Dual mono with REL Subwoofer

[Antoine]

My JL Audio F112 sub also has a soft hum but it can only be heard with the ear near it. Accidentally I once found out it lowers in volume when I ‘shield’ the side e.g. using a piece of aluminium foil so it’s somehow sensitive to outside RFI. Nothing to worry about, I agree with Martyn; we’re spoilt with our dead silent Devialets!

Enjoy!

Have your tried a better shielded cable? I am thinking to get the REL baseline blue. I believe it will decrease the background noise slightly.

I’m using the QED Reference subwoofer cables (the old one not the current ‘40’ model), not tried an other one but this one is dual screened and dual twisted pair. I think in my case it’s neglible so I’m OK with it.

[PeppaPig]

My JL Audio F112 sub also has a soft hum but it can only be heard with the ear near it. Accidentally I once found out it lowers in volume when I ‘shield’ the side e.g. using a piece of aluminium foil so it’s somehow sensitive to outside RFI. Nothing to worry about, I agree with Martyn; we’re spoilt with our dead silent Devialets!

Enjoy!

Have your tried a better shielded cable? I am thinking to get the REL baseline blue. I believe it will decrease the background noise slightly.

I’m using the QED Reference subwoofer cables (the old one not the current ‘40’ model), not tried an other one but this one is dual screened and dual twisted pair. I think in my case it’s neglible so I’m OK with it.

Did you found a noticeable improvement over the stock cable? If so Like what?

[Antoine]

Have your tried a better shielded cable? I am thinking to get the REL baseline blue. I believe it will decrease the background noise slightly.

I’m using the QED Reference subwoofer cables (the old one not the current ‘40’ model), not tried an other one but this one is dual screened and dual twisted pair. I think in my case it’s neglible so I’m OK with it.

Did you found a noticeable improvement over the stock cable? If so Like what?

It’s actually the first and only cables (3 meters long) I’ve tried and used with it. Not sure if the sub came with a cable from factory but I bought the sub second hand.

[PeppaPig]

I’m using the QED Reference subwoofer cables (the old one not the current ‘40’ model), not tried an other one but this one is dual screened and dual twisted pair. I think in my case it’s neglible so I’m OK with it.

Did you found a noticeable improvement over the stock cable? If so Like what?

It’s actually the first and only cables (3 meters long) I’ve tried and used with it. Not sure if the sub came with a cable from factory but I bought the sub second hand.

Ah.. I am ordered the Rel baseline cable and additional S5 SHO. Can’t wait to see how they goes.

[PeppaPig]

Ok, I got my second REL, and the Bassline blue cables.

1. Did not hear improvement from the Bassline cables. In fact the connector with the Bassline is harder to connect to Devialet than standard high level cable as it use spade connectors, I have to stack the yellow and red up and it’s hard to tighten them on Devialet. Anyway, in my opinion standard cable is as good as the bassline.

2. Second subwoofer. I have been playing with the second subwoofer for days. In my view, adding second subwoofer does not increase bass loudness/volume, I did a blind test, keep turning the second sub on/off, and I cannot tell if the second sub is on or off every time. Only in a song with a lot of drum playing, adding second sub smooths up the bass in the area, therefore it feels less directional. I don’t think every body need a second sub, the first sub give you a major improvement, huge! but not the second one, however if money is not a concern, it’s better to have a second one as in some case it does help to reduce directional effect....

3. Placement of sub is important, when I put the sub too close to the wall which behind the main speaker, it doesn’t sound as good as I keep 15cm away from the wall. I put my subs closer to the main speaker in an angle facing to listeners and I feel it sound more integrated with the main speaker. When the sub is very close to the front wall/corner, it also sounds the bass is behind the main speaker and from the wall...

4. Good Sub is very important for stereo system...now with the REL I heard many things that is exists in the music but was completely missing in my listening. It also improves over all sound representation quality, to a much higher and complete level of experience.

5. Break-In process is very important, run the sub for very loud for 2 hours and no more than 2 hours as described on their website.

Anyway this is my 2 cents, hope it helps the next sub buyer.

[sam1000]

2. Second subwoofer. I have been playing with the second subwoofer for days. In my view, adding second subwoofer does not increase bass loudness/volume, I did a blind test, keep turning the second sub on/off, and I cannot tell if the second sub is on or off every time. Only in a song with a lot of drum playing, adding second sub smooths up the bass in the area, therefore it feels less directional. I don’t think every body need a second sub, the first sub give you a major improvement, huge! but not the second one, however if money if not a concern, it’s better to have a second one as in some case it does help to reduce directional effect....

The second sub will not provide more impact, however it will smooth out frequency response for wider listening area.  The second  subwoofer might help tremendously to fill out nulls like 60 and 85 htz in the attached sample. Are you using any kind of device like dspeaker to calibrate your subs? Its very effective in taming subwoofer responses for normal listening rooms. 

