Hi, general question. In a powered sub and the amp in a receiver which as more control over the sound quality of the base. Does the Damping factor of the receiver impact the sub? Am I hearing the sound produced from the sub's amp or the receiver's amp???

With a powered sub the sub only uses the signal from the receiver and then it is solely responsible for the SQ of the bass notes it receives in the signal

Froggy(wawaron), as Jason points out, the internal amplifier in the sub is what is actually powering its driver. As long as it has enough output voltage for the needed sub sound level, that's all it does. The "control" of the sub is determined almost entirely by the parameters of its driver and the tuning of the enclosure. The amplifier damping factor, as long as it's anywhere in the double digits, doesn't significantly affect the sound and shouldn't be a cause for concern.

Every time I give in to the urge to adjust my sub in any fashion, I hate myself for weeks. I can never seem to decide when it's "right" and even if I put it back exactly the way it was, I still think it isn't how I remember it.

Goes to show how much of this this can be self interpretive.

When I first ran Audyssey on my modest twin 10" Velos, it correctly saw that I had the subs' amps gain set way too high.

Over time & subsequent runs, I brought them down in increments & now have them set at about half from where I started. They work wonderfully with lots of authority & no booming.

I now leave them alone & enjoy...

TAM

Just to clarify, what do you mean by bass? What main speakers do you have and what crossover frequency is set?

What we hear as 'bass' is usually a combination of the very lowest frequencies (below, say, 30 Hz) which are typically reproduced only by a subwoofer, and the somewhat higher frequencies (150 Hz or more) which depending on the speakers and settings might be reproduced by a combination of all the speakers. For example, I have a (non-Axiom and not very good) subwoofer with LFRs and a VP180. I set my fronts as "Large" so most of the bass I hear probably comes from all the mains plus my sub - in fact my sub may even roll off more steeply than my fronts!