Axiom Home Page Forums General Discussion Advice from Axiom Owners Epic 80 500 with Denon 3808 bass issue(lack of)

Good day folks,

I just purchased my speakers and they made the long and harrowing trip to Canada's frozen North with no major damage except for a dented dust cap!

The setup is the Epic 80 with the 500 sub, and a Denon 3808 receiver.

I have been messing around with the system for the last 3-4 days but I am having a hard time getting any type of bass from the sub. I ran the auto setup, then went back and changed the level of the sub to 0 db, I am sitting 12 feet away from the front M80's and Centre speaker, and the QS8's are 4 feet on either side of the couch. It seems like if I crank the system I can start to get some decent bass,buts its rather lacking, and the low level base is non existent for normal listening. Can someone maybe shed some light on their setup and maybe some suggestions on how to do the crossover stuff as I am getting lost in how I should set those up for the speakers etc.

Thanks for the help.

Martin, welcome to you signing in from the far north(I had no idea what Nunavut was until I checked the Google maps). The difficulty in analyzing your question arises because we don't know what you consider to be "decent bass". The basic concept that applies to setting the sub level is that it shouldn't be so loud that it draws attention to itself; the impression should be that the sub isn't working, but that the speakers are putting out more bass. My setup is calibrated in this way, but you may be dissatisfied that you can't "hear" that sub that you paid so much for. You've already bumped the sub level up more than the Denon auto-calibration set, so it would seem to be sufficient in general. You haven't described the location of the EP500, and that can also affect the bass level significantly.

As to the crossover, try setting the M80s to "Small" and 80Hz regardless of what the 3808 set them at. The bass assignment should be LFE, so that the EP500 is responsible alone for any LFE and redirected bass below 80Hz or whatever other crossover frequencies were set.

In addition to John's usual good advice, I would suggest trying the system with Audyssey turned off, especially if the 3808 is an early model and not updated, I never liked mine until the last update, although I am quite sure the last update didn't fundamentally change Audyssey. You may find that the EQ in Audyysey has sucked all the bass out of it. You may also want to try the LFE setting at LFE+Mains.

If this problem is just in 2 channel, there is a seperate setup screen for 2 channel listening and the sub has to be turned on in this setting.

I am wondering, was the volume(gain) on the sub set high during the initail setup? If so turn it down and then rerun Audyssey and leave the sub level in the 3808 at 0, once the program is done(do at least 2 positions for the setup), You can then increase the sublevel in the receiver as desired again.
DO you have an SPL meter? If so, try setting the speaker and sub level manually, If you are unable to get the sub to the same levels as the mains with pink noise from the receiver, there could be a problem with the sub.

maybe its too cold for the ep500 up there?

Nah, but I have the same system- 3808 m80's and ep500 and It sounds great. is your lack of bass during movies, music , or both?

I would suggest at least TRYING the "LFE + main" setting, and def. set your m80's to small. try the trim on the ep500 at half or full as well.

You will get lots of good adivce on this particular set up since lots of us have it. However, I am going to work.... good luck.

And yeah, as Jakewash mentioned there is a separate place to make adjustments for 2 channel listening (crossover, bass settings, speaker size, ect.) I suspect that your m80's may be set to large in that 2 channel set up so you ep500 isn't working.

Oh yeah, I learned where nunavat was in my world regional geography class several years ago. I actually knew something that Johnk didn't? WOW

One way to check that your problem is not the 500 itself is to go to the channel level settings in the Denon setup menu and choose the subwoofer channel. With that channel selected, as you turn up either the gain on the subwoofer or turn up the channel level with your remote, you hear increasingly loud bass. With the 500, as you bump the volumes up, you really should be capable of shaking your walls, so if neither volume adjustment has that sort of effect, the problem may be in the sub and not in the Denon configuration.

On the other hand, if running these quick tests does produce palpable bass, then the problem will likely be solved using one of the few suggestions above, as they are the most common source of these problems.

Jason

Thanks for the help, I am going to get back in there and start trying some of the suggestions, I am sure its my lack of knowledge in regards to crossovers and freqs as I am stuck in the plug and play HTIB systems that just do stuff when you plug it in.

Thanks again
Martin

If you try the test tones in each speakers, do you hear it when it's the sub's turn?

Thanks for all the help guys, the sub does work and I have started to get some better base, one question I have is in regards to crossover frequency. My current setup has these input via the Audyssey.

Front M80's @ 80hz I set them to small
Centre VP150 @ 90hz
QS8's @ 110hz
VP500(lfe) @ 80hz

Also,should I set the crossover on the sub on the dial at 80hz as well? Sorry for all the questions.

I think it is best to set the crossover on the sub to the highest setting (it may say 150 or bypass)

I have my denon 3808 set at 60 hz for m80's, 80 hz for vp150, 90 hz for QS8, and 90 hz for LFE... these were entered by hand as I am not running audyssey right now.

i have the crossover setting in 2 channel mode at 40 hz, but I often have it at 60.

Many people use 80 hz for the m80's too.

Have you tried different locations for the sub?

One thing you might try is to set the m80's to "large" and change the LFE option to "LFE+main" try this with a 40 or 60 hz crossover on the m80's. This will essentially duplicate the bass below the crossover frequency in both the sub and the mains. you will probably find it too "boomy" but it may be worth a shot. have you tried setting the trim on the ep 500 to half or full instead of flat?

Also, don't be afraid to go into the channel level adjustment and bump the sub up 2 or 3 db in the receiver.

WoW, Audyssey set my M80s to 40 (large) and I switched them to small and increased the XO to 60. It set my VP150 to 60hz and QS8s to 80. Obviously our rooms are very different.

As Terzaghi said, the sub crossover should be set to bypass or turned all the way to keep it out of the loop and let the receiver do all the bass management.

Don't apologize for questions, that is how we learn