# Need help getting more out of my SVS ultra



## bevofrancis (May 15, 2009)

I'll start by saying long time listener first time caller. 

Here is my setup.
fronts polk RTi A5's
Center polk Csi A4
Sides polk FXi A6'
Rears polk RM8s
Sub SVS pb13 ultra
Receiver denon 1909
RS spl meter
room 24x14 with a stairway in the rear, and a large archway leading to the rest of the downstairs. The sub is currently setting in the front left corner opposite of the archway.

Room treatments are out of the question.

I have a huge null that drops my 60hz by 30 db compared to my 20hz. There is a natural curve from 15-50hz that drops pretty evenly about 10db. I actually kind of like that because it brings out the rumble in movies but doesn't make the audible bass overwhelming. But when I get to 60hz the bass just dies, and then comes back up about 10db for 70-80. It makes listening to music horrible.

The null runs almost the entire length of the room straight down the center, a foot below and above the listening position as is about 3 feet wide. It amazes me that I can hardly hear bass at 60hz at my position and then stand up or move my head of few feet left or right and it's fine.

The only suggestions I can not do are room treatments, at least for now. I might be able to start sneaking them in, if I find some my wife like the looks of, but really I don't want to do it yet.

I'm going to have a friend come over and help me find a better spot for the sub over the weekend. The ultra is near impossible to move around on your own, so placement is difficult for me. Hopefully he will stay for a few hours and really help me out.

Anyway my questions are:
Since my sub is so heavy, where could some easy places to set it be to do some testing?
What options would you suggest for me? I have read about REW, and this that and the other, but I really don't know where to start. It seems like I could go with the REW BFD setup, but really after buying the BFD, a sound card, and a decent mic or spl I would have as much money in that as an SMS-1. 
I have looked at the SVS automatic peq thing but I really don't want to spend that much yet.

I'm not ruling out anything, but would like to make it as affordable and easy(probably impossible) as possible. I have read about people not liking the SMS-1 for one reason or another, and really don't know if it works well or not, but for 350$ shipped it is an option. It's really the option I am leaning toward, but I don't want to regret buying it after I do. Another thing is, I like to listen to music and movies with the bass at different levels. Can levels be adjusted on the fly with the SMS-1 or does it lock the sub in at a certain level and need to be disabled to turn up the sub without using the subs level knob.


Really any advice would be great. I just need to know what direction to go in.

One thing I forgot. I keep reading about when to run my receivers audysseyy, and people seem to disagree on if you do it before or after you try and tame peaks. Should I turn off the peq on my sub before I run Audysseyy, and then try and tame a peak, or should I try and tame the peak before I run audysseyy?


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## tonyvdb (Sep 5, 2007)

Have you tried adjusting the phase on the ultra? I found that turning my phase knob I could actually move the dip around the crossover up or down the frequency range.


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## bevofrancis (May 15, 2009)

tonyvdb said:


> Have you tried adjusting the phase on the ultra? I found that turning my phase knob I could actually move the dip around the crossover up or down the frequency range.


I actually did get 60hz to come up about 5db with the phase, and it helped some but I'm still way off where I want it to be.


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## drdoan (Aug 30, 2006)

Welcome Bevo. Have fun. Dennis


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## tonyvdb (Sep 5, 2007)

Placement is a big part of getting it right. Have you tried moving the sub? Even a few feet can make a huge difference.


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## DougMac (Jan 24, 2008)

The Ultra is a beast. I think your best bet is "placement by crawling around". It might be hard to get the Ultra on a sturdy table at your listening position, though.

Are you using REW and doing sweeps? Are you using Audyssey? Do you have your fronts set as large or small? The frequency at which you have your null makes me wonder if your mains and the sub are fighting each other.


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## bevofrancis (May 15, 2009)

DougMac said:


> The Ultra is a beast. I think your best bet is "placement by crawling around". It might be hard to get the Ultra on a sturdy table at your listening position, though.
> 
> Are you using REW and doing sweeps? Are you using Audyssey? Do you have your fronts set as large or small? The frequency at which you have your null makes me wonder if your mains and the sub are fighting each other.


I haven't used REW because I don't have an external sound card. I have been doing manual sweeps as best as I can though and I just used excel to graph them. My fronts are small at 80hz and I haven't been playing any tones that the mains would use. 

I moved the sub out of the corner and across the room. The null is still there but not as bad. 60 hz went up a little, but not enough. I can't believe that moving the sub that much didn't help. 
When I figure out how to post the graphs I made I will.


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## tonyvdb (Sep 5, 2007)

You wont be able to post graphs until your post count is above 5 you can use our post padding thread to accomplish that and then you can upload your graphs to our Image Gallery and link to them in this thread.

It still sounds like a phase problem with your mains at the crossover range.


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## bevofrancis (May 15, 2009)

I think my room is jsut screwed. No matter where I have moved the sub, the null stays right down the center of the room. The last place I put it, it helped the most, but the bass in our living room and kitchen was rattling the light fixtures, and was way to loud in the living room.

I only have one spot left I can try, but it is right beside the staircase, and that would probably send all kinds of bass upstairs toward the bedrooms, and I can't have that.

I'm almost ready to pull the trigger on a SMS-1 and just try and level everything out with that. If I can sell me polk rm8's I use for surrounds( I have new surrounds on the way) I might even go for the SVS EQ. Really though I don't think anything is going to help the center of my room. I'll try with the graph again.


