I was lucky enought to borrow a pair of these small but powerful subs from the Axiom Labs on Saturday. I went back to my place near Dwight and hooked them up to the high level inputs crossed at 60hz to a pair of vintage Dynaco A-25s. I played the latest Cowboy Junkies DVD, Trinity Revisited and was amazed at the deep articulate clean, tight bass coming from such small enclosures.
That 8" driver is deceiving but with the same amp as in the EP500 it really delivers the low frequencies. And they are small. Here is a shot of one on top of my EP600 back in Toronto to give you some perspective of the Axiom mini-me.
The idea is to use two or four of them to control room nodes and I can hear why those would be an effective use for them. There is a surprising amount of output from something so small. But I have taken a liking to them as stereo subwoofers in my smaller HT room where the fit like a glove right under the elephant ear speakers of my Sony 60XBR2. Their size makes them very versatile and they tuck away in places you wouldn't think.
That's Prison Break on the Sony, which has well recorded soundtracks full of LFE. Needless to say they are making a big impression with my family who like their dimunitive size and big sound. In reality they are a small version of the EP500.
More impressions to come as I get used to them and move them to my larger HT.
I still can't believe those little 8" drivers can put out such low output. And in a sealed enclosure! Those are very nice. I've used multiple subs before and I really like it. Somewhat of a pain to set-up and dial in, but worth the effort. Very nice, John. Thanks for sharing.
John,
Can you please give us some comparisons to the 600?
Good to read your impressions of the EP400, John. Incidentally, following the conventions adopted by those members christened as "Frankensteins of the audio world" because of their recent experiments with combining speakers, your first picture appears to be an "EP1000"!
following the conventions adopted by those members christened as "Frankensteins of the audio world"
I wonder who that could be?
John, you now have me thinking 2 EP400s instead of 1 EP500, and you haven't even done a full review yet! I am very much looking forward to the rest of your thoughts and comparisons.
(I am so envious you live that close to them.)
John,
Can you please give us some comparisons to the 600?
Will do Mojo.
I will try in the next day or so. I will be listening more for sound quality but I may just see what co-locating the pair achieves. They are meant to be separated though for smoothing room nodes in a HT so I will also set them up that way when comparing to the 600. They are excellent as a stereo sub pair for people still into 2 channel systems.
Jakewash, yes its neat being able to drop by and hang out with such friendly, talented folks. The Axiom team are some of the nicest genuine people you could meet. Its a high point of my occasional visits. I always enjoy getting up north to my place on Lake of Bays but nowadays my teenagers prefer the city on weekends.
John,
Thanks for taking your time and effort to do this comparison, I am sure the whole board is looking forward to your thoughts from your HT.
Hi John,
I know you vastly prefer multiple subs, but for those of us on a budget (and a WAF budget), can you give your impression of a single EP400 as well?
If WAF is the priority then the 400 has few rivals anywhere, though the also small sealed excellent sounding Fathom JL113 would be up there as well, but it costs 3x as much. You really can stick this small guy just about anywhere and it will be heard and not seen. The 400 sound is very detailed and tight ( I won't use the term "fast" because all the engineers I know don't like that term, but both "tight" and "fast" refer to excellent handling of abrupt loud transients). If you don't need the high output of the other EP subs, then its a great choice for small rooms or if your listening habits are at lower volumes.
John,
How detailed & tight compared to the 600?
Heh... I rarely listen above 75 dB, and my room is about 19x20x8.
Tex, I can't comment on that one until I have them side by side and listen with a variety of material. I'll probably just listen to one EP400 next to the 600 and go back and forth. It won't be blind so take that into consideration.
That's almost the dimensions of my closed HT (19x21x8). One 400 won't be enough and Ian suggests 4 of them to flatten the nodes and foregoing any equalization. Also sudden loud LFE can go well over 75db. Even though a single 400 is rated max SPL in room of 116db, and is quite powerful for its size, I would say you need more headroom and more subs.
John,
I wonder what would happen if you rip out the amps from the 400s and run them in parallel with the 600? I would imagine that the 600's eye will fly right across the room leaving you with a blind clown
.
I had my brother over tonight who also owns a 600 to help me do the comparison with the 400/600. We set up both subs in my larger HT on the right mid sidewall where I usually have my DD-18.
I set up the 400 on top of the DD-18 to get the drivers around the same height, connected them to an XLR splitter for easy switching and calibrated them separately flat to the speakers. Volume was set at 3 below reference.
We went through a variety of material. I didn't expect the 400 to keep pace but it did except in the most demanding HT scenes where the 600s deeper extension and higher SPLs clearly took over. On the music passages it was much closer but we detected a tighter more responsive sound with the 400. Here's details of how they performed:
First we played we played the opening minute from Eric Clapton's Sessions with Robert J DVD, an excellent recording of Clapton in the studio doing modern versions of old Robert Johnson blues numbers. Bassist Nathan East plays some very aggressive bass riffs for 40 seconds at the start of this DVD which makes it a great test for clarity, pitch, resonance, attack and decay. I had to replay this passage four or five times because the two subs sonic character is close. We both agreed the 400 was tighter and decayed more quickly than the 600. My brother described the bass from the 600 as fatter and lingering a bit more and he preferred that sound while I preferred the tighter 400 a bit more. I thought output coming from the 600 port also contributed to the subtle difference. In my way of thinking I would describe the 400 as more "musical" based on that track.
To confirm our initial impressions we then played the palace drum and beans scene from House of Flying Daggers and once again we described what we heard much the same way. A year ago I recall comparing the Ultra and the 600 in this scene and thought the 600 had better transient response and was more detailed. The comparison was much tougher with the 400, both were detailed but the 600 seemed to hang around a tad more with the loud sharp drum transients. Again my brother preferred the sound from the 600 and I favoured the 400 in this scene.
I know this can be cruel but I like to drive subs hard when testing to see how they perform in demanding film scenes. You can really tell much more about sub performance that way and subs that look great on graphs sound terrible when brought to their knees.
Pulse is one of the worst horror movies ever made and not watchable. However it has one of the better torture tracks in the middle of the movie, a very loud repetitive 15-30hz "pulse" that goes on for about a minute during a scene which makes no sense. (You know you've got a bass obsession when you rent movies just for the soundtrack
). Anyway the big 600 reproduced the pulse cleanly without flinching, while the 400 made some wretched whimpering sounds at the end of each pulse and the driver looked like it was going to pop out of the enclosure. Not enough headroom for one small sub, even a formidable one like the 400.
On War of the Worlds I was a bit leery of damaging the 400. A few weeks ago at a friends place in Richmond Hill, his Ultra-13 was making awful noises in the pods emerge scene just before the BASH amp shutdown and the smell of plastic filled the air. While the 400 alone just doesn't have the output to do that scene justice to its credit it didn't flinch or shutdown or make sobbing noises like the Ultra-13. The 400 limiters kicked in first to gently take the stress off the amp and driver. Very nice. Of course, when we played that scene again with the 600... well it was no contest with how visceral the waves of sound felt. The big enclosure, bigger amp and bigger driver do make for a bigger sound which is quite important for HT. Its also why Ian suggests at least two of the 400s for HT but part of our idea of using just one was to find the 400s performance limits.
With Master and Commander, Battle with the French Frigate, again the 600 performed with authority, easily reproducing the deep loud textured cannon shots. The 400 actually sounded very good given its size but couldn't produce the visceral physical feeling of bass. Again, the greater headroom of the 600 makes the difference.
We played one more musical track, Diana Krall, Live at Montreal Jazz, All or Nothing at All which features Diana's lovely voice with a strong acoustic bass. Again I preferred the sound of the 400 on this tune while my brother chose the 600.
