Axiom Home Page Forums General Discussion Technical Questions Subwoofer Settings/Audyssey

Before a person runs the Audyssey program to set up their speakers where should the settings be set at on the Sub;

1. Subwoofer Level

2. Subwoofer Cut-Off Frequency

3. Sub./Sat. Phase Alignment


Tks, Adrian

According to my Denon manual they recommend setting the volume gain on the sub itself to the 1/2 way point and turn the crossover knob to it highest setting so it does not interfere with the receiver crossover before running Audyssey. It really doesn't matter what the settings on the receiver are because after you run Audyssey it will set its own distances for the speakers/sub, crossover point and sw/speaker levels on the receiver. In my experience other than the distances the settings I found were not beneficial. I would double check everything because sometimes it will set speakers to large when in fact they should be set to small and sometimes the crossover points are set way too high. For the phase I would leave it set at 0. Audyssey is very dependant on the user. Others swear by it and find it is the greatest thing since sliced bread. I still like my SPL meter :).

Tks, Doc. The first time I ran Audyssey(yesterday) I basically left all three in the 12:00 position(halfway). I played a couple of movies and things sounded excellent, however since then, when watching a basketball game I hear an annoying(exaggerated) "thunk" when the ball hits the rim for instance. So I figured I'd just turn the level down a little but that seems to have cancelled what audyssey set up and now the sub signal has dissappeared altogether (I'll run Audyssey again tomorrow). I believe Audyssey had the fronts on large and a crossover of 40hz which doesn't sound right, does it?

What is the subwoofer level set to on the receiver?

-12db

Adrian, the level setting on the sub should be at a point where after the calibration the sub trim on the receiver isn't either all the way down or all the way up. Starting out anywhere between 1/4th and half is okay, and if the trim was set all the way down by the auto-calibration that means that the sub level setting was too high to start and has to be lowered for another calibration try. The opposite(higher sub level control to start)if the trim was set all the way up.

The sub "crossover"(lowpass filter, actually) control should be set to bypass, if available, or otherwise set all the the way up to get it as far out of the way as possible of the crossover that the receiver will do.

The phase control should be left at zero. Part of the reason why the sub distance will often be set far from the actual distance by the auto-calibration is that Audyssey is using the distance adjustment to correct for phase differences between the sub and speakers at the listening position.

Seeing your results now, set the sub level control lower for a re-try so that the -12 will be higher. The auto-cal ran out of room and couldn't lower it enough.

Also manually set the mains to small with an 80Hz crossover.

Ok that is a problem. That -12 setting is set way to low and the receiver is not sending enough voltage to the sub. If you want to use Audyssey I would turn down the volume gain one the sub itself to half of what it is set to now and re-run Audyssey so you get a much higher setting on the receiver. If not all you have to do is adjust the volume knob down on the sub and adjust to a higher level on the receiver to your liking. When setting up a subwoofer I start it at -4 on the receiver (with proper adjustments on the sub) and adjust the level up on the reciever accordingly to level match.

Tks, John. I'll run Audyssey again tomorrow with the level at, say 10 o'clock instead of 12, set the lowpass filter to bypass and turn the phase control off.

The sub was set too high I'm sure because it seemed to pick up on very simple things like when, for instance, I watched some of Obama's speech the other night and I kept hearing a dull thud every so often. When they panned the camera angles back, I saw what it was....the President was tapping his hand on the podium every once in a while, lol. It was annoying though.

Thanks for the advice, I'll do that tomorrow.

And when you turned it down you were lacking bass? This is easily solved Adrian. You just have to find a happy medium between the levels set on your receiver and sub.

That makes sense Doc. Maybe I should back off the sub a little more still. I'm still learning this reciever as well I should mention(Denon 2809). Until yesterday I had been using it for music(in stereo) only, and yesterday got the surrounds up on the wall and the rest of my Banana plugs/cabling hooked up, then ran Audyssey...sounds like I had all the settings wrong on the sub to begin with.

Despite all this, I watched 'Master and Commander' on BD, and was amazed, as I'm sure many of you were, at the realism of the cannons, the creaking of the boat, splintering of the wood, walking on deck(above) ect.