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## bevofrancis (May 15, 2009)

Here is my humble and first attempt at excel.


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## tonyvdb (Sep 5, 2007)

Have you tried to change the crossover setting on your mains? Go up to 100Hz or down to 60Hz and see what happens? and make sure you dont have the subs internal crossover turned on.


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## drdoan (Aug 30, 2006)

have you tried the center of a long wall, instead of the corners? That is where mine works best. Also, I would encourage you to get the AS-EQ1 from SVSound. It has made a major improvement in my bass. Dennis


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## bevofrancis (May 15, 2009)

Deleted because I'm new to this and this was a dumb question.


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## bevofrancis (May 15, 2009)

drdoan said:


> have you tried the center of a long wall, instead of the corners? That is where mine works best. Also, I would encourage you to get the AS-EQ1 from SVSound. It has made a major improvement in my bass. Dennis


I just tried that and it worked out better then anywhere else. It didn't completely eliminate the null, but it helped a whole bunch.

Heres my little excel graph. It has a pretty steep curve, but if it didn't drop off at 70 I would actually be pretty happy with it. I like my floor to rumble anyway during movies.

I wish I knew another way to post these graphs besides pdf.


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## tonyvdb (Sep 5, 2007)

bevofrancis said:


> Deleted because I'm new to this and this was a dumb question.


There is never such a thing as a dumb question, 
even though your crossover is set at 80Hz it is just a slope meaning that at 80Hz it will slope the lower frequencies down to nothing so you will still have information below 80Hz usually down to about 40Hz before its all gone.
When you said that you played with the phase control did you have someone else turn it slowly while playing a 60Hz tone to see when it sounded the best while you were sitting at the listening position?


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## bevofrancis (May 15, 2009)

I set my spl meter right at my ear level at my listening position while I turned the knob. I got it to boost the 60 and 70hz as high as I could and tried to lower the huge 50hz peak I had. For some reason audysseyy left the 70hz alone and boosted everything else like crazy. It's by far the best result I have had so far, I just widh it wouldn't have made the curve so steep. 

Slowly but surely I'm starting to learn something from you guys.

What would everyone recomend, The SMS-1, REW BFD combo, or is the SVS EQ actually worth the price, and after the last result I got is any of it worth the trouble?

The only thing I really don't like now is that it is beside me and it's pretty easy to tell where the bass is coming from.


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## kareface (Jan 30, 2010)

Here is a great compareson of the SMS-1 and the BFD:
http://www.avforums.com/forums/subwoofers-tactile-transducers/473613-bfd-v-sms-1-review.html

I can't speak for the SVS.


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## glaufman (Nov 25, 2007)

Try moving the LP. Even if it's unacceptable by aesthetic standards, at least you'll know. The idea I'm going for is that if your LP is sitting in a null, then NOTHING you do, short of moving the LP or installing acoustic treatments will get rid of that null. Even if it can't be moved/fixed that's to aesthetics, knowing at least means you can focus your efforts in other places where they'll be more fruitful.


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## bevofrancis (May 15, 2009)

I think this weekend I might move my entire room around, and instead having it setup long, I might use the width of the room instead and see how that works. That would mean going from 7.1 to 5.1 though. I really wouldn't mind that, because I just got dipole surrounds today. It amazed me how much better they sound. Instead of the sound coming from the speaker, it's more like my entire wall is a speaker now. Well worht the money for the upgrade.


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## kareface (Jan 30, 2010)

From the standpoint of acoustics having your mains against the wide wall will be much worse then against the narrow one in most cases. The only real exception to this is if your mains require being so far away from the side walls and the narrow portion of the room can't support the distance required. Even then it's more of a issue of your speakers being in a room too small for their dispersion, and the will sound better in a larger room that uses one of the layouts listed below.


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## bevofrancis (May 15, 2009)

Well, I ordered the SVS-1 today. I think it will fit me the best, because I just don't have enough alone time to sit down and listen to sweeps and tones. I still might try to help out the null a little more this weekend. I would really like to get the sub back in front of me somehow, or farther behind me. Where it sets now is just no good for music, it's just way to easy to hear where the bass is coming from. It's not so bad for movies, but it would be better if I can just get it away from me a little.


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## kareface (Jan 30, 2010)

Do you mean the SMS-1?


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## bevofrancis (May 15, 2009)

kareface said:


> Do you mean the SMS-1?


Yes, that's what I mean. I just had SVS on the mind.


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## bevofrancis (May 15, 2009)

I found a site and showed it to the wife and she said we could use a few pictures on the wall anyway. Here's the link http://www.acoustimac.com/index.php...ufacturer_id=0&option=com_virtuemart&Itemid=1
Would these help me with my room, are they overpriced, and are they decent quality?
After seeing this, i think I could get away with a decent amount of treatment in our room.


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## tonyvdb (Sep 5, 2007)

If your interested in decorative panels that work have a look at GIK acoustics I highly recommend them


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## bevofrancis (May 15, 2009)

I got a chance to try and get my sub dialed in as close as I can before the SMS-1 comes. There was one setting on the sub I had never messed with before. The room size compensation knob. I read somehere that it lowers the low bass for smaller rooms. I moved mine form large to small, and it did wonders. 
It almost fixed everything. Here's a pic of my excel graph. What should I look to improve when my EQ comes?


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