Rel t5 owners? Help with settings.

[Chr78]

Hi guys.

System: peachtree audio nova 125se, kef ls50 speakers, rel t5 sub.

I need a bit of input on the settings. The subwoofer sound im looking for is for the bass just to take over, like you are not even noticing it, but still a fast and musical bass, not dominating.

Where do you guys have the volume and the crossover frequency?

Kind regards Christian

 

[MickyBlue]

my crossover is around 55hz-60hz as for volume this is going to take a few days for you to tweak it to your liking, get a mate to tweak the volume whilst you sit in your primary seating position until you get the volume the way you like it, even then you might want to tweak it as the sub beds in.

 

[SteveR750]

You need to use an spl meter to correctly match the sub to your main speakers. There is no way round this, otherwise you might as well roll a dice.

 

[Deleted member 116933]

You need to use an spl meter to correctly match the sub to your main speakers. There is no way round this, otherwise you might as well roll a dice.

Come on its not the only way. It wont be the end of the world if you use difference ways.... Placement is more important ( and thats easily solved with the crawl test) everything else is personal choice......

 

[SteveR750]

You need to use an spl meter to correctly match the sub to your main speakers. There is no way round this, otherwise you might as well roll a dice.

Come on its not the only way. It wont be the end of the world if you use difference ways.... Placement is more important ( and thats easily solved with the crawl test) everything else is personal choice......

The crawl test simply indicates the most effective position to place your sub. It doesn't indicate the correct volume and nor does it set the phasing. In my experience, it is still many not accurate enough using your ears alone, and the sub will not be working anything like as well as it could. That's fine if you like boomy muddy indistinct bass!

 

[Deleted member 116933]

You need to use an spl meter to correctly match the sub to your main speakers. There is no way round this, otherwise you might as well roll a dice.

Come on its not the only way. It wont be the end of the world if you use difference ways.... Placement is more important ( and thats easily solved with the crawl test) everything else is personal choice......

The crawl test simply indicates the most effective position to place your sub. It doesn't indicate the correct volume and nor does it set the phasing. In my experience, it is still many not accurate enough using your ears alone, and the sub will not be working anything like as well as it could. That's fine if you like boomy muddy indistinct bass!

On its own an SLP meter will tell you very little other than the gain is set to highly. Maybe you should go in to more detail on how use an SLP meter or direct him/her somewhere that will give them the knowlege needed to know how use one (which i might add is quite a steep learning curve if one has never done it before). Just a thought

Ive given them the Knowlege to do it by ear which will get them 90% of the way there if done correctly and will be more than enough for most.

In my opinion the crawl test is one of the most important aspects of setting up the subwoofer as i have said it will help set the delay which will need to be bang and will be the place least effected by room nodes, so pretty important step and one not to be under estimated. Its a simple technique with hugh rewards. And in all likely hood if it sounds good (strong bass) then very little will need to be done with the phase ***. It will most likely be in phase strong v weak bass ( and you can hear that). The Phase switch in my opinion/experiance dose very little if anything at all.

If everything's in line up front and pos to neg are correct then i would leave it at 0. I'm not even sure if the phase *** is variable on the REL which will make it next to useless if it isn't variable. (my old rel was a selector switch 0,90,180) and i always left it a 0 with no problems.

 

[Deleted member 116933]

Hi guys.

System: peachtree audio nova 125se, kef ls50 speakers, rel t5 sub.

I need a bit of input on the settings. The subwoofer sound im looking for is for the bass just to take over, like you are not even noticing it, but still a fast and musical bass, not dominating.

Where do you guys have the volume and the crossover frequency?

Kind regards Christian

To be honest no one is going to be able to help you with the gain/volume that's very room dependent. But if you follow the rule of thumb for the crossover you won't go far wrong. LS50 "can" go down to 50hz (room dependant) so i normally add 20-30hz more on the subwoofer for a seemless crossover as your speakers will start rolling off at around 60-70hz. So i would start 80-100hz and if the bass is over exagerated then wind it down a little. Hi fi's don't have reference points like AV dose so in my opinion theres reallly no need for a sound meter. Maybe im wrong but ive never felt the need

Easiest way to describe it is you want it doing what the amp is doing. Quiet when turned down and loud when turned up thats all there is to it. BUT! position is key! Timming is going to be you biggest concern as there are no dalay setting on hifi so it has to be done moving the subwoofer and speakers around.

Another concern will be room peaks and dips that you will have to correct for manually unless you purchase a room eq like the animode.

hope that helps a little

 

[SteveR750]

The JL subs have an infinitely variable phase adjustment, which probably explains why they sound so punchy and tight.

Google and you tube is a good source of how to use a quantitative approach to setting up a sub, this is how they do it in pro studios and theatres etc. An SPL meter and a test tone disc are required, but given how easy it is to fry your system with sine wave signals I'm not going to prescribe a method in case it all goes horribly wrong. In principle, using the right test tones and looking for null outputs it's quite straightforward to phase align a sub with the main speakers. It's a surprisingly small window to hit on, but when you do, the result is spectacular.