The 600 is clearly the better performing sub all around but if I listened to music only I would favour the 400, though my brother would say different. Also its tough to stick a 600 in a audio rack or TV stand.
Next time I will set up the 400s one on each sidewall and see if these impressions remain.
John,
Thank you so much for this. It answers a lot of questions that I had. I know exactly what you mean when you say that the 600 sounds "fatter".
If you can scan your memory banks, do you recall which sub sounded more transparent?
Jason, do you still want the 400 or has this convinced you to go with the 600
?
One more question, John. Was there a difference between the two subs when it came to hearing the initial "slap"/"punch" (whatever you want to call it) of the stick or foot-pedal hitting the drum skin?
Mojo, if by transparency you mean detailed and not vieled I'd say its a draw. Both subs produced clean transparanet bass as you would expect given how flat the DSP keeps their FR curves. The main difference which is not subtle is in how effortlessly the EP600 pounds out high SPLs when called upon while the Little Subwoofer That Could runs out of steam climbing the steep hills so to speak.
There was a difference with drums which I heard as a faster attack and decay coming from the sealed sub, or a tighter punch. To my ears I thought the 400 was handling those transients better. My brother heard it as well but he really loves the fatter sound of the 600 and consistently chose the 600 with all music and film scenes. I suspect what he calls fatter sound is pleasant sounding 2nd order harmonic distortion.
Keep in mind that much of that slap/punch depends on how well you have the speakers dialled in with respect to blending FR at either side of the crossover point and if you have the sub and speakers in phase up to 200hz. Also room resonance can play havoc with kick-drum.
Great review, John! It sounds like Axiom has a fine little sub in the EP400. In a smaller room I imagine it would do just fine for most HT applications. Sometimes, though, there just isn't any way around a large driver and enclosure for that visceral impact most of us crave with our movies.
Jason, do you still want the 400 or has this convinced you to go with the 600
?
Actually it makes want to compare the 500, 400 and 350, as those are the ones I could actually stuff into my room.
I can't wait to hear the HSU as well.
John,
Flipping the phase switch doesn't help with the slap/punch. And I'm dialed in so that at the cross-over frequency, I have the exact same SPL out of my 80s as out of the 600.
Transparency is hard to explain but it's like the effortless lows coming out of a pipe organ. I have been wondering the last few months if it is possible to have transparency AND faster attack/decay/tighter punch all from the same sub.
My 600 hits me in the gut and below but never in the chest and head if you know what I mean. Does the 400 hit you in both places?
Thanks St. Pat. Great summary comments you make there. A single EP400 would provide surprisingly responsive bass in a small room but sometimes a film just demands more headroom which is why I would recommend the 400 as a pair for most rooms, or ideally as Ian says as quads to deal with room acoustical issues in larger rooms.
Also if you are thinking of a small sub for music only applications the 400 is the one to get.
Mojo the 400 does not hit at all like the 600. To get what you are asking you need dual 500s or 600s. Also flipping the phase switch and its effectiveness on the speakers will depend vvery much on where the sub is placed relative to the speakers.
I suspect going the acoustical treatment and bass trap route will help give you the kind of transparency you are looking for. Treating my HT with wall panels and bass traps made a bigger difference in improving sound quality, than any component I have ever purchased.
Jake my comments would apply to the 500 as well. The only difference between the 500 and 600 is 3hz more extension and 3db more output in the 600 otherwise the sonic character of those models are identical. You can safely interchange 500 and 600 for purpose of comparing either of those 2 subs with the 400.
Also if you are thinking of a small sub for music only applications the 400 is the one to get.
Although a bit expensive, a pair of EP400s in a two channel set-up would probably be spectacular. In a previous system of mine I went from one sealed sub to two and was delighted by the expansive soundstage.
Good stuff, John. I've been eagerly looking forward to someone putting the 400 through it's paces and posting impressions. Thanks so much for doing it.
Jack, I find doing these side by side comparisons a lot of fun (and work) and always come away learning what the subs or speakers are capable of. Given how quickly we humans adapt to our environments it can take a long time to key in on a single subs sonic qualities compared to the side by side testing. I still have some more testing and listening to do with the 400.
St. Pat, you'd have to hear for yourself just what a awesome difference stereo 400s make to soundstage and imaging. I have now tried them with 3 different sets of speakers and I was wowed by the 400s with all three sets. The fact they are so small makes setting them up for 2 channel listening a relative breeze. While they are being proposed primarily as a multi-sub HT solution, I'm just so impressed how they perform in stereo.
Over the next few days I'm going to test the 600 and 400 pair in various locations to see how effectively they tame the nodes. I'll take shots of the SMS display for comparison.
John,
Awesome review on the single EP400...this thread is a keeper for sure! It should be stickied at the top of this board while the EP400 is still a new product to give new comers a good understanding of it.
I very much look forward to the follow up running dual EP400s. Having that DSP technology with the limiter in the EP400 is a VERY wise choice, especially with those wanting to use it for HT applications...and accidentally run it too hot.
Regarding the Ultra 13, was it in a pretty large room? That thing has a 725 watt amp, that's pretttty suprising that they blew that amp...wow!
"Transparency is hard to explain but it's like the effortless lows coming out of a pipe organ. I have been wondering the last few months if it is possible to have transparency AND faster attack/decay/tighter punch all from the same sub."
Yes, I think that this is possible. You will have to nearly double the price and go with the JL F113 though. This sub is about $3200 and weighs in at about 130 lbs although it is the size of the EP500. It has a sealed enclosure and is supposed to have a very fast attack/decay even though it extends down to below 20 Hz flat. This is the sub that I have my eye on, but I don't know if I will ever be able to get $6,000 together to get two of these subs.
- Nick
Thanks for the review! I'm really starting to salivate about this sub. Probably never afford it, though.
Too many other toys!
When I first heard about it, I was afraid that the 8" woofer wouldn't keep up with my current 12" sub. Sounds like those fears were completely unfounded. I currently have a Cambridge Soundworks Powered Subwoofer 1. I'm sure no one but Peter and Adam have heard one of these...
Hutz, we were testing a Paradigm Servov2, Fathom JL113, Velodyne DD-18 and SVS Ultra-13 in a small room sitting nearfield. Here is an excerpt I posted elsewhere of what happened:
"All was well until the amp fuse blew in 10hz mode while playing the Pods emerge scene. The other subs performed as expected while the Ultra conked out which was a surprise seeing how we were playing at only 5db below Dolby reference. In light of that blowout and other reports of amp problems it appears SVS still needs to work on solving a very important design flaw. While the designers hoped to get away with a larger enclosure for more efficiency, the sub could have benefited from a more powerful amp than the Indigo 750w BASH amp that was chosen IMO, especially given what it is aiming for in fully
plugged mode. Its a criticism I had of my old Ultra and which continues to this version. Though not directly comparable because of alignment, the other subs fielded a 2500w Class D in the Fathom, 1250 Class D in the larger DD-18 and 1200w Class d amp in the Servov2."
Yes, I think that this is possible. You will have to nearly double the price and go with the JL F113 though. This sub is about $3200 and weighs in at about 130 lbs although it is the size of the EP500. It has a sealed enclosure and is supposed to have a very fast attack/decay even though it extends down to below 20 Hz flat. This is the sub that I have my eye on, but I don't know if I will ever be able to get $6,000 together to get two of these subs.
- Nick
Nick the JL113 is an incredible performer as you mentioned and here in Canada it is priced at over 3x the price of the 400 so it better be that good. I have one as well and its much smaller that an EP500 . Here is a shot I took of the 400 pair next to my JL113 to give you an idea of relative size.
