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Open Letter To REL, SVS, Hsu, etc., et al

Why don’t you include a cd that will actually enable your customers to properly set up their purchase from you? Telling me to choose something with ‘low bass content’ and put it on repeat is pathetic at best. There are very specific and very limited numbers of tones needed to dial in a sub. One of the above companies tells me to use track 4 from ‘Sneakers’, a 29 year old movie, as an aid in dialing in a sub. Maybe in 70 years the track will be in the public domain and they can just rip it for free to whatever medium is current in 2091.
Test tones, as far as I know, aren’t copyrighted, and would cost very little to put on a cd. 50 blank cd’s cost 15.00 retail. Include one with tones and instructions in the box. Tidal, Spotify, Qobuz, etc., etc., would also qualify as a place to put your sub setup tones, along with detailed voice instructions. 
I know many people now use automated setups in their AVR’s, but I’d bet many reading this on Audiogon don’t- most two channel systems are behind the times in this regard.
Or am I missing something?
james_edward
ieales's avatar
ieales
1,201 posts
 
Once again, if your 2 channel speakers such so bad in bass that you need to "Dr" it with a sub, you bought the wrong set of 2 channel speakers to begin with and they should be replaced Pronto. All my opinion, some may object lol....
@audioguy85
Pray, do tell, what perfect HiFi speakers do you own?

Adding a sub properly, i.e. with a crossover to roll the bottom from the mains, reduces amplifier load thus increasing headroom and reducing woofer distortion.

Look at the low end impedance curve of many highly regarded [by some] speakers. With tube amplification, a sub is almost mandatory.

"An articulate, extended and veracious low end adds realism out of all proportion to the numbers." - me
t-mac
14 posts
 
Grab the Jennifer Warnes CD called The Hunter.
That's my sub reference CD for tuning.
tomic601's avatar
tomic601
13,735 posts
 
none other than the great Max Townshend ; “ pushing the boundaries of audio playback requires more understanding of our art form objectively, not just hearing but understanding through measurements “......

listen and measure......
tomic601's avatar
tomic601
13,735 posts
 
nice short Q and A with Max, back page TAS , March 2021
justplainlawr
1 posts
 
Martin Logan subs have a Tone sweep button mentioned in this video. https://youtu.be/wty1M6GzVt4

Good points made above that it would be nice if the SVS app could generate test tones.

Using the tone generator in REW is simple solution.

Is it not more important to use demo material that you are familiar with, so that when you add or take away equipment, you can hear the difference. The most important thing is to keep it consistent. If a demo CD is introducing new content along with new hardware... what’s the point?
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