I emailed JC at axiom about this (I have a new EP500 also) and he did infact say they lowered the gain control making 12 0 clock possible. And he said to turn that filter on only when listening to music not for movies. But I have mine past 12 0 clock ALL THE TIME for everything. I can even put it at full volume and it isnt really all that loud. I was thinking it was my sherwood R772 but now it just the way the sub is. The thing is when I try to increase my bass with the channel level it doesnt get louder it gets kind of distorted which I didnt think was possible. Do you have the Denon 3808 that is the amp I am thinking of getting but if it isnt going to make a differance than I wont. Still it sounds good I have the Epic grandmaster 500 just not a ton of bass.
Yes, the receiver I'm using is the Denon 3808 and I like it a lot. It's one of the receivers that I see people recommend all the time for Axiom speakers and it also has a lot of useful features. In case you're wondering, the channel level goes up to +12db on the 3808. This might make a difference in your case; however, I'm not sure if changing the receiver would change how your subwoofer behaves but I suppose if you think something is the matter with your Sherwood you could always buy a receiver from a store nearby that has a good return policy and see if you get similar/different results. As far as other sub settings on the 3808 there is one that sounds similar to your Sherwoods Plus settings and its called Subwoofer Level (separate from the channel level), you can choose between 0db, +5db, +10db and +15db. The manual recommends to always set it at +15db which is what I have it at.
I'm not exactly sure what you mean by distorted bass, like I said previously, I try not to set the channel level too high in the receiver settings but from what I've read it shouldn't matter where you increase the volume, at the sub or at the receiver. I can try playing around with my settings to see if increasing channel level and decreasing volume on the sub will give me distorted bass however I'm not sure what it's meant to sound like. I personally think the bass sounds very tight and defined with the way my system is set now. I would probably agree with you and say that it isn't crazy loud or anything but it's loud enough for me and I'm really appreciating the quality over the power. I'm not exactly cranking my system either. I'm sure if I played the whole system louder the sub would be able to keep up. It's hard to say because one thing I've realized is how incredibly subjective listening is and what for me might be totally adequate bass is not enough for other people who are used to their own systems for w/e reason. Like other people have said, as long as all the channels are calibrated to play at the same db level there's not much more you can do.