You can get 3 EP400s for the price of a JL F113, I would say that the 3 EP400s would be much more desirable if they can produce the same tightness as the JL F113, and they can extend very low as well.
John, I would love to hear what you would prefer after your testing, 2 EP400s or a JL F113? Regarding the Ultra 13...I am not sure why SVS chose to make a 13" driver, is to be the baddest boy on the block? Looks like they have underestimated the kind of power that a driver of that size and a sub of that enclosure needs for reference levels.
Well the bigger enclosure does mean better efficiency for the power supply however those BASH amps can be finicky if the impedance does not match up well with the driver. In demanding passages impedance moves all over the place and the risk of overheating and clipping becomes a serious issue at high SPLs. Those cheap BASH amps which lack dynamic headroom, can't touch the performance of Axiom's DSP controlled amps which are designed in house by Tom and Ian.
While most people will fawn over the drivers or enclosure, its the hidden electronics and amp which are just if not more important. That's what makes these small EP400s with 8" drivers perform so well. Everyone who has heard them at my house has said the same thing, "I can't believe the bass from that small box!"
Stop with all the praise for the EP400 already, you are making it very difficult for me to not get one.
I have a question for the sub experts here:
With my crappy, 13' square room, is there any significant advantage to upgrading my older EP350 sub to a single 400 or 500?
I understand that the new subs will go deeper, but I'm currently dealing with 28dB swings from one seated position to the next, and I'm still going to have the same room nulls and peaks. If I were to get a 500, for example, is there any advantage to replacing the current sub (same position) with a 500 if I'm currently satisfied with the volume of bass? Again, excepting that the new sub will go deeper.....
I'd like to think that I could get two 400s or 500s to help even things out, but that's an awful lot of coin and a helluva lot of sub potential for such a tiny room....
Any thoughts?
I'll second that from another person who has a crappy square HT room. I have an EP500 and probably won't be buying another for years to come but I do have a Sony sub (10" driver, fairly loud but not accurate like the EP500) left over from my old satellite surround system. I wonder if adding it to my room would help smooth things out for my different listening positions or would it's comparative lack of power and accuracy compared to the 500 just degrade the sound more than it helps.
I know, I know, just try it out and see what it sounds like....
Just thought I'd throw it out there while the topic is up. That and if I buy one more audio cable, my wife is likely to strangle me with it. Her maiden name was Garrett and so I feel my fears are justified...
Mark, I think it's really cute that you still have "hope".
I dunno, I don't think he could make it much worse.
Jason, you'll have one very soon
.
With my crappy, 13' square room, is there any significant advantage to upgrading my older EP350 sub to a single 400 or 500?
If you have an outside wall, maybe the best thing would be to join the Cult of the Infinitely Baffled, put the subwoofer outside, and turn the room into a giant subwoofer enclosure.
Tom and John:
Now you know why I was excited to get the opinions of some non-regulars....considering how much help you "regulars" are!
Jack, can I borrow one of those "sticking the tongue out and giving a razzzzberry" emoticons from your arsenal?
I have a question for the sub experts here:
With my crappy, 13' square room, is there any significant advantage to upgrading my older EP350 sub to a single 400 or 500?
I understand that the new subs will go deeper, but I'm currently dealing with 28dB swings from one seated position to the next, and I'm still going to have the same room nulls and peaks. If I were to get a 500, for example, is there any advantage to replacing the current sub (same position) with a 500 if I'm currently satisfied with the volume of bass? Again, excepting that the new sub will go deeper.....
I'd like to think that I could get two 400s or 500s to help even things out, but that's an awful lot of coin and a helluva lot of sub potential for such a tiny room....
Any thoughts?
Let's set aside the fact that square rooms result in more difficult acoustical problems than rectangular rooms. For starters I would always recommend placing your existing sub as close to the listening position as possible to minimize room influences.
Moving up to a 400 or 500 from an old 350 is a huge stepup in performance and sound quality. Its not just about more extension. The 500 will give you much more headroom for sure which is always a good thing. However if you want or need the sub to be heard but not seen a 400 in that room would work well. And two would be better, especially in a square room. I'd suggest the 400 if budget and size are issues, though the improved 350v3 would also be a reasonable alternative.
I'll second that from another person who has a crappy square HT room. I have an EP500 and probably won't be buying another for years to come but I do have a Sony sub (10" driver, fairly loud but not accurate like the EP500) left over from my old satellite surround system. I wonder if adding it to my room would help smooth things out for my different listening positions or would it's comparative lack of power and accuracy compared to the 500 just degrade the sound more than it helps.
I know, I know, just try it out and see what it sounds like....
Just thought I'd throw it out there while the topic is up. That and if I buy one more audio cable, my wife is likely to strangle me with it. Her maiden name was Garrett and so I feel my fears are justified...
I'd encourage you to experiment with the sony sub. Many folks discourage the use of different model subs but I've usually found the benefits from smoothing room nodes outweigh the less accurate sound from the weaker sub. It will be more challenging to get the subs in phase with each other and the speakers so it will take some time to check out various placement options. Its tough to do without the aid of a graphing display though. Without one the best approach is to take your RS metre and check it frequently as you make changes to sub placment and phase. Eventually you will find a place where the needle on the RS metre does not flucuate as much.
What 's going through my mind right now is I would use the EP400 for music, to keep the bass nice and tight and when it's movie time turn on my old sub for tandem use on the other side of the room.
That's a viable approach. The 400 would be sweet by itself with music. What's the other sub and how big is your room?
Jason, that's an interesting idea. John, if I use a 600 with a 400, can I get the tightness from a 400 and the depth, power and transparency from the 600? And I have a Sony too so maybe I can use that as well.
One other question. In your experience, how many subs are daisy-chainable from the sub output of a receiver?
Well the 600 does sound good with music, its just that the 400 sounds better IMO. Jason's plan is a good one. Position a 400 between your speakers and listen to it with music. For HT power up the big guy and the sony. Its going to take time to optimize those three subs but with patience it should do wonders for your LF room acoustics. I like to use 3 different model subs in my larger HT and they work very well once you find the right placement and get them level matched and working in phase.
I've got a 4,000 cubic foot room. I don't think a puny
400 will cut it even for just music, will it?
Mark, the more powerful sub will give better performance with respect to frequency extension and dynamic capability, but it won't help the problem of rooms that suck. Use of two subs located at opposite midpoints of the side walls or the front and back wall(as shown in the Harmon paper)can help with room modes and would generally be a better bet for a given amount of money.
I guess it depends how loud you play music. In any event don't forget that the 400 belts out nearly the same SPLs as the 350v3 which is 2.4 x as large amd the size of a 500. For music it should work, though I'm a fan of the 400 pair as stereo subs if you want the best musical presentation.
If budget is less of a constraint I would get the pair and with the 600 you are well on the way to conquering your room. Otherwise adding the 400 for music and powering the 600 and sony for HT looks like a good plan with proper placement.
Maybe I can gift my wife dual 400s for our 14 year wedding anniversary on November 5th. What do you guys think?
Even with your wife's love of music, I think you will need to borrow my couch for a few days.
Only if they come with a doghouse.
Your doghouse has couches too?
what better place for a dog to sleep?
Well, you can get her dual EP400s and an A1400-8, then tell her she can decide which one is the gag gift.
I was actually hoping she'd get ME the A1400-8. I'd be satisfied with an A1400-2 as I'm not greedy
.
This Saturday afternoon, I invited over five pals and fellow audio enthusiasts for a day of music, movie scenes, food and drink. Oh yeah we also compared a few subs which are pictured below.
