Small or large sub for music

Large subs go deeper, better and louder.

HOWEVER! Larger subs are harder to match to the room. The lower they go, the more room modes you are likely to find. 

With proper room treatment, and good EQ, a good 15" sub will do music or movies absolutely superbly with any speaker. 

Without those two .... a small sub is far less dangerous and more likely to work for you.

Erik,

I use the HGS-10s and 15s with SMS-1 bass managers that provide acoustic room correction.  I noticed when I played the Saint-Saens 3rd symphony that the pedal notes are not as well realized by the HGS-10s as they are by the KEF Reference 107/2s.  I think the 10s extend to just below 30 Hz whereas the 107/2s and 15s extend to below 20 Hz, so pedal notes have that more felt than heard vibration I sense at live recitals.

db

Just get a larger room, sorry thats not an answer...big woofer more full deep bass, small woofer better tunefulness most the time, big woofers are better for some , small better for others, depends on what sub what room, what you like... thanks
Matt

Room modes cease below the frequency where the bass wave is twice the length of the longest room dimension. For 18 feet this is 31hz. Smaller rooms, it is higher.

Subwoofer size has nothing to do with how boomy, fast, or slow it sounds. That is a function of qtc and group delay.

The largest effect on how a sub sounds is placement and the room. Room treatments help with ringing, dsp with frequency response at the listening position.

I ran velodyne subs for 25 years. F1000, ULD-12s in stereo, HGS-10, HGS-12. I have moved on to Rythmik. A L12 in my office and F15hp in my main system. The L12 is the equivilant of an HGS, the F series takes the HGS and wipes the floor. It is like a layer of crud cleaned off, nearly dry sounding, articulate, deep, and much higher output capability. It is a great step forward and well worth the upgrade. A pair is recommended to minimize room modes, the f12 probably being more than sufficient.

Two quibbles:

1 - Room modes ARE ringing
2 - Once bass traps are in place, DSP helps with ringing and nulls. .

Not going to argue this, plenty of professional acoustics literature out there. The bass traps help de-energize the rninging, and make DSP’s possible. You can even clean up nulls this way.

The combination of sub placement, room acoustics and DSP all contribute. Well done, they are lightning fast and completely organic sounding, and bigger = better.

However, poorly done, limited placement, no bass traps, no EQ, a small sub may often sound better.

Best,

Erik