Small or large sub for music

I'm firmly in the "DSP robs the music of some soul" camp (I don't trust the sonic opinions of the designers...how do they know what I want to hear?), and think a normal room (meaning with furniture, rugs, and stuff other than traps and damping panels) can sound great. If you live in a steel shipping container with no furniture you have other issues to worry about that DSP ain't gonna fix. Using 2 subs takes care of a lot of the aforementioned room mode issues if they're receiving the same signal (not stereo) at the same time...it just works. Also, if sub levels are too loud, turn it down. 

Thanks for all the advice.  Whether I use 10, 12, or 15 inch subs I will use a pair, most likely placed just behind the speaker stand.  Looks good and sounds good in my experience.  The sub will be non-ported.  

I've almost decided on rosewood KEF Reference 1s.  A pair Rhythmic F12s in piano black might be a good upgrade from my aging Velodyne HGS-10s or 15s.  I might continue to use the Velodyne SMS-1 bass manager that provides acoustic room correction, although that may be redundant with the F12s.

Thanks again for helping me firm up my plan.

db

I have two Rhythmic 15 inchers. I too thought I would place them on the inside of the tower speakers. That didn't work, so I went to the printed manual and they suggested placing them on opposite ends of the room pointing towards the middle. Magic! The difference was night and day.

dbphd,
Acoustical engineers have proven that bass response performance in any given room improves as the number of subs is increased and that the size of the drivers in the subs is much less important than the actual number of subs in the room. 2 will perform better than 1, 3 better than 2 and 4 or more is just exceptionally good.
Of course, these experts realize that there’s a limit to the number of subs consumers will allow in their home rooms; or at least that consumers’ significant others will allow in their home rooms.
Through research, they discovered statistically that using 4 subs in a room provided the vast majority of bass performance benefits of using many more subs did while still remaining a feasible number for home use if reasonably sized.
In your situation, I’m almost certain that using 4 moderately sized subs would provide significantly better bass response than 2 subs randomly placed with one behind each main speaker. I believe this will hold true irregardless of the price, quality or driver size of the subs you choose based on specific scientific research on this very subject and my personal experience supports this conclusion.

If you have a decent sized room and want state of the art bass response, I suggest you at least read the Absolute Sound review of a DBA (link below) so you can make a more informed final decision.

https://forum.audiogon.com/discussions/anyone-else-using-an-audio-kinesis-swarm-or-debra-distributed...

Best wishes,
Tim

dbphd,

Sorry, I linked the wrong link for The Absolute Sound DBA review.

Here’s the correct link:
www.theabsolutesound.com/articles/audiokinesis-swarm-subwoofer-system/

I also forgot to mention that the Audio Kinesis subs are positioned facing and within an inch of the wall. So all you see of them in the room is the attractive wood you choose covering the top, back and sides of each sub (connections are on the bottom).   I use the supplied spikes for each on my carpeted floor. My wife says they look like art gallery pedestals and usually has a vase of fresh flowers atop 1 or more.

Tim