cut off settings ?

[Frankw150]

Hi folks,
My receiver has a sub out but the lowest cut off setting is 100 Hertz , is this setting low enough for my STF 2 ?
My front mains are fairly large with 2, eight inch woofers each.
Any help would be greatly appreciated as I am new to the subwoofer world.
Thanks,
Frank

[cschang]

It is fine for the STF-2, but judging on the size of your speakers, your setup would probably benefit from a lower crossover.

[Frankw150]

Does this mean I would need another receiver to get a lower crossover frequency?

Frank

[Dudley]

There is a way around a new reciever, but it more convoluted.

Hook your left and right fronts from the reciever to the sub, then hook the sub to your mains. Set subwoofer to none on your reciever, and set your mains to large (should be default with no subwoofer). You can now use the crossover in the sub.

Generally the pre-amp output for the sub is preffered.

[Dr_Hsu]

Hi folks,
My receiver has a sub out but the lowest cut off setting is 100 Hertz , is this setting low enough for my STF 2 ?
My front mains are fairly large with 2, eight inch woofers each.
Any help would be greatly appreciated as I am new to the subwoofer world.
Thanks,
Frank

I hate receivers that do that. Do you know what the crossover slopes are on your receiver? Some of them have a gentle slope, especially on the high pass. If that is the case, then its fine to set your mains to small so the receiver rolls off the bass from the mains starting at 100 Hz. Switch in the crossover on the STF-2 and set it to 90 Hz. There should not be too much of a gap between the fronts and the sub. Even with large main speakers, I would recommend filtering out the bass. It helps increase the headroom in the mid to high frequencies.

[Frankw150]

Hi again folks,
I have no idea what the crossover slopes are in my receiver but after some playing and positioning I really don't notice any great gap between my mains and my sub . Would this be my inexperianced ears or is it possible that my system can work fine with my mains set as large and the crossover on my sub set to off ????

PS
I never realized what a difference a good sub could make until I tried yours.
My music now sounds much fuller and much richer than I ever thought possible.
Thank you very much for a fantastic product.

Frank

[tgrisham]

I go along with Dudley on this. For all but the most sophisticated receivers, using the Hsu sub crossover is the best. Running the signal from the receiver via the sub to your speakers is a great way to control the crossover point. You can then experiment with the crossover point and volume (which are inter-dependent) until you reach the best sound. Good luck!

[Frankw150]

If I run my mains through the sub and set the sub crossover to off in the amp, will my 5.1 system still work properly?
I thought I would lose certain sound signals if I didn't use the sub out.

Sorry if I sound ignorant in such matters but like I said I am new to this stuff.
Thanks Again,
Frank

[Dudley]

You won't loose anything. The reciever will route all the LFE (.1) to your fronts. Since your fronts have the sub, they will handle it fine. Same with all sounds below the crossover - they will go to the fronts and hence will go to the sub.

It does require a little more wire to set up though, and you are more limited with sub placement.

[Frankw150]

I'll give it a go and see what I come up with.

No matter what it sounds great, but could probably benifit from some fine tuning.
I'll let you know what I come up with.

thanks for all your input .
Frank

[Dr_Hsu]

If I run my mains through the sub and set the sub crossover to off in the amp, will my 5.1 system still work properly?
I thought I would lose certain sound signals if I didn't use the sub out.

Sorry if I sound ignorant in such matters but like I said I am new to this stuff.
Thanks Again,
Frank

What do you mean by 'set the crossover to off on the amp'? The crossover on the subwoofer amp? If you set the mains to large, and feed the speaker level outputs to the sub, you have to set the subwoofer's crossover to 'in'. Otherwise the subwoofer will be trying to reproduce all frequencies (not that it can, but it will go up to several kHz and waste amplifier power trying to reproduce frequencies it should not be doing). Running the main speakers full range will also decrease the dynamic range capability of your receiver. I still recommend setting all speakers to small and setting the subwoofer's crossover to 'in' and frequency at 90 Hz.