The subs from left to right are EP600, Velodyne DD-18, EP400, Fathom JL113, SVS Ultra-13 and an older model Velodyne FSR (HGS)-18. All these subs were tested blind and equalized through a SMS-1. In terms of sound quality the EP400 was as clear, tight and detailed as the big sealed DD-18 and the JL113. It didn't match the output of any of the other subs though no one expected it to. What's interesting is the way the limiter kicked in before any audible stress could be heard when the EP400 was being pushed beyond its limits. The same couldn't be said for the non-Axiom subs though the Velodyne DD-18 also filtered the distortion well in the turbulent stuff.
I wish I could have been there. It looks like the room was shaking when you took the photo
.
Jason and I also noticed that the 400 was very controlled although I was pretty worried that the driver would fly across the room the way it was pistoning in and out during the U-571 depth charge scene.
Can you give us your impressions about all the other subs relative to each other?
Is the JL113 really worth the price difference from an ep 500 or 600?
How much more is it than a 600? About $1700?
"Worth more" is a concept valid only in relation to your own objectives. The EP500, EP600 and JLl13 are all excellent subs relative to their price points.
I wish I could have been there. It looks like the room was shaking when you took the photo
.
Jason and I also noticed that the 400 was very controlled although I was pretty worried that the driver would fly across the room the way it was pistoning in and out during the U-571 depth charge scene.
Can you give us your impressions about all the other subs relative to each other?
The limiters on the EP subs do a terrific job of keeping the subs out of distress. Those limiters are especially important on the small EP400 and they really shine. However they aren't perfect and even the EP400 had problems when pushed to the limits wih Pulse.
Because the listeners have not posted their impressions yet I'm hesitate to post mine for a few days but I will cut and paste their comments as they report them. For now here is the report by PBC (Steve) a mod at HomeTheaterSpot. Note that Sub 1 refers to the EP600.
Originally Posted by PBC
So we headed over to John’s house for the second round of what I will call “fun with subs”!
John has a spectacular house, with what seemed like rooms full of audio/video stuff all over the place! John and his wife were wonderful hosts, and the food and beverages were incredible! Nothing like a beef tenderloin sandwich to get the day going, especially after lugging that 155lb beast back and forth from my SUV!
There was 6 of us in total, with Asher having to leave very early unfortunately as he was on call. As you can see in the picture, the subs we listened to were:
Axiom EP600
Velo DD-18
Dual Axiom EP400’s (you can see one on top of the Velo)
JL Fathom F113
SVS PB13 Ultra
The last sub is the Velo HGS18, but we were having issues with it right off the bat so left it out.
The room was relatively large, at about 3,000 cubic feet and sealed with bass traps all over the place. It had a steep but narrow null from about 38 to 42hz or so, then again up in the 120 range if I recall. The speakers (6 Totem Model 1’s and a matching CC) were crossed over at 90 on John’s Arcam pre, and were driven via an Outlaw 770 amp. The video source was very impressive, what I believe was a JVC DLA-RS2 on a 110” 16:9 screen. The speakers were incredibly articulate and sounded great, and HD sources (I stuck around to watch a bit of 300 and then a couple periods of the Leaf’s game after everyone had left) was a site to see! DVDs/CDs were played through a Toshiba XA-2 HD-DVD player.
We equalized all subs before hand using the SMS-1 (more on this a bit later), took about 1.5 hours or so (for some reason the SMS started messing with the settings after they were saved the first time around), so we had sine waves in our heads for quite some time!
We only listened to the EP-400’s for a couple scenes and quickly realized it simply couldn’t keep up from an extension perspective with the rest and left it for some music tests at the very end. It sounded wonderful with some bass guitar tracks (Eric Clapton) that we had played, an impressive little performer. Looking at the SMS graphs, it rolled off considerably at about 27/28hz or so. Would make a great sub for stereo applications or in a small room (e.g., a condo) and was very clean.
The scenes/music we tested the remaining 4 subs in were:
Cars – Highway scene with lots of “rap”
Eric Clapton – bass guitar solo
Pulse – not sure what the scene is called, but you know which I mean!
WOTW – Laser scene
Sasha – Not sure which CD, but basically house music
Macus Miller – fantastic bass guitar track
We tested an organ track at the end but I can’t recall what it was (reached down to 17hz or so) and I unfortunately didn’t take notes at that point!
As most of these scenes were “new” to me and I’m still new at this stuff, I had some difficulties with getting pen to paper with what I was hearing, but I did my best in any event! It was very difficult doing it with 4 subs blind as by the time I hit the 3rd/4th sub, I was having trouble remember what the heck the first one sounded like! John manned the switcher and was the only “non-blind” participant.
Before I start, I will add that it’s incredible just how subjective this really is, which confirmed what I’ve felt all along about subs. Some people will simply like the way one sub sounds over another, and then like a different sub for a different application or scene! Just checking the notes of others showed just how so, since the other participants had different results in most of the scenes!
The SVS was tuned to 20hz, and all listening was done at -5db DD, unless noted otherwise.
Cars
This was a difficult track to judge, as I’m not a huge fan of rap and therefore aren’t entirely sure what it’s supposed to sound like (i.e., I was guessing it should be boomy vs. tight).
Sub 1 – This sub seemed somewhat reserved to me on the track, the notes were pretty clean, but didn’t seem to have the same “chest slam” as 2 or 3 in this scenario.
Sub 2 – Seemed a tad more “loose” than sub 1, but did have that “boom/slam” I would have thought one would want with this sort of track
Sub 3 – was somewhat similar to Sub 2, but with more chest slam and possibly slightly higher SPL? Hard to choose between this and sub 2, but give this the slight nod as it had a tad more output/feel, in particular where the “fire” juts out of the exhaust of one of the cars.
Sub 4 – Again, less output than 2 or 3, but seemed “tighter” and cleaner. Similar to 1, but not much output with the “exhaust” like sub 3 and 2.
After this first scene, I was thinking 1 and 4 were the sealed subs (I was only half right!).
Eric Clapton
Sub 1 – The bass guitar seemed a tad muddy to me, with not a lot of “definition”, in particular, I wasn’t getting that nice “plucking” sound when the bass player was playing.
Sub 2 – Much tighter than number 1, I thought this was the 2nd best sounding sub of the lot for this scene. Seemed to give you that “I’m there” feeling
Sub 3 – personally I thought this sub performed the worst of the 4 in this test. Again, this is highly subjective, as by “worse” we are practically splitting hairs here! Just seemed the most “loose” of the bunch to me, but did have some nice slam, just too much overhang for my tastes.
Sub 4 – Personally, my favourite for this scene. Good “tight” sound, hate to use the term “fast” but just seemed to recover the best after each note.
Pulse (-5db)
Before I start on this one, I have to say that John seemed very much inebriated here after just 1 glass of scotch! Kidding of course! But after playing 3 subs he sheepishly looked over and said “darn, I think I screwed up on the last one”. So hopefully I’m getting the order right, but in any event you’ll see my responses below. This was by far the hardest scene to judge, as none of us really knew what it was supposed to sound like and almost all the subs were hitting their limits here. Jesse was just sitting there with a smug look on his face as we all struggled asking “is that what this is supposed to sound like”? Jesse, with his 4 18” Avalanche IB setup with 2500 watts, simply said “no, that is definitely not what it is supposed to sound like”. In his system he indicated the “pulse” is all around you and not localized at all. Also, it seemed many of the subs were “reversing” the pulse to him (I’ll let him explain that if he joins in).
Basically at this point I was just listening for “bottoming out”, or what Ilkka believes is the subs’ limiters engaging.
