B&W 5.1 M1 - why bother with the sub for music?

[admin_exported]

Had the following set up for a while now - B&W M1 in 5.1 with ASW608 sub - for movies there is no doubt the sub offers a better experience but for music the sub seems to cloud the bass making music sound muffled/fake -

music sounds better with just the M1's on and switching off the sub - has anyone else had expereience of this, it must be my set up that is causing the problem as cant see believe this would be the case for a B&W product or maybe the M1's are that good that you dont need a sub?

I have used the auto set-up that comes with the Onkyo 609 amp!

 

[Paul.]

I personally switch off my sub for most music with the exception of Hip Hop and Electronic stuff, but I have floorstanders. Best advice I ever had for setting up the sub was that it takes about 10Hz for your speakers to properly roll off, so set the crossover on the sub a little lower than the spec sheet for your satellites suggest, and then turn the volume up a bit more. For me this made kicks etc much more punchy and stopped the sub muddling everything else.

 

[Anonymous]

Thanks for the advice -

 

[super]

I think it depends a lot of what type of music you are watching/listening to. If i'm watching a rock concert i definately could not do without my 2 subs being on. :rockout:

 

[Big Chris]

I'd look at the settings for the 608 because it shouldn't be taking anything away from the sound only adding to it. Sounds like you might have it set too hot or with the crossover too high.

 

[Anonymous]

thanks for the replies -still a bit confused with implementing the advice - the B&W sats have a crossover freq of 4khz - the options on the reciever to set the crossover start at 40hz to 200hz - what value should i be going for as advice is to go for 10hz less than the sats?!!

 

[Anonymous]

thanks for the replies -still a bit confused with implementing the advice - the B&W sats have a crossover freq of 4khz - the options on the reciever to set the crossover start at 40hz to 200hz - what value should i be going for as advice is to go for 10hz less than the sats?!!

 

[Anonymous]

thanks for the replies -still a bit confused with implementing the advice - the B&W sats have a crossover freq of 4khz - the options on the reciever to set the crossover start at 40hz to 200hz - what value should i be going for as advice is to go for 10hz less than the sats?!!

 

[The_Lhc]

Err, I would guess that 4kHz refers to the point the M1 crosses over from its tweeter to its mid-range driver and has nothing to do with the crossover point between the sats and the sub. You need to find the lower frequency limit for the sats and adjust the sub accordingly.

 

[Anonymous]

ok - this is what the tech spec has, any ideas?

http://www.bowers-wilkins.co.uk/Downloads/Product/InfoSheet/ENG_FP22608_M-1_Info-Sheets.pdf

Frequency range -6dB at 55Hz and 50kHz

Frequency response 64Hz - 23kHz ±3dB on reference axis

4kHz
Crossover frequency 4kHz

 

[moonfly]

The lower range limit is stated as 55hz. Thats a -6db figure though, a -3 would have been better, but that would mean the low frequency figure would look higher (more truthfully so) which isnt how marketting works. Try setting the subs crossover at about 55 hz to begin with and up it a touch if you feel the need. It might also be worth seeing what the subs output is like in relation to the speakers, because you want them to be roughly equal. I would say that if the sub is overly obvious and boomy, its probably a bit loud.

 

[Son_of_SJ]

The lower range limit is stated as 55hz. Thats a -6db figure though, a -3 would have been better, but that would mean the low frequency figure would look higher (more truthfully so) which isnt how marketting works.

But he did quote a -3dB figure!

Frequency range -6dB at 55Hz and 50kHz

Frequency response 64Hz - 23kHz ±3dB on reference axis

By the way, I'm struck that at the top end, the speakers can go from 23kHz at -3dB with the -6dB figure being more than an octave higher, at 50kHz! All these high frequencies for humans whose upper hearing limit is generally taken to be only 20kHz .....

But back to the main topic, using Paul Hobbs's suggestion, you could set the crossover frequency from satellites to subwoofer to be 10hz below the lower limit of the satellites, so that would be 45 Hz or 54Hz, or the nearest frequency to those that your receiver offers.

I'm lucky in that I have floorstanders for the main and surround speakers in all my rooms, and I certainly wouldn't dream of using the subwoofers for anything other than films. In fact, and I've tried this, the front speakers can give a very passable impression (though they are not as good as actually using a subwoofer) of depth when I set the receiver to switch the subwoofer out and redirect the movie's LFE channel to the front speakers. But then, the various front speakers are all over a metre high, with at least 20cm diameter bass units. And I do recognise that many people simply don't have the space for large floorstanders, or they wish to stay married!