[Frankw150]

Dr HSU,

I meant set the sub out to off or no in my receiver, meaning no sub is being used. Sorry for the confusion.
So what you're saying is I should leave my sub hooked up to the sub out on my receiver, set all other speakers to small and use the crossover in the sub set at 90 Hz?

Frank

[Dr_Hsu]

Dr HSU,

I meant set the sub out to off or no in my receiver, meaning no sub is being used. Sorry for the confusion.
So what you're saying is I should leave my sub hooked up to the sub out on my receiver, set all other speakers to small and use the crossover in the sub set at 90 Hz?

Frank

Yes. That would be my preference. The amplifiers in the receiver will have more headroom that way. They do not have to use up their available voltage on the bass.

[Frankw150]

Dr Hsu,

I gave your recomendation a try and set up everything as you suggested, I lost all of my mid bass, lots of low end, (of course) and the midrange and Highs are fine but there is a large gap between my mains and my sub.
Maybe I did something wrong but I don't think so. Anyway i'll give the other suggestion a try and run my mains through the sub, do the fine tuning with the sub's crossover and see how it works.
Thanks for your help.
Frank

[Matt B]

Hi Frank,

How did running your mains through your sub and using the sub's crossover work? Have you had any better luck with Dr. Hsu's recommendation? Which setup has worked best for you?

I'll face the same dilemma when my STF-2 arrives this week (my receiver's lowest crossover setting is 100Hz), so I'd be happy to learn from your experiences.

Best regards,
Matt

[Frankw150]

Hi Matt,

I just set up my system with my mains running through the sub today and it definitely made a difference in the sound.
I'll give it a try for a few days, do some playing with the crossover and volume and get back to you.

Any way you set it up you bought yourself a great sub.

Frank

[tdekany]

Hi Frank, I'll face the same dilemma when my STF-2 arrives this week (my receiver's lowest crossover setting is 100Hz Matt

Matt - My Pioneer receiver's lowest setting is 100Hz as well. No need to worry my STF2 sounds awesome! Fill out the form here so that Dr Hsu can suggest the best placement for your sub.

[Frankw150]

Hello all,

So far I am more pleased with the sub hooked up in line with the mains, I now have my sub volume at about one third and my crossover set at about 75 HZ,
sounds better even to my inexperianced ears.

I would like to know if it would be safe to hook the sub up to the B side of my receiver as it is not being used for anything else.

Thanks Again,
Frank

[cschang]

What would you be trying to achieve by using the "b" output?

There is no benefit from what I can think of.

[Frankw150]

If I use the B output of my receiver I will not have to run so much wire, and since it is not being used I thought it would be better than running my mains through the sub.

Just a thought,
Frank

[cschang]

then you lose the crossover abilities of the sub to the mains.

[Frankw150]

I didn't realize the sub via the crossover reduced the bass going to the mains, if this is the case i'll start running more wire I guess.

Thanks,
Frank

[cschang]

that's exactly what it is doing. :)

[Dr_Hsu]

Hello all,

So far I am more pleased with the sub hooked up in line with the mains, I now have my sub volume at about one third and my crossover set at about 75 HZ,
sounds better even to my inexperianced ears.

I would like to know if it would be safe to hook the sub up to the B side of my receiver as it is not being used for anything else.

Thanks Again,
Frank

I would just use the same A output. Some receivers series A and B when you engage both. They do this in order to keep the load impedance not dropping too low. If they do that, then connecting to the sub on B will cut out the sound from your main speakers. This is because the input impedance of the speaker level input is high. When you series this with your 4 or 8 ohm speaker, you get hardly any sound from the main speakers.

[Frankw150]

I scanned the specs page of my receiver, I know it's not the best amp in the world but it's what I have to work with.

Could Dr HSU or someone else knowladgeable in such things please have a look and tell me if running my sub from the B side will reduce power to the A side.

Sorry for being a pest but we are talking about an extra 60 feet of wire to run A through the sub to the mains.

Thanks again
Frank

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