people using it to find higher clarity in the midrange. What and how much do you use.

My sub is very audible. As in, its doing work the main speakers were not doing. I have heard a lot of people say you shouldn't hear your subs. You only notice them when you turn them off. I'm probably moving in that direction. I can hold the subwoofer amp/crossover in my lap. Shockingly I have this sub darn good just sitting hear dialing around the volume, phase, and slope. I have not messed with the crossover yet. I do have some software I was told to load on my phone to help with that. So far I would say its been a complete success. I would never be without a sub in this system again.

Rex

"Below all imo :"

12 inch / 320 mm woofersize is ideal
20 - 200 / 300 hz freq range at minimum to give body / membrane surface to the midrange.

Important:
Needs to be in phase and fast enough to act as as a well integrated part of the main system , therefore passive with X over .
The membrane material has to sound pleasant and not be to heavy/ slow

....Unless your FM acoustics.

Below are not facts just what i picked up from M Huber YT vids

FM acoustics splits the signal in Bass and mid / high freq .
The amplified signal goes directly to the speakervoice coils.( the potmeters at the back on the speakers are for tw adjustments , i think ).
No coils / caps (X over) in the speakers themselves .

The already seperated? amplified signal comes in the small box ( bass / mid high level adjustments ?)and goes to the speakers drive units through the thick black cable it looks like.

 

[Robh3606]

My sub is very audible. As in, its doing work the main speakers were not doing. I have heard a lot of people say you shouldn't hear your subs. You only notice them when you turn them off. I'm probably moving in that direction. I can hold the subwoofer amp/crossover in my lap. Shockingly I have this sub darn good just sitting hear dialing around the volume, phase, and slope. I have not messed with the crossover yet. I do have some software I was told to load on my phone to help with that. So far I would say its been a complete success. I would never be without a sub in this system again.

There is a difference between a sub being audible and noticing the bass extension. For example depending on crossover slope and frequency a subwoofer can betray it's location if the integration frequency is too high and slope is not steep enough.

You should not be able to hear the location. You should be able to hear and feel the extension. Glad you are enjoying your new sub I have subs in my HT and a couple of stereo set-ups. They are well worth any "trouble" and time to set-up. There is plenty of music out there where they make all the difference.

As far as level taking Fletcher Molson into account, depending on listening levels you may have to run the subs a bit raised in SPL to achieve what is perceived as equal loudness

Here is a group of target curves as an example

Rob

 

[ssfas]

If the system presents [ ] double bass sound convincingly, I’m pretty much satisfied.

100% spot on.

Exactly my requirement, speakers have ARR 31 Hz -3dB, minimum impedance 2.53 ohms at 139 Hz, so needed an amplifier with some grunt. Good room acoustics help.

 

[PeterA]

How much bass is enough? This is a question about quantity. For me, when it comes to bass, it is a matter of quality. The bass has to sound natural. Balance, weight, tone, and impact. Each of my open back corner horns has a 15” paper driver and uses the front and side walls to extend the horn. They sound as though they extend to the low to mid 30s Hz.

 

[Another Johnson]

FWIW, the lowest note on an 88 key piano is 27.5 Hz. It appears occasionally in normal music. Much of the classical genre was written before the 88 key piano was created.

A contrabassoon can get down into the low thirties. It is not heavily utilized in normal music. The double bass goes down to 41 Hz, but can be extended into the mid 30s with the addition of a fifth string … again, not common in normal music.

Most rooms begin to thwart fidelity below 50 Hz. You want better bass? Nothing is as important as a more suitable room.

FWIW #2, if you can get the double bass to sound true to life, you will usually find that the next lower octave (taking you to 20 Hz) will be pretty darn good. Even complex heavy bass percussion events, like those in Fanfare for the Common Man, will please you if your amplifier and main speakers are up to the task.

If you want to experience literally earth shaking infrasonics, then you’re going to need subs. I do use a sub in the HT, but it’s not because it’s needed for music.

 

[PeterA]

FWIW, the lowest note on an 88 key piano is 27.5 Hz. It appears occasionally in normal music. Much of the classical genre was written before the 88 key piano was created.

A contrabassoon can get down into the low thirties. It is not heavily utilized in normal music. The double bass goes down to 41 Hz, but can be extended into the mid 30s with the addition of a fifth string … again, not common in normal music.

Most rooms begin to thwart fidelity below 50 Hz. You want better bass? Nothing is as important as a more suitable room.

