Practical tips for setting up your subwoofer(s)

Positioning is most of the battle won....

It’s never that great to put subs on the front stage. 

Try some positions like this....Hopefully your subs will take a XLR input, because they might need a longer XLR cable. Hide it under the rug or whatever...

Try to get a reference point for excellent bass (determine what excellent bass sounds like), if there’s some dude’s setup near your house and he knows what’s going on....kinda hard to explain what you never heard.

If done right, there will be a womb of bass and you’ll never know where your subs or speakers or anything is located...It will just feel like a womb of bass and music/instruments floating around in a 3 dimensional sphere.....gotta work on that envelopment..

If done really right...it should shut down your mind and the music should be all inside of ya, you whole body engulfed with it....the true goal is to shut down the audiophile’s foolish mind. You shouldn’t be able to know where the hell you are. You should disappear as well (like your speakers and subs did) and reach a state of nirvana.....

@deep_333 Interesting placements. The subs in the back pull the soundstage toward the sweet spot. I’ll try the front two in the places you suggest. In the front the subs are normally either in the corners or, I saw one placement from Rel with the front left sub in the corner and the front right sub to the left of the front speaker.

Those of us without any bass management or LFE have to take a slightly different approach. Here is my experience adding a subwoofer.

Without any HPF to the mains a lower than normal sub LPF will integrate better with less overlap. Since there is already a slight latency with the use of the crossover filter I prefer not to add any more by using any additional DSP such as  PEQ adjustments.

I am lucky to have a dedicated listening room so can position the sub closer to the listening position than the mains are. In my case it's almost 2 feet closer as I have no way to adjust distances with the amplifier. 

I have tried many different crossover settings but always return to 45 hz as it blends well with my speakers and room. I have a second identical sub ordered, just awaiting the back ordered SB1000 Pro to finally ship. Here is my equipment list:

Marantz PM8006, Denon DNP2000NE, XLO interconnects, Elipson 24F, SB1000 Pro (2), some diffusion and absorption in a 21'x24' room.

@pennpencil 

Yes! Positioning the sub is critical

I wouldn't get caught up in that, especially for music. That's more applicable for ULF for movies. What if it's optimally in front of your door or an entry? It's unrealistic and a time killer. Unless you have a room 3D map of your low frequency acoustics, it's best to put them as near the front speakers as possible because you will be able to localize it and it will also help reduce the timing differences with the speakers. You'll have to make compromises one way or the other.

@davegood 

Those of us without any bass management or LFE have to take a slightly different approach.

Personally, I avoid bass management and LFE at all cost unless it's a single sub config. Music is in stereo and it's less dynamic and spacious to down-convert it to mono. I use high level or stereo RCA, measure it, use a digital EQ from a preamp and knock down any overlap. Most likely, the sub will have a crossover knob that's sufficient without needing EQ, like you having it at 45Hz. For movies, I do the same and send LFE to the mains. Bass management was a home theater compromise for consumers without full range speakers. But if you have subs connected to each speaker, you have full range and therefore don't need bass management.