I hope my feeble post/story helps someone else who is searching for subwoofers.
It all started 3-4 years ago when I was lurking at this forum and decided after much trepidation to buy an Onkyo Receiver for my new home theatre stereo system. I never used it as intended and put two speakers on it and called it a day. So that hopefully demonstrates the depth of my knowledge about Home Audio!
Background: I built a house with a 40'x35'x15' Great Room with 3 pairs of 120 watt, 12" ceiling speakers in this room with wiring for a sub in the corner and mains/fronts in the back where the kitchen is and behind the couch and TV wall. I never found the right person to hook the system up, so we just watch our 60" plasma with two Sony speakers over on the side. Kind of redneck, I know. But when your frame of reference is nothing.."'something" is good... and that was the status quo for us.
After visiting a buddy's fancy house in Silicon Valley, that had total house automation from his ipad, I researched and hired a Control4 dealer to come out and help automate some features around my house: sound, ipod, dvd, tv, lights, thermosat, etc.
When I finally heard my ceilings' speakers, I realized I needed a subwoofer for the Great Room (25,000 cubic feet). Dahhhh, I know! The installation fella wanted to sell me a proprietary sub for a few hundred and it didn't feel right ,so wanting to research the right subwoofer to buy brought me back the the AVSFORUM
Being a true Scottsmen, the BIC F12 was my first choice after 30 minutes of lurking. Went to my local BB store and they did not have it (online sight said they did - weasels). Called BIC and tried to find where I could pick one up in Northern California (Was trying to get one in a day kind of thing). Couldn't do it. So back to the AVSForum. btw, BIC recommended the Kevlar VK-12 on the phone to me for that space & budget.
I Kept reading all the posts about subwoofers that I thought would work. I got the impression I was going to need to increase my budget from $200 to $600 to get a 15" sub for the massive space (keeping in mind I was not trying to pressurize the room, just get some low frequencies and improve my situation/listening experience). After more reading, I decided to step up to the Outlaw LFM-1EX: called and found I could not get one delivered until April (back ordered). Ug!
ar%$#*&^%
Kept reading posts. Called Cadence and they offered me $100 off the CSX15 Mark II (only $399+ shipping) and I thought this was the bomb...but I couldn't find reviews and that was concern. I read the jimwilson thread, but he had not followed up on the CSX15 demo as of March 15...
So back to reading more reviews. After thinking about the Cadence, I finally read that two smaller subs might be better than one expensive one. This appealed to the Scottsmen in me. Plus, I could buy one now and add one later. Or use the first one in the master bedroom and buy a bigger one etc. So I read many more posts on this subject...
So I went back to researching BIC's again, then onto psw505's, Energy and others on the shootout lists for this price range. I read the budget threads, read the Hsu threads....again trying to see if two smaller/cheaper subs would be better than a larger/expensive one. I kept finding great deals on low budget subwoofers, coupon codes, buy now threads etc.
I was going crazy as a newbie trying to make sense of it all...
Finally, I called Hsu Research (popular in this forum) and chatted with them for a while as I did with many other manufacturers. After drinking a couple of beers in my great room and pondering my options (the causal relationship between price/quality), I talked myself into spending $1,069 for the Hsu VTF-15H delivered to my door. I know this will not pressurize the space. And possibly two Cadence's, Epiks or Outlaws might have been better (or similar for my needs). But I was just damn happy I made a decision - any decision, and I was content with it.
From what I read, I think any powered woofer in $1,000 plus range was needed for my great room in my situation (yes, many would argue I would need at least two subwoofers of this caliber). Plus, I was not wired for two subs nor did I want to have that conversation with my wife!
Conclusion:
The hardest challenge over the past three days was the realization that a $300 subwoofer was not going to fix, help, or enhance my situaion in any way shape or form ( due to the size of the room). A $600 subwoofer was going to bridge/enhance the quality gap and give me future options. But the $1,000 plus was where I needed to start for MY situation/room.
Once I made the mental jump to spend in the $1000+ range for a subwoofer (regardless of the manufacturer), I was quite relieved. Or drunk, I am still a little fuzzy with a hangover this morning...
I wanted to thank all the previous posters in this forum as every reply: the scientific, the empirical, and the bias/flaming ones all helped me decide in some little way on my final decision
If there is ever a get together in the greater San Francisco area, would love to be invited (with or without the wife). Being involved in an "audio shootout" is now on my Bucket List!!!!!
As a footnote: I think I have the audio bug, I haven't even received my first sub in the mail and I just ordered a BIC-Pl-200 ($279 delivered) for the master bedroom (16'x22'x10') to add some bottom end to the pair of 12" ceiling speakers in that area! Hopefully by this time next week I can control it all from my ipad.
