On Sat, 12 Mar 2005 23:23:44 -0500, George
wrote:

I have had a few different setups over the years but one thing seems to
always stay consistent: I've always had to boost the bass on my head unit
in order to get decent output from my subwoofers. Right now I have a
Pioneer DEH-P2600 which has 2.2V preouts hooked up to a DEI D1200.1 amp
and a pair of Infinity Reference subs. I need to have the 40 hz region
EQ on my HU maxed out at +12 dB or otherwise I can't even tell I have subs.

I've had other setups with completely different components and I have the
same result. A lack of bass without any boost. I keep reading about
other folks who get sufficient bass output while everything is
flat so I don't understand why my systems require a big boost.

Can someone suggest why this may be the case? I plan on getting a more
expensive subwoofer in the near future and I don't want to be pushing it
unnecessarily if I can help it.

Thanks,
George


Could be several things. First, I've always been happiest with a
slight amount of boost in the bass frequencies rather than setting
everything perfectly flat. Nothing near +12dB, though.

What frequencies are you sending to your subs? You mentioned that
you're boosting the 40 Hz region, but you didn't mention what your
low-pass crossover is. If your crossover is set very low, like 50 Hz,
and you're playing a lot of tapes, FM radio, MP3, or other sources
that don't have very much low-frequency information in them, you just
may not be sending much of anything to the subs in the first place.

Also, are you sure you have the amplifier gains set correctly on your
sub amp? How did you set them? What size/impedance are your subs?
Are you using the low-pass crossover on the head unit, on the
amplifier, or both? Could your subs be wired out-of-phase and
cancelling each other out? What kind of enclosure are your subs in?

It sounds like something's misconfigured, because depending on the
impedance of your subs, your amplifier should be capable of providing
somewhere between 450 and 1200 watts. Even just 450 watts into a pair
of subs should be more than enough to make your hair bounce.


--
Scott Gardner

"If you find yourself in a hole, the first thing to do is stop diggin'."