Okay, I just dropped 500 bucks on Yamaha's 1000-watt 12" SW-1500 sub, and I'm pretty disappointed with the sound. After reading a LOT of glowing consumer reviews, I'm beginning to think the problem is with my setup and not the actual equipment.
I'm using a Yamaha RX-V1300 receiver and 2 NS-515 floor speakers which sound great by themselves, but this sub is so muddy and imprecise that it ruins the whole sound of everything. I have the CD player connected via a digital coaxial cable, and I'm going out from the sub mono-out on the reciever to the standard sub-mono in on the subwoofer (by the way, my whole set-up is for music playing in stereo; no movies or dolby decoding or anything). There is also an LFE input and an HPF output on the sub but neither make much difference except in gain. The receiver detects the CD player source as being PCM, and I have the Speaker-Set option set to Small, and the LFE output setting set to Sub only (as opposed to main speakers and sub). I get the best response with the high-cut (or crossover or whatever) on the sub set all the way down to 60 Hz, which seems much too low, but anything higher creates an incessant low-frequency droning which drowns out everything else.
Hopefully this is enough information for anybody who's willing to help me troubleshoot. I think I can pretty much rule out speaker placement, because I've tried three different locations without much change, and I've read the manuals for the receiver, sub, and CD player front to back several times...so I'm wondering if I'm just making a very common rookie mistake or something (this is my first major A/V system). Any suggestions would be highly appreciated!
Nuck, thanks for the tips, but neither have worked. The HPF in's only work for Dolby-decoded signals, so it might help for DVDs but they won't make a difference on two-channel CDs (according to the manual). I don't know what OSS is, but it might because I'm actually using a high-end Sony 5-disc DVD changer as my CD player (not a lot to choose from when you live in Japan)... and yeah I've changed the output from digital to analog stereo composite cables but they sound almost identical from what my untrained ear can discern. But thanks anyways!
Hmm. Maybe it just suks? Although the reviews I read looked promising as well. Hows your cable? OSS is on screen setup, sorry bout that. Is your player in pcm or 2.1?
Not a lot of choices in Japan? Really? I understand Sony City, but the coolest stuff comes out of there.
Nuck, do they make CD players that play 2.1? I'll look into that. I'm using good cable (monster cable all around), and yeah, the cd player has an OSS which I just tried last night. I switched everything to dolby digital and dts but I don't notice a difference.
Thanks for the recommendation Edster, I'll see what I can do.