Q: SAM - impact on small speakers bass (i.e. KEF LS50)

[amabrok]

Greetings,

Hope this is the right forum to post. All the SAM discussion seem to be gathered in this forum.

Question - having never heard Devialet's SAM in action, I am quite amazed by the claim that it now help the LS50 to produce bass down to 28hz. I believe that he LS50 is one of the first speakers that they matched to SAM. That is stunning bass extension for a speaker that small.

However, I'm not sure how SAM can produce much usable bass down to 28hz and if they limit woofer excursion so that there is no damage.

A few questions if I may:

1. Has anyone actually done a frequency sweep test to see what the dropoff is at 28hz? I wonder how flat it is down to 28hz.

2. And if it does get down to 28hz, what decibels is it actually capable of at that frequency response? Wondering how usable that is.

3. And if you use SAM with the LS50, what % do you set it and does it reduce the quality of the mids and trebles?

The claims of SAM is quite astounding to me - and yes, I realize that I'm a bit late to the party as this feature has been out a while. I've tried to google for answer but did not turn up any. Perhaps few people match a $6500 amp to a $1500 speaker...

Thanks!
MtnGuy

Hi MtnGuy

welcome to the forum, couple of other members match the KEF LS50 with Devialet and they are very pleased with the results, especially with SAM which seems to benefit smaller speakers more than full range floorstanders in the bass department. Indeed there are several reports on bigger bass with more control and extension but i am not aware of any scientific measurements to answer your question [sorry].

I speak from own personal experience when i say that SAM did very well with my previous Martin Logan ESL and really improved bass and i started to hear things i could not hear before and i assume they were all at much lower frequencies. but also amazingly i felt improvements in mid-range as well, bigger sound stage, more immediate presence and the feel that the vocals are right there in front of me!

maybe other members especially KEF LS50 owners would like to chip in.

cheers!