Help me find my missing bass.

Originally Posted by tokerblue

There are a few things that may be causing the issue.

1. It's possible that your YPAO isn't very accurate when setting the volume for the sub. You can buy a SPL meter and double check the settings.

2. I'm not familiar with your receiver, but do you know if it suffers from the LFE problem of not increasing the LFE by +10 for PCM sources?

Originally Posted by Kal Rubinson

I do not know YPAO (doesn't he play for Houston in the NBA?). Does it check for phase/polarity of each speaker? It may be that the sub is not in phase with the others and you might try to vary it

Originally Posted by Kal Rubinson

Flip the switch anyway and see what happens. Nothing to lose.

The only other suggestions have to do with speaker and listener positioning.

Originally Posted by Richard Cohen

If you have a sound meter and have set your speakers to small try a test tone near or at the crossover frequency and see which phase setting gives you the most output.

I have had similar issues that you describe. With my receiver and JBL mains with 12" woofers I find setting the receiver speaker setting to LARGE works much better than small in most situations. The mid bass is much smoother and enveloping.

Give it a try and see what you like. No rules only what sounds good to you.

Originally Posted by Kal Rubinson

Try the classic trick. Put the sub where you sit and then crawl around to the possible sub sites. You can use your ears but a decent analysis system makes it easier.

Originally Posted by Ethan Winer

Lack of bass is very common and, assuming the gear and speakers are not faulty, is always improved by adding bass traps and possibly other acoustic treatment.

--Ethan

Originally Posted by krabapple

What is the crossover setting on the Hsu itself? It should either be OFF (if that's an option) or set as high as it can go.

Also: AFAIK Yamaha AVRs with YPAO, like Pioneer's MCACC-equipped AVRs, do no EQ of frequencies output from the subwoofer. It merely sets the low pass frequency, sub delay and sub channel levels. So if you actually need a the range of 80-100 to be EQd (boosted specifically), you may have to set the crossover lower than 80, so that the AVR can 'work on' the target frequencies (which will be output from the mains/satellites)

Also: check to make sure that your microphone for YPAO measurement is really where you head is (in both the vertical and horizontal dimensions). If you're off by too much, the readings your mic gets won't correspond to what you are hearing -- for example , your head might be in a null, but the YPAO mic isn't. Hence the AVR will suggest less bass, while your ears want more.

Finally: it may be that you are just a bass hound --- most music recordings don't have much 'chest thumping' bass. That's for movie sound effects.




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Originally Posted by Mr. Audio

Hoosier, your problem is extremely common and there are some common ways to significantly reduce it or even eliminate it. It's phase cancellation. The reason why you're loosing bass around 80Hz can be caused by your subwoofer and your mains canceling each other out at that particular band and/or the sound relfections in your room are bouncing back out of phase causing them to cancel as well. You can have a number of frequency bands cancel out on you and you're lucky if you're only dealing with one. You notice this more on music because HT can still sound really good even though you're getting cancellation from 80 to 90Hz because it's a lot easier to be fooled when you hear tons of really low bass and it kinda covers up the lack of mid-bass. Music is not forgiving in the least due to the 80Hz band being where you get all the kick from a bass drum and running bass from the bass guitar. You cut all that out and your music sounds thin and empty.

How do you fix it? No. 1 is speaker placement. Some people choose to fight problems like these with bass traps so they can keep their room in the configuration they want. The best way is to do both in which it has a much greater chance of eliminating your problem completely rather then reducing it to an acceptable level. You can totally eliminate the cancellations by just moving your speakers around, but not always. If you want more details I will elaborate if you would like me to.

Originally Posted by Kal Rubinson

Well, did you try flipping the polarity switch?

Originally Posted by Mr. Audio

Ok. What you should do first is get a real bass tester that can do a sine sweep anywhere from 150 to 200 Hz down to 20Hz. You'll need this to hear your actual bass frequency response. You may be able to just download something like that from this forum somewhere or you can buy a Bass Mechanic CD that has tons of different test tones and sine sweeps. Either way, just make sure you have the sweep mentioned above. Another bass tester I own announces the frequency and plays it for 5 seconds and moves on to the next. This is extremely handy for pinpointing exactly what frequencies are canceling and how wide the band actually is. If you can get a hold of a bass tester like this I highly recommend it.

Once you get the bass tester, now you wanna get the cold hard truth about what you're really listing to and play the sine sweep and take notes on what you hear. Phase cancellation has a very distinct sound. Usually it sounds like a massive dip to where you hear almost nothing at all, but you can still hear things resonate in the room as if bass were there. It won't be hard to hear them because it will be a very obvious dip. Take note of how many you hear as the frequencies sweep down to 20Hz. Naturally you'll want to take into account the specs of your equipment. You have a VTF-3 MK-3 which is a totally bad ass subwoofer than can produce well under 20Hz with no strain so listen for dips in your low bass that you might not even be aware of. So after you've heard how ugly and choppy your response is it's time to start the process of elimination and optimization.

You begin by playing the sine sweep through no other speakers but the subwoofer. Set the sub to the crossover point you want it at and test to hear if you are getting any massive dips with just the sub. If everything sounds smooth, then the room is not adversely interacting with your sub. If it's not smooth, move the sub in different areas until you find the best spot. Now this can be anywhere, even near or right next to your seating position. Once you've done that, move on to the mains only, no sub. Mains are a little different. With mains you have to find the best position not only for smooth bass reproduction, but sound quality as well. Not a lot of people take into account that mains can cancel each other out due to their placement in the room. My mains had to be placed near the side and front walls in order to sound good with minimal cancellation. This worked out ok because my speakers are ported in the front and not the rear. I've always achieved the best results spreading my mains wide instead of the more eye appealing right next to the TV stand. Anyway, you want to play the sine sweep through only your mains the same as you did your sub until you've gotten the smoothest response. Then you want to play music you know well through the mains only to hear if the rest sounds good. If they don't, moving the speakers closer to you can clear up the midrange. Moving them back from you will give you more bass and less clarity most likely. One thing I that did the trick for me was placing one speaker a few inches closer to me to rid of cancellation. If you do that, adjust your speaker levels according to what you moved of course.

Finally once you've reduced the room cancellations as best you can, it's time to play the sweep with the mains and sub on together. This is where you will possibly have to use the phase switch on your sub. Play the sweep through on o degrees and on 180 degrees and listen for which sounds the best. Then if you're still getting cancellation, try moving the sub around A LITTLE first. Then see if moving the mains A LITTLE in any direction will help.

This process is a lot of trial and error since you can't SEE sound and can be very discouraging when it doesn't work out right away. However it is extremely rewarding to your ears when you music doesn't sound like crap anymore. It's worth the hassle. I cut this post short intentionally due length. Feel free to ask questions.