It all started 3-4 years ago when I was lurking at this forum and decided after much trepidation to buy an Onkyo Receiver for my new home theatre stereo system. I never used it as intended and put two speakers on it and called it a day. So that hopefully demonstrates the depth of my knowledge about Home Audio!
Background: I built a house with a 40'x35'x15' Great Room with 3 pairs of 120 watt, 12" ceiling speakers in this room with wiring for a sub in the corner and mains/fronts in the back where the kitchen is and behind the couch and TV wall. I never found the right person to hook the system up, so we just watch our 60" plasma with two Sony speakers over on the side. Kind of redneck, I know. But when your frame of reference is nothing.."'something" is good... and that was the status quo for us.
After visiting a buddy's fancy house in Silicon Valley, that had total house automation from his ipad, I researched and hired a Control4 dealer to come out and help automate some features around my house: sound, ipod, dvd, tv, lights, thermosat, etc.
When I finally heard my ceilings' speakers, I realized I needed a subwoofer for the Great Room (25,000 cubic feet). Dahhhh, I know! The installation fella wanted to sell me a proprietary sub for a few hundred and it didn't feel right ,so wanting to research the right subwoofer to buy brought me back the the AVSFORUM
Being a true Scottsmen, the BIC F12 was my first choice after 30 minutes of lurking. Went to my local BB store and they did not have it (online sight said they did - weasels). Called BIC and tried to find where I could pick one up in Northern California (Was trying to get one in a day kind of thing). Couldn't do it. So back to the AVSForum. btw, BIC recommended the Kevlar VK-12 on the phone to me for that space & budget.
I Kept reading all the posts about subwoofers that I thought would work. I got the impression I was going to need to increase my budget from $200 to $600 to get a 15" sub for the massive space (keeping in mind I was not trying to pressurize the room, just get some low frequencies and improve my situation/listening experience). After more reading, I decided to step up to the Outlaw LFM-1EX: called and found I could not get one delivered until April (back ordered). Ug!
ar%$#*&^%Kept reading posts. Called Cadence and they offered me $100 off the CSX15 Mark II (only $399+ shipping) and I thought this was the bomb...but I couldn't find reviews and that was concern. I read the jimwilson thread, but he had not followed up on the CSX15 demo as of March 15...
So back to reading more reviews. After thinking about the Cadence, I finally read that two smaller subs might be better than one expensive one. This appealed to the Scottsmen in me. Plus, I could buy one now and add one later. Or use the first one in the master bedroom and buy a bigger one etc. So I read many more posts on this subject...
So I went back to researching BIC's again, then onto psw505's, Energy and others on the shootout lists for this price range. I read the budget threads, read the Hsu threads....again trying to see if two smaller/cheaper subs would be better than a larger/expensive one. I kept finding great deals on low budget subwoofers, coupon codes, buy now threads etc.
I was going crazy as a newbie trying to make sense of it all...
Finally, I called Hsu Research (popular in this forum) and chatted with them for a while as I did with many other manufacturers. After drinking a couple of beers in my great room and pondering my options (the causal relationship between price/quality), I talked myself into spending $1,069 for the Hsu VTF-15H delivered to my door. I know this will not pressurize the space. And possibly two Cadence's, Epiks or Outlaws might have been better (or similar for my needs). But I was just damn happy I made a decision - any decision, and I was content with it.
From what I read, I think any powered woofer in $1,000 plus range was needed for my great room in my situation (yes, many would argue I would need at least two subwoofers of this caliber). Plus, I was not wired for two subs nor did I want to have that conversation with my wife!
Conclusion:
The hardest challenge over the past three days was the realization that a $300 subwoofer was not going to fix, help, or enhance my situaion in any way shape or form ( due to the size of the room). A $600 subwoofer was going to bridge/enhance the quality gap and give me future options. But the $1,000 plus was where I needed to start for MY situation/room.
Once I made the mental jump to spend in the $1000+ range for a subwoofer (regardless of the manufacturer), I was quite relieved. Or drunk, I am still a little fuzzy with a hangover this morning...
I wanted to thank all the previous posters in this forum as every reply: the scientific, the empirical, and the bias/flaming ones all helped me decide in some little way on my final decision
If there is ever a get together in the greater San Francisco area, would love to be invited (with or without the wife). Being involved in an "audio shootout" is now on my Bucket List!!!!!
As a footnote: I think I have the audio bug, I haven't even received my first sub in the mail and I just ordered a BIC-Pl-200 ($279 delivered) for the master bedroom (16'x22'x10') to add some bottom end to the pair of 12" ceiling speakers in that area! Hopefully by this time next week I can control it all from my ipad.