FWIW #2, if you can get the double bass to sound true to life, you will usually find that the next lower octave (taking you to 20 Hz) will be pretty darn good. Even complex heavy bass percussion events, like those in Fanfare for the Common Man, will please you if your amplifier and main speakers are up to the task.

If you want to experience literally earth shaking infrasonics, then you’re going to need subs. I do use a sub in the HT, but it’s not because it’s needed for music.

Great post. It puts it all in perspective.

 

[ssfas]

FWIW, the lowest note on an 88 key piano is 27.5 Hz. It appears occasionally in normal music. Much of the classical genre was written before the 88 key piano was created.

A contrabassoon can get down into the low thirties. It is not heavily utilized in normal music. The double bass goes down to 41 Hz, but can be extended into the mid 30s with the addition of a fifth string … again, not common in normal music.

Most rooms begin to thwart fidelity below 50 Hz. You want better bass? Nothing is as important as a more suitable room.

FWIW #2, if you can get the double bass to sound true to life, you will usually find that the next lower octave (taking you to 20 Hz) will be pretty darn good. Even complex heavy bass percussion events, like those in Fanfare for the Common Man, will please you if your amplifier and main speakers are up to the task.

If you want to experience literally earth shaking infrasonics, then you’re going to need subs. I do use a sub in the HT, but it’s not because it’s needed for music.

At 30Hz you lose the last three keys of a standard keyboard, which frankly is no great loss. Contrabassoon goes to 35Hz. There are subcontrabassoons that allegedly go to 26Hz, are about 8 ft high and I've never seen one.

The bass sax, which to me sounds quite low, only goes to about 65 Hz.

 

[Al M.]

A large bass drum in the orchestra can go down to 32 Hz, with some even lower.

Of course, techno/EDM (electronic dance music) goes really low.

In that respect, I found post #391 here interesting:

Post in thread 'Sad news. MBL has filed for insolvency.' https://www.whatsbestforum.com/threads/sad-news-mbl-has-filed-for-insolvency.40978/post-1063637

 

[Al M.]

By the way, in my experience most speakers/systems don't go as low as advertised.

If you think your speaker makes 30 Hz or even just 35 Hz at full strength in your room, think again. Of course, you can test it with a frequency sweep.

There is a reason for subwoofers.

 

[Kingrex]

By the way, in my experience most speakers/systems don't go as low as advertised.

If you think your speaker makes 30 Hz or even just 35 Hz at full strength in your room, think again. Of course, you can test it with a frequency sweep.

There is a reason for subwoofers.

That was my issue. The Trio 15 is supposed to go to 36 hertz. But it was rolling off hard at 50 hertz with my Dartzeel. And that amp seemed to have a lot more body and weight than my Blade.

The sub has added a significant amount of power to my system. The music is much more full and alive. Much more complete. I was amazed how much it was doing for classical last night. I fully expected it to add a lot for the techno and pop, but the classical surprised me. I have never with any amp I have used, or speaker in my house felt such complete and powerful room filling sound.

What is sort of interesting is if I mute the main amps, the sub is not very loud. For how much it adds overall, the actual output seems pretty small. I did put my DB meter in front of the sub horn mouth when playing and it was showing 70 db. Same for my main speakers. So it is somewhat balanced in output. Another interesting observation is the sound from the cone is almost nothing. What comes from the mouth of the sub is enormous. lightly tapping the driver cone is very audible out the horn mouth.

I was texting with the manufacturer today and he was adamant the horn mouth has to be 19.5 inch from the wall. The wall is part of the horn. I tried standing it on its back and shooting up to the sloping ceiling. That was boomy. I put it back down facing the front wall and it was much more even. He then told me I should be placing the sub at the rear wall. Not the front wall. I will give that a try soon.

I did some adjustments last night. I change the phase to 0. I also reduced the output. I have it blended pretty darn good now. I am not aware the sub is there. I am just aware the music is much more full and reaching lower notes that I never heard before. And the sense of power is enormously greater. I fell like my 40 watt amps are far more powerful than I realized. I put on The Ratchets - Inferno. I had it turned up pretty loud. The first note when it started actually made me jump it was so dynamic and fast. That put a big smile on my face.

 

[morricab]

That was my issue. The Trio 15 is supposed to go to 36 hertz. But it was rolling off hard at 50 hertz with my Dartzeel. And that amp seemed to have a lot more body and weight than my Blade.

The sub has added a significant amount of power to my system. The music is much more full and alive. Much more complete. I was amazed how much it was doing for classical last night. I fully expected it to add a lot for the techno and pop, but the classical surprised me. I have never with any amp I have used, or speaker in my house felt such complete and powerful room filling sound.