Sub 1 – bottomed out in the hallway sooner than sub 2
Sub 2 – bottomed out as the woman opens the door
Sub 3 – Started to bottom out just before the opening of the door, then a ton of that ugly sound once she walks into the room!
Sub 4 – Very little impact in the hallway, then when she opens the door this is where Jesse felt the sound of the Pulse was reversed (i.e., higher then lower, or vice versa, I can’t recall!). The sub didn’t bottom out, but clearly its limits were reached as the SPL just wasn’t there
Pulse (-15db)
Sub 1 – clean, but not a lot of SPL/slam
Sub 2 – seemed to hit it’s limits at open of the door
Sub 3 – very similar sound to 2, slightly less bottoming out?
Sub 4 – again, did not bottom at all, but couldn’t even hear the heartbeat?
WOTW - Laser
Sub 1 – Very clean sounding laser blasts, good slam/response
Sub 2 – Great SPL and good punch, think it was my favourite on this scene
Sub 3 – sub seemed to continuously hit it’s limits, very high SPL and great slam, but that ugly noise reared its head a few too many times
Sub 4 – Very clean, articulate, but not a lot of slam. Very pleasant though.
Sasha
I won’t really go into this track as all the subs seemed to sound the same to me here. I believe sub 3 seemed to reach the deepest at one part though.
Marcus Miller
Sub 1 – to my ears the best sounding sub (which is odd, given that I wasn’t a fan of this sub for the Clapton bass guitar solo)
Sub 2 – Good kick, possibly some overhand?
Sub 3 – The most output and good “full sound”, great chest slam, just not as articulate as the first sub to my ears.
Sub 4 – Wasn’t as impressed with this sub for this scene
As you can see, and I hate to sit on the fence like this, but for me there was no clear winner. We had a discussion about this at the end and most agreed that each sub had it’s positives and negatives, or trade-offs if you will. I jokingly added “you’d almost want a different sub depending on what scene you’re listening to” and everyone agreed.
The subs were:
Sub 1 – Axiom EP600
Sub 2 – Fathom F113
Sub 3 – SVS PB13
Sub 4 – Velo DD18
Personally I have to admit I wasn’t impressed with the fact that we seemed to keep getting the limiter to engage on the PB13 in 20hz mode, which had me wondering whether the new amp still had some issues?
We did listen to the Eric Clapton scene again with the PB13 in sealed mode and were quite impressed with its sound. In sealed it’s a very musical sub and seemed to keep up with the F113 to my ears here. The EP400s were very impressive with this track as well!
At the end as John mentioned we tried to torture the PB13 in 10hz mode as John felt if the sub was going to fail, this is where it would fail. So we put it to the test (besides, Ron and Ed at SVS were pretty clear when they told me to “test it out”!). At -5db the limiter was engaging big time and those “farts” were coming out all over the place. But the sub didn’t stop, that’s for sure! We decided to try it again, but this time without the SMS-1, and for those of you interested, this definitely showed the SMS1 was limiting the output at lower frequencies as the sub was much louder after this. However, the limiter was kicking in even more often (obviously). Hopefully Velo comes out with their firmware fix for this ASAP. Although in this case it did exactly what they intended it to do!
That’s it for now folks. Sorry that this wasn’t as helpful as I would have hoped. What was clear to me was that each of these subs were incredible performers and sounded different depending on the application/scene. The Servo on the DD-18 was impressive in keeping it’s distortion to a minimum, albeit by limiting its output. However, that is what it’s intended to do!
Cheers,
STeve
Keep them coming, John. This is excellent.
I am curious about one thing: what was the set-up like? I mean, it takes a while to properly calibrate a sub to blend with your speakers. How much time (and the process followed) was spent making sure each sub was operating with comparable parameters? How about placement?
Thanks in advance.
The room is 19'x21'x8' ft with floor to ceiling basstraps in the corners. The entire front wall is covered in Roxul R12 acoustical panels hidden behind heavy Velvet curtain. A quarter of each sidewall is also covered with Roxul 12 panels. Overall the room is well damped but not overly so.
We spent the first couple of hours setting up the subs on the left side midwall 3 metres from the seats, and connecting them to a switchbox for blind testing. Each sub was equalized flat using an SMS-1 bass management equalizer for easy switching as well. The display and mapping function with this unit make for relatively fast calibration. All subs were calibrated level at 80db, 2db hot or 3db below Dolby reference and checked for phase. The idea was to test these subs using a variety of demanding music and soundtracks, and in particular to see how they behaved when pushed near their limits.
Thanks a lot. This always help whem reading eval posts (not to confuse with evil pasts).
After this session on Saturday, I now know how the guy in my avatar feels.
That's a tremendous set-up , John. When I'm in the Toronto area again, I'd feel priviledged to listen to it. As you know my room is not damped at all and I need to be convinced
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And as a bonus you would get to hear some totems!
Actually, I'm strongly tempted to try out M3v2s or VP150s all around. A friend in Florida just set up his new HT system using 3 VP150s up front, 4 QS8s sides and rears,2 EP500s and a A1400-8 for power. He can't stop gushing about how his world will never be the same and how he now spending too much time listening to music and watching movies. I'm going to ask him for some pics.
Mojo, sure send me a PM next time you are coming through Toronto.
So, he is using VP-150 as main speakers? If that's the case, I really would like to see pictures... and hear that... In my experiements, I did try VP-150 as main briefly (only one, of course) and the result was not convincing at all (actually, it was very convincing, but the other way around!).
Let us know if you ever get to hear it yourself.
Has anyone else tried this?
I will hear the system when I am next in Florida, possibly later this month. One VP150 as a main?? He says his front soundstage is seamless with the 3 vp150s on the same plane. In the interim I have asked him for pictures.
Alan mentioned that he and Ian have tried VP150s as mains and liked them.
John, Thank You Very Much for these excellent stories.
Another report on the Saturday sub comparison, this time from Soundemon, a moderator at Canuckaudiomart. He appears to favour the EP600 over the other subs.
I had the pleasure of attending this sub shootout as well. It was a great opportunity to Listen to these excellent subs, and make some new friends. Great group of guys in attendance, all very serious about high end HT. Thanks again to John and his wife for hosting. Very classy people.
I made notes per test, per sub, but I've compiled them as to keep my post brief:
The Axiom EP600 I found to be the most "musical" sub, with good depth and the ability to convey quickness and detail the other ones missed. It had a little less impact and depth for a couple of scenes, but one thing I noted was in the laser firing scene in WoTW, the other subs would provide bass and the speakers would provide texture for the sound, the Axiom also had texture to the bass, which was quite impressive.
The DD18 I found had great depth and impact, but was a little to "clinical" and "dry" (difficult to describe exactly what I mean by "dry" sorry!) very good control of start and stop of bass notes, very little overhang, very tight. This one seemed to suffer the least amount of distress during the intense "pulse schene, but also had the least output.
The JL F113: This was a sub that I really wanted to like thruout the testing, as I'm a big fan of the W7 drivers. This sub had a good deep and smooth sound, and some really nice texture to the bass. a little less so than the Axiom, but much more than the DD18. I found the leading edge of bass to be very impressive with this sub, altho it also had a little more hangover at the end of the note than the others. Good impact, and great feel with this one.
The SVS PB13 The SVS had great intensity and impact, and seemed to have a little more volume or output than the others. for the music scenes I liked this one as it was good and tight, with a crisp sound to the bass. start and stop were very well controlled with very little hangover. the sound was pleasing and full. Thru the stress tests, there was alot of audible distress with this one, and it was difficult to say if it was the driver bottoming out, or port chuffing, or both.
