Help Upgrading - Lower Bass Seeked

IB, +1, very accurate analysis, thank you.

DBLs.

All known speaker ills are cured by DBLs

:-)

I like it!

1 pair DBLs and a chair in the room and no other furniture.

In a 3.5m x 4.5m room after installing a pair of DBLs there won't be room for anything else (even the equipment rack will have to be outside the room).

plenty of room -- if I remember right, the room they were developed in was 11 foot by 11 foot. Or something like that?

+1 to Innocent Bystanders comments above.

mat,

If you are inclined to have two subwoofers, and can afford it, then by all means try it in your room.  In my experience I prefer the sound of stereo subs.  It is of course possible to obtain very enjoyable replay with one well integrated sub, and that is a viable compromise (every system invoves compromise).  The proof is in the listening.  The only caveate is that effort must be expended in the "integration" process before you can make judgement.  So audition will not be trivial.  This is perhaps the major drawback of subwoofer(s).

Charlie

I was being ironic (hence the emoticons).

However, at the time, internally by Naim staff, they were known as the "Damn Big Loudspeaker"!

Most definitely FBL originally... or so I was told by JV (so it could have been an ironic twist to the tale, but there you go)

He called the electrostatic speakers "flash harry" for their propensity to spark.... (if my memory is right, it was a LONG time ago)

a pair of allaes would give you plenty of bass and can be placed near the wall, plus with a 200 would be plenty of power needed.

Yes, FBL originally in early development, "Damn..." after the commercial abbreviation 'DBL' was decided upon.

To add a Sub to your system is the cheapest way but take care that it's very difficult to set up correctly and to place the sub.

I had once speaker from MBL (model 126) and wanted heavy bass: so I bought an expensive REL sub. For me it was a nightmare: the regulation of volume and frequency of intervention never satisfied me and with different type of music the result was very different ! So I decided to sell both the MBL and the Sub and to buy a bigger speaker with a heavy bass.

I have found an answer to the problem of sub positioning and alignment...

First get  copy of Room Equalisation Wizard and use the 'Room Simulator' dialogue.  Enter the position and bass cut-off of your main speakers, the dialogue will show the 'in room' frequency response of your main speakers.  Then add a sub to the mix, set the upper filter cut-off point of the sub to the same as the lower cut of the main speakers, and try moving it around in the dialogue box to see how the frequency response changes (the changes when you move the sub are not subtle!).  If you want you can also try changing the upper filter cut-off point of the sub, as sometimes an overlap works best.  This process will give you a few (typically 2 or 3) candidate positions for the sub for you to try out for real.  In my case the position it indicated was best was one that I thought was ridiculous, so I tried the other two positions first.  Then I tried the 'ridiculous' position that the software had recommended - it was right, I was wrong!

I then used a microphone (initially on a tablet, later on a laptop) and used this to refine the sub's HF filter point and volume setting to get a smooth crossover response.  Now the sub is consistent with all genres of music (and even with speech).

This way is consistent and not difficult to do (it's much easier than trying to do it by ear).

The problem with this is that it assumes I can position the sub anywhere in the room. As I said in an earlier post I don't think I have anywhere I can position an extra box. If only!

So unfortunately, since the geek in me is thrilled by the possibility of a sub, I'm gonna have to buy bigger speakers.

mat,

Unfortunately, if you just use speakers with greater bass extension, you may find that you just end up with excessive excitation of the fundamental room modes.  Greater bass extension may work for you, or it may not work for you; depending on the size of the room and the position of the speakers.

Usually, the smaller the room, the greater the magnitude of the problem.

If you're going down this route, you really do need a home demo to see if any particular speakers are going to work for you.

Reposting because of error - there's an amazing speaker that truly LOWERS your bass, at least according to the seller (no reviews yet). It's on a well known auction site -search transmission line horn (sorry, in my original posting of this earlier today I wrongly said transmission line bass, so not easily leading to it).