What is sort of interesting is if I mute the main amps, the sub is not very loud. For how much it adds overall, the actual output seems pretty small. I did put my DB meter in front of the sub horn mouth when playing and it was showing 70 db. Same for my main speakers. So it is somewhat balanced in output. Another interesting observation is the sound from the cone is almost nothing. What comes from the mouth of the sub is enormous. lightly tapping the driver cone is very audible out the horn mouth.

I was texting with the manufacturer today and he was adamant the horn mouth has to be 19.5 inch from the wall. The wall is part of the horn. I tried standing it on its back and shooting up to the sloping ceiling. That was boomy. I put it back down facing the front wall and it was much more even. He then told me I should be placing the sub at the rear wall. Not the front wall. I will give that a try soon.

I did some adjustments last night. I change the phase to 0. I also reduced the output. I have it blended pretty darn good now. I am not aware the sub is there. I am just aware the music is much more full and reaching lower notes that I never heard before. And the sense of power is enormously greater. I fell like my 40 watt amps are far more powerful than I realized. I put on The Ratchets - Inferno. I had it turned up pretty loud. The first note when it started actually made me jump it was so dynamic and fast. That put a big smile on my face.

It’s not about the power. The darTZeel has a higher damping factor than your tube amp. The tube amp is not over controlling the woofers, allowing them to move more freely and with their own inherent damping (or lack thereof…look at the Qts of the drivers).
Back in the day, Carver deliberately used very high Qts woofers on his Amazing planar speakers to combat the cancellation you get from front and back waves in the bass region. The high Qts woofers made a huge bass hump that flattened out nicely when on the panel in room response.
This was necessary for the speakers to make bass with Bob’s high damping factor SS amps. Can’t have incompatible product lines from the same company…

 

[hopkins]

Presumably you need 'enough bass' to meet or at least get close to the needs or requirements of the music you enjoy. You can look at that in terms of the fundamental frequency of the notes in a piece of music. Maybe your speakers don't go that low, but you should at least get some of the harmonics.

People have cited the frequency range of various low frequency instruments. It's somewhat rare for music to require taking an instrument to the bottom of its range but knowing what that is can be helpful for choosing speakers adequate for your type of music.

I'm not the guy to speak to the requirements of jazz -- there I speculate that the double bass is the foundation of the rhythm section with baritone and bass saxophones, all in the 40-70Hz range.

Classical can be more complex in its low frequency needs for orchestra, with Harps, Tubas, Bass Trombones, Baritone Horns and Double Bass, Timpani and Tam-Tams in the what, 40 - 80Hz range? Large Bass Drums can be as low as 20Hz but mostly higher. For string quartets again the double bass provides the low end. Organ music can get pretty low - the low note in Bach's Tocatta and Fugue in D-Minor is D2, ~73Hz.

Of course none of this speaks to bass quality - tonality, articulation.

And yes, bass can deliver as you say power and foundational deep power. Imo the quality of a system's bass is integral to the quality of the system overall. I love large scale orchestral. My JBLs give me satisfaction. @Another Johnson mentioned Copland's Fanfare ... the way the gong resonates when no other instruments are heard is so cool.

The link to the actual performance is more useful, for those with headphones, to get a sense of what the music should really sound like:

Open Qobuz

open.qobuz.com

 

[DasguteOhr]

It’s not about the power. The darTZeel has a higher damping factor than your tube amp. The tube amp is not over controlling the woofers, allowing them to move more freely and with their own inherent damping (or lack thereof…look at the Qts of the drivers).
Back in the day, Carver deliberately used very high Qts woofers on his Amazing planar speakers to combat the cancellation you get from front and back waves in the bass region. The high Qts woofers made a huge bass hump that flattened out nicely when on the panel in room response.
This was necessary for the speakers to make bass with Bob’s high damping factor SS amps. Can’t have incompatible product lines from the same company…

Precisely, the higher the Qts, the less sound pressure loss at the driver's resonance frequency (FS). Unfortunately, the Trio's baffle is too narrow to prevent acoustic short circuits.


The Dartzeel amp only has a damping factor of 20-30.
A U frame baffle add 6db in bass easy

 

[Ron Resnick]

This is a question about quantity.

For me, when it comes to bass, it is a matter of quality. The bass has to sound natural. Balance, weight, tone, and impact.

Can bass in a stereo system sound natural if it doesn't reproduce the weight and impact of what you hear in the concert hall?

For me both quality and quantity matter.