All in all, each of these subs sounded great untill it bottomed out, and they all seemed to bottom out around the same volumes. For this shootout none of the subs could I say ran away with it, and none of them would I advise to avoid.
One comment I'd have is I wish we'd spent a little less time making them bottom out to the "pulse" schene, and a little more time listening to some more music, and maybe a couple of extra movie scenes. I'd also suggest that instead of listening at reference volume, where most of the subs did show distress, the volume be set so that the sub is sounding great, and we could compare this to the other subs, to see which bottom out, which show distress, and which play clean. Finding this "golden" volume for the room / sub would be a lenthy process tho!
Do you know if they were put vertically or horizontally?
Horizontally above the screen pointed down to the seats.
I know that Alan and Ian had them vertical.
Another report, this one from Mark (Huff at AVS). Still undecided about a sub and trying to decide between a pair of EP 500s, a EP600 or the Ultra-13. He prefers the JL113 overall but not at the price.
First, thanks to John (jakeman) and his wife for the fantastic food, drinks and hospitality. John's house is stunning and could grace an architectural magazine. And that dedicated man-cave of a home theatre! It was better sounding and more enjoyable watching movie clips in there than any other movie theatre I've been in.
Second, I haven't (yet!) purchased any products by any of the companies that make the subs we listened to.
Third, my main goal from the session was to try to make a purchase decision. I'm looking to buy my first "reference" calibre sub and was lucky enough to be invited along (twice now!) to be able to compare some really great subs in side-by-side listening. And my usage is 90% HT, 10% music so that weighs heavily on what I was listening for.
Here are my impressions of the 4 main subs compared (dual Axiom EP-400s were also compared briefly and, while sounding great, were not in the same league for HT as the others so were sidelined). Just layman talk, nothing technical (the others are much more qualified than me on the technical side):
My Overall Choice (disregarding price)
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1) JL F113
2) SVS PB13
3) Axiom EP-600
4) Velo DD18
Throughout the movie scenes it was readily apparent that 2 of the subs possessed the WOW factor. The WOW factor has to do with the width of the smile on your face and the rumble under your seat when the bass effects kick in. The easiest thing to determine when A/B testing these subs for movie effects is which one sounds louder and which one you can "feel" more. It's much more difficult to determine differences in the sound reproduction when all the subs are as good as these. The F113 (hidden sub #2) and PB13 (hidden sub #3) had me thinking "now that's what I'm talkin about!" and the other 2 were a level below. I was most surprised at the fact that the large DD18 did not seem to produce the same output as the F113 & PB13. So it's not all about size.
During "Pulse" - a ridiculously tough assignment for a single sub - I heard the F113 and the PB13 making some strained sounds. The DD18 and EP-600 much less so, likely due to some kind of limiting when the going got tough. This was the only time during the afternoon that I heard any sounds of distress from any of the subs and since I would never play a movie like that at that level in my home, I really didn't care and it would not affect my purchase decision.
For music, it was very difficult to discern any significant differences between these subs on a variety of 30-60 second soundbites. On the Clapton bass guitarist track, I thought the F113 and DD18 sounded best. On a different Marcus Miller sampler track, I thought the EP-600 sounded best. On the Cars "rap" segment, I liked the F113 and PB13 best. It was splitting hairs really. If I listened to the tracks a few more times, I might even have changed my mind. They all sounded really, really good and for the pop music I mainly listen to, I'd be very happy with any of them. If you're into instrumental or jazz or classical (I'm not), then I bet that after extended listening and A/B comparing (with material you are familiar with) you would detect differences that may sway your purchase decision.
The JL F113 wins my overall choice (disregarding price) over the PB13 because of its ability to almost disappear in a room due to its size (extreme WAF!) and still produce pants-flapping, accurate bass that makes you smile so wide it starts to hurt. For HT, the PB13 was equally satisfying and gets its own kudos below.
OK, so the DD18 is at the bottom ... something has to be right? It's there because this is a subjective choice and I'm choosing for primarily HT use. My guess is that the DD18 is targetted toward the discerning music listener, and likely excels at instrumental music reproduction.
My Best Value for $$$ Choice (in Canada)
======================
1) SVS PB13
2) Axiom EP-600
3) JL F113
4) Velo DD18
To my door, the EP-600 is ~$1900 CDN, PB13 (Rosenut) is ~$2100 CDN. The F113 and DD18 (new) are beyond my budget, but I'm guessing the F113 is ~$3K+ and the DD18 is ~$3.5-4K+ new. If a used F113 could be had for ~2.5K or less, it would move up to #2 in my best value list (and end up in my house!).
In the contest for value-for-the-buck, the PB13 wins this comparison for me. It plays loud, sounds great and has a furniture grade finish. It's worth the extra $$$ over the EP-600 for me, primarily for the extra punch I like for HT. I liked the EP-600 a lot and its finish options are much better suited to my HT room than the PB13, I just wanted a few db more from it.
As of now, I'm still considering the EP-600, the PB13 or dual EP-500s (EP-600's little brother). The EP-500s are much smaller than the EP-600, are ~1.2K each and I expect sound just as good. Duals would be a few hundred $$$ more than 1 PB13, but the finish options are much better (there's that WAF again!) and the prospect of having dual subs, both for effortless output and better freq. response throughout the room, is appealing.
Ah, it's really all about the journey, isn't it ?
Yeah Ken, I recall that Alan was so impressed with the performance of the vertical VP150s as mains that he was going to suggest to Ian that they possibly be marketed as such.
I don't think I've seen another vertical with a tweeter on the bottom like that. I wish I'd tried it. Now I'm real curious.
That's the for the next GTG.
When we meet with Amie and Allan at that pub in the NE, we should bring all of our speakers, receivers and subs. That would be a party that they'd talk about for a while
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Mo, Dr. D'Apolitto created his MTM design to be used vertically, not horizontally, to take advantage of the wider and smoother horizontal dispersion and narrower vertical dispersion that the design made possible.
But we are talking about the VP150 TWWWT, does that still apply?
Right, exactly. Does it, John? Used as mains, those would be tremendous frankenspeakers. Especially if they were stacked in a VP300 configuration
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Jason and Mo, it's unclear whether the same considerations D'Apolitto used in his design apply equally to a TMMMT, but Alan's enthusiastic view indicates that it would, at least to some degree.
The comments in the November S&V magazine review relating to the horizontal dispersion of the VP150 can also be noted.
I guess it would be not much different than the M82 in that the M22s blended very well to the M60s even though it was a TMMTMWW (going top down)design. The Tweeter in the middle did very little to change the sound.
I have found, when comparing the VP150 to an M2 centre, that the VP150 does not have the spaciousness of the M2. I am guessing it is because of the sealed design, I prefer the M2/M22 sound over the VP150. I cannot really pinpoint the difference, but it has something to do with the VP150 sounding a little thin and condensed? compared to the M22/M2.
Just my opinion.
Just wanted to add this last comment on the EP400s to get this thread back on track. He (Jesse) seemed to like the JL113 and EP400s best for bass guitar, though he leaned toward the punch of the JL113. Keep in mind that you can buy 3 EP400s for the price of a JL113.
Eric Clapton bass guitar scene (don't know who the player is)
I preferred the clarity and depth of the JL. The dual Axiom ep400's could match the clarity but had none of the string pluck "punch" that you feel when being in a room with a bass player and his big bass amp. The SVS had very nice "pluck impact" but the notes hung around too much. We tried the SVS in sealed mode and it still didn't match the clarity of the Axiom duals and the JL. I didn't find the Velo or single Axiom 600 to stand out in clarity or punch for bass guitar. However, I think the JL could be eq'd to give more pluck punch but I'm not sure the SVS could be eq'd to reduce the slight overhang.