[PeppaPig]

2. Second subwoofer. I have been playing with the second subwoofer for days. In my view, adding second subwoofer does not increase bass loudness/volume, I did a blind test, keep turning the second sub on/off, and I cannot tell if the second sub is on or off every time. Only in a song with a lot of drum playing, adding second sub smooths up the bass in the area, therefore it feels less directional. I don’t think every body need a second sub, the first sub give you a major improvement, huge! but not the second one, however if money if not a concern, it’s better to have a second one as in some case it does help to reduce directional effect....

The second sub will not provide more impact, however it will smooth out frequency response for wider listening area.  The second  subwoofer might help tremendously to fill out nulls like 60 and 85 htz in the attached sample. Are you using any kind of device like dspeaker to calibrate your subs? Its very effective in taming subwoofer responses for normal listening rooms. 

Hi Sam, I never heard about DSpeaker before, I just had a quick look at it. Are you using it?? Do you hear a noticeable improvement? The device remains in the connection chain all the time?

I am not exactly sure how it can help to improve performance, because each sub has different characteristic and room is different too, how this device knows my room size and sub woofer spec? without knowing those parameters, it will be hard to do a proper optimization I guess.

And I assume high end sub woofer like REL S5 might already has something similar like this built in? Anyway its very interesting, I should do more research on it. Thanks for the information mate.

[sam1000]

Hi Sam, I never heard about DSpeaker before, I just had a quick look at it. Are you using it?? Do you hear a noticeable improvement? The device remains in the connection chain all the time?

I am not exactly sure how it can help to improve performance, because each sub has different characteristic and room is different too, how this device knows my room size and sub woofer spec? without knowing those parameters, it will be hard to do a proper optimization I guess.

And I assume high end sub woofer like REL S5 might already has something similar like this built in? Anyway its very interesting, I should do more research on it. Thanks for the information mate.

Hi PeppaPig:
Yes, I do own Dspeaker which can calibrate 2 subwoofers. The first thing you do with this device is to connect the supplied microphone and calibrate the response for your room at different locations. Some subwoofers like JL f112/113 have a calibration software built in. I'm not sure if REL includes calibration software. In my case, yes, the difference was quite remarkable mainly because my room is not ideal for audio and I have very limited acoustic treatment in the room. 
In your case you might not need it, but you can start with measuring the frequency response using the REW software which is a free download, however, you might want to buy a decent  microphone like this one. 
Here's a review from stereophile for dspeaker anti-mode device. 
Have fun.

[Antoine]

I’m also using a Dspeaker device to apply ‘room correction’ to the subwoofer output. In my case it’s the AntiMode 2.0 Dual Core connected to the pre-out of the Devialet and the sub then connected to the analog outputs of the AntiMode.

I agree with sam1000 it’s a very effective and easy to use ‘tool’ to flatten the response and avoid the big peaks. It won’t fill up dips due to cancellations as that is fysically impossible but it will give one more freedom in subwoofer placement e.g. in a corner or near walls.

Years ago I made a picture of a before and after, it’s here: https://devialetchat.com/Thread-Antoine-...390#pid390

But there’s many forms of DSP of course, both software or hardware based. One could also use REW like sam1000 mentioned to create convolution filters and apply these in Roon for example.

[PeppaPig]

Hi Sam, I never heard about DSpeaker before, I just had a quick look at it. Are you using it?? Do you hear a noticeable improvement? The device remains in the connection chain all the time?

I am not exactly sure how it can help to improve performance, because each sub has different characteristic and room is different too, how this device knows my room size and sub woofer spec? without knowing those parameters, it will be hard to do a proper optimization I guess.

And I assume high end sub woofer like REL S5 might already has something similar like this built in? Anyway its very interesting, I should do more research on it. Thanks for the information mate.

Hi PeppaPig:
Yes, I do own Dspeaker which can calibrate 2 subwoofers. The first thing you do with this device is to connect the supplied microphone and calibrate the response for your room at different locations. Some subwoofers like JL f112/113 have a calibration software built in. I'm not sure if REL includes calibration software. In my case, yes, the difference was quite remarkable mainly because my room is not ideal for audio and I have very limited acoustic treatment in the room. 
In your case you might not need it, but you can start with measuring the frequency response using the REW software which is a free download, however, you might want to buy a decent  microphone like this one. 
Here's a review from stereophile for dspeaker anti-mode device. 
Have fun.

Thanks Sam, I have looked more into the AntiMode product, it is very interesting!! Thanks for sharing it.

After you using AntiMode, do you feel bass become less? And do you think it introduced delay to the bass?

I have never use REW software too, probably should spend some time on it. Some of my music are not play via roon, they are on Spotify, so in this case I cannot use filter created by REW I guess.

Thanks!