The comments in the November S&V magazine review relating to the horizontal dispersion of the VP150 can also be noted.
I've read the article and his comment about lobing. This one is headscratcher for me. Anytime I have heard this speaker, I haven't been able to detect the change in tonality and dispersion within a fairly broad axis.
Most recently I heard a pair of these above and below a projector screen, again another no-no and it sounded pretty good sitting in front of the screen and off to the side. What's bothering me is I know the theory and acoustical problems associated with lobing yet in real world usuage I haven't experienced it with the VP150. It could be one of those things where despite the theory, in practice such configurations and alignments can work pretty well.
Robb,
I'd like to listen to your M2 centres some time.
John,
The comments on the string pluck "punch" are very applicable to my situation. I couldn't help but wonder if it was my room acoustics but now a number of facts have conspired to convince me it's not my room. These facts are that others report limited punch in your nicely treated space, the 300W STF-3 that is currently in my room has very good punch (but a terrible finish as I previously reported) and my 150W Sony has punch too. I would take the 600 over the STF-3 and Sony any day but I also want the punch to boot
. I'm therefore convinced it's not my room.
Although the EP400 seems to have the potential to provide that punch with its 150Hz cut-off, it still does not. At least not in my space. I can definitely hear moe punch than the 600 (although I again prefer the 600 over-all) but it's a "teaser" rather than the real thing. When I'm at Jason's later this week, I'll see if the 400 provides any more punch in his much smaller space.
If you situated three 400s in your space, they wouldn't create the "punch" of the Fathom would they? I don't believe the punch is a factor of the number of subs or even the power of the subs. Rather it's a function of the cut-off frequency, the slope thereafter and the transient response of the entire sub-woofer system. I don't know if the Fathom has selectable slopes but if you were hearing that kind of a punch, I'm sure that the slope was 12dB/octave or less.
Again, very informative and thanks for posting.
The JL does make for a realistic sounding bass guitar. Despite its small size, keep in mind we are talking about a 135lb sub with 13.5" driver and a huge 2500w amp. Its slope is selectable to 12 or 24db. To my ears I actually thought the EP400 pair with 8" drivers and 500w amps had more clarity and texture, but the punch was with the JL.
Either one has excellent transient response and that tight bass sound. Room acoustics make a big difference. The writer has an IB with 4 18" Avalanche drivers in an untreated room and to me it sounds unnatural with lots of overhang and not as tight sounding with guitar. Terrific with HT effects though.
Mojo, I can't help but think there's something slightly strange with your room or configuration that's not getting you that punch. I mean, I've got an old, 12" sealed mid-quality sub and M80s, and I think I hear what you're talking about. In the 500/600s that I've heard, I haven't heard anything lacking. Where are your crossovers again?
Granted, I run my M80s as full range on stereo listening. When I had L+R going to the sub, the bass got a little overpowering. I'll have to play with that again sometime.
Alternately, you're a candidate for that odd Hsu upper range subwoofer.
Can you give us your impressions about all the other subs relative to each other?
You asked me this question a couple of days ago and I'm now able to respond having just posted this response at a couple of other sites.
Its always interesting reading everyone's impressions after a blind test. As has been mentioned several times any of these subs would be a terrific addition to a HT. But the session on Saturday was about comparing limits of high performance which should be expected given the relatively expensive price points of these subs. I knew running the subs close to or at reference levels after equalization in a tightly sealed treated room was going to test the limits. I've always believed side by side blind comparisons with demanding material reveal much more than can be gleaned through reviews, individual sub listening sessions and standard measurement techniques.
Typically I run multiple subs in my HT at listening levels -10 to -5 below reference. I've run duals, trios and quads at one time or another. For the last several weeks I've had the JL113, DD-18 and the FSR-18 at various locations and its no surprise to anyone reading that sound quality was much better with higher output than what the group experienced on Saturday. Because of coupling I'm able to level each sub -6db cold to match them combined 2db hot to the speakers. That provides huge headroom. Output for HT is highly desirable, but my taste leans to keeping sound quality high as possible which is the main reason I run multiple subs in an acoustically treated sealed room. Its too bad Asher was on call, as I know he is passionate about quality sound with his terrific audio system which includes dual FL113s. Like myself I know he is sensitive to distortion and artifacts.
One of the objectives was to find out more about the strengths and flaws of each sub and as the reports by Steve, Mark, Jesse and Ben show we found them. We all agreed that all these subs are fine performers when used at reasonable listening levels. As Steve remarked each one seemed to rise to the occasion depending on the track. Nevertheless, there has been a trend to more demanding bass heavy soundtracks so the performance bar has been rising for subs. For music reproduction other factors are very important such as reproducing clean, textured sound free of artifacts and distortion. Studies have shown that audibility of distortion is less of an issue at low frequencies yet everyone seemed to sense that the single subs were under stress during the demanding tracks. In a way, the session was also an interesting experiment into how people perceive distortion.
The Saturday session has also made me rethink my assumptions that sealed subs are the natural choice for music and ported subs for HT. The Ultra-13 really caught my ear with the way its ports superbly reproduced Jean Guillou's gigantic 32ft organ pipes when Jesse put on Mussorgsky's Pictures at an Exhibition. And like Ben I thought the EP600 was consistent at capturing the texture and detail of the bass in most of the music scenes and providing a very balanced presentation for HT. Its DSP circuit and amp was keeping the sub on a more even keel by keeping its output and distortion within preassigned limits.
Though the guys didn't mention it we started the listening with Diana Krall singing All or Nothing at All from the Montreal Jazz Festival DVD, accompanied by only a standup acoustic bass. The EP400s were running at the time and I thought they really articulated the finger plucked acoustic bass clearly with alot of detail. I've said it before and I'll say it again, these little guys can play beautiful music and they demonstrated it again with Nathan East's aggressive bass licks in the Eric Clapton "Sessions with Robert J" DVD. To my ear the 400s sounded tighter, detailed, textured and more natural than the other subs including the JL113. Jesse remarked that it lacked punch but that's where its a matter of taste as I thought it was faithful to what an acoustic and electric bass sounds like. We didn't play the demanding movie soundtracks on Saturday though a few days earlier I put them to the test with Pulse at -5db and the 400s sounded heavily distorted and bottoming despite its protective circuits. Those transients were just too fast and too powerful for that 8" driver. Interestingly the EP600 larger driver with the same DSP design, didn't have that problem with Pulse. With WoTW the limiters were able to keep both subs artifact free.
Where my impressions were most different than the others was with the DD-18. I leave the servo setting on that sub at the max to keep distortion as low as possible, at the expense of output which is a tradeoff faced by most sub designers. That's the reason why Jesse and Steve thought the pulse reversed itself, the servo was kicking in very aggressively to keep the sub from distorting right as the women opened the door . It was also keeping the higher level harmonics which contribute to that all around you bass fairly low compared to the other distorting subs. The DD-18 works very well in a multiple sub setup but as a single HT sub it was interesting that the group favoured the higher output/distortion of the other subs. For my tastes, that sub was reproducing the cleanest, accurate bass but in doing so it wasn't as loud as the others. Interestingly all the other guys penalized it for having the weakest output but given my parameters I thought it performed as well or better as the other subs in the music scenes and with less compression and noise in the HT scenes. The reaction of some of the guys indicated that many people don't mind or prefer a reasonable amount of output that comes with higher levels of distortion particularly if its even order harmonic distortion . I suspect if I had turned the DD-18 servo down to its minimum setting to permit more distortion and output views may have been different. In any event if we had an award for cleanest, most accurate bass I would have put my money on the DD-18.
I have to admit to being a bit disappointed with the JL113 though unlike the others I knew when it was playing. While it was the steadiest performer with all the music tracks it wasn't outperforming all the others by any means and all the other subs took turns keeping up with the Fathom depending on the track. The Ultra-13 left the FL113 and all the other subs behind with the Mussorgsky organ track. I remarked earlier that the little EP400 sounded better than either with Clapton. On the Marcus Miller track I thought the JL113 was not as clear and detailed either the EP600 or the DD-18. At the start of the day I thought the JL113 was going to be the overall best performing sub but I could hear the sub distorting which I usually don't in the multiple setup. I thought it did the best job of reproducing the Master and Commander cannonball fusillade and the Pulse scene but its bass was not as immediate and visceral in the other movie soundtracks with the EP600 delivering the ray gun blasts in WOTW and the Ultra-13 delivering the earthquake in the ipod emerges scene.
Perhaps I'm being too critical with the JL113, because Pulse is arguably the most difficult HT soundtrack for a sub to reproduce faithfully. You really need multiple drivers/subs to do this one justice. None of the subs did it well and while the JL113 was audibly distorting more than the DD-18 and EP600 it was showing just how capable it was at keeping non-linearities to a minimum at high output levels while still responding rapidly to that powerful 16-18hz fundamental and the higher harmonics. This is one brute of a sub and it must have been the sub that my wife said caused a 3' x 6' light plastic dog fence to fall over in the room above the HT.
After the amp shutdown at Steve's a few weeks ago I was curious to see how the Ultra would perform with the replacement amp. And I'll say right off the bat that it performed very, very well with all the material except Pulse. I expected to hear loud chuffing from the tri-ports at -5db (DTS) which is the tradeoff for the tuning feature of this alignment. What I also heard was the telltale annoying non-linear distortion from amp clipping and possible bottoming of the driver though it was hard for me to tell with all the chuffing. At -10db at least the clipping stopped but the chuffing was still pretty bad which ended at -15db down. I suspect this may have been a result of something that was redesigned into the replacement amp but I'm not sure. Ordinarily that performance would have resulted in a curtain hook from me if not for the fact how well it performed overall, especially the Mussorgsky organ piece, in Master and commander and WoTW. The Pulse performance confirms to me once again that the Ultra-13 is one 1000w amp away from being an outstanding subwoofer.
Anyway, there are no right or wrong views here, merely impressions and opinions. As I stated earlier I suggest readers put more weight on the excellent blind test reports of Ben, Mark, Steve, Jesse and Asher who despite my repeated attempts to ply them with wine, beer and whiskey stayed true to the task at hand.
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Very nice John and I understand what you're saying.
So now we await for you to acquire the Elemental Designs monster so that you can give us your impressions
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Wow! Great summary/review/explanation. Even after reading everyone's thoughts, I still don't know which sub I'd prefer, excluding cost. John, I really like what you said about the DD-18 and how it sounded the best to you despite not having the bombastic wow factor. Subtlety is very hard to critique with subs, after all, we get those to amaze our friends and scare the neighbors.
Again, excellent job all the way around! That goes for everyone involved.
John, thank you again. I value your opinion very highly, and this is an excellent contribution to the collective wisdom.
Okay, everyone who DOESN'T have sub envy now, raise your hand.
Thanks all. One thing that came through for sure is that the Axiom EP line belongs in the league as these worldbeater subwoofers. To say that they held their own is an understatement in light of the extreme demands we placed on all the subs last Saturday.
Is that the Japanese or American version of Pulse? I haven't seen either, but I'll have to look into watching it, if only for the subwoofer stress test.
Its the American version. Its a terrible movie with a ridiculous plot so I wouldn't waste your time watching it. It is selling copies because of that incredibly powerful bass track. The huge bass fundamental is centred at 16-19HZ with powerful harmonics all the way up to 75hz and goes on for about a minute. What sub are you using?
EP600. One day I'll get to dual EP600s, at least by the time I get my dream home theater.
Great. I asked because it could damage a lesser sub if played close to reference levels. The entire scene is from the 1:12:40 timestamp until about 1:13:20 with a woman walking down a dark hallway accompanied by a loud heartbeat like pulse which goes up at least 10db the moment she opens a door into a creepy lab.
It won't damage the EP600 so let your ears decide how high you want to go with it. Dogs, cats and significant others may feel otherwise.
Thanks for the tip on the scene.
I keep going back to the initial pic you posted of the 600 and 400 colocated. Considering the advantages as well as limitations of each, ie limited spl but tight response of the 400 vs greater spl but somewhat less responsiveness of the 600. Have you listened to them together stacked to see how well they play together?
I've listened to the 400 pair colocated which gives you more headroom and the same acoustics. I have not colocated the 600/400 though its worth a try .
If it does provide more of a "total package" by colocation, then it might be interesting if you could borrow your brother's 600 and test a pair of these "EP 1000's"!
Jakeman,
I am not sure if you answered this directly, but would you rather have a single EP600, or dual EP400's on opposite walls, in your room? They cost roughly the same, give or take a couple bills.
Well I have colocated 600s, 500s and 500/600s and the extra headroom meant more effortless sound with no change to the sonic signature. Adding a 400 would be different. I'm a big believer in lots of headroom to keep any noise or artifacts to a minimum. The 600, like the DD-18, excelled in this regard and it could easily be argued that it put in the best overall performance of all the subs given the difficult bass tracks we played.
I can try the 600/400 combo in a couple of days. Adding my brothers 600 will provide more headroom but I gather its the sonic signature thats you are interested in.
Jakeman,
I am not sure if you answered this directly, but would you rather have a single EP600, or dual EP400's on opposite walls, in your room? They cost roughly the same, give or take a couple bills.
Its different strokes for different folks Hutz. Both subs sound differently and much depends on your room size, WAF and if you are mainly into music or HT. That's why there are different type of subs in the product line.
As price does play a role in all purchase decisions, 2 EP400's are roughly the same as a single EP600. With the 2 subs, you get the advantage of getting a more uniform bass response in all the seats in the theatre...but less chest pounding bass, a single EP600 will give you that headroom, and chest pounding bass...
But how much more exactly does the EP600 give you? Enough to not get TWO E400s?
Robb,
In my 4,000 cubic foot space, I would never replace a single 600 with dual 400s. There are many reasons but the most predominant one is that two 400s cannot reproduce the couch-shaking bass that I demand for movies and the enveloping, transparent bass that I crave for music. Four 400s might give me what I want but just barely.
Now having said that, the 400 "teased" me with its initial tightness or put another way, its ability to reproduce "snap". If the 600 could expand upon that tightness without losing its enveloping, transparent nature, I believe this would be the best sub on the market at perhaps any price. What I struggle with is whether the next version of the 600 should have a 12dB/octave or 6dB/octave roll-off or perhaps a way to vary the slope or at least select between a number of slopes. It's this slope that greatly contributes to the tightness without making the sub sound bloated.
The 400 is a tremendous sub for smaller spaces though.
Hutz can you give us more details of your room and how much HT vs music?
Hey Mojo, it seems your 600 would be perfect except for the tightness of the 400 and "chest thump" and "slam" (according to 2 reviewers) of the JL 113 & the Ultra-13. Do you think a 2nd 600 would help with those 2 issues? (Pie in the sky question, of course)
I have a single 500 and also feel as you do about the "chest thump" question.
I don't think a second, third or nth 600 would help with slam/chest thump/slap.
Didn't we have the 400 and 600 on at the same time, but due to the lower output of the 400 you couldn't really tell it was on?
That's right. The 600 swallowed it up
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I did some extensive listening with the STF-3 today. The 600 swallowed that one up too
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