Axiom Home Page Forums General Discussion Home Theater Texas' New Epicenter

It is interesting you guys are not hearing these things. A lot must have to do with your crossover settings. In my opinion my 80's are producing most of those frequencies based on my 80hz crossover.

And yes, after smoothing things out with my SMS-1 this "punch" did improve as I've eliminated most of nulls/peaks that were cancelling the frequencies in those ranges.

I think my new 600 amp has the updated firmware with no brickwall in place, but even before I've always heard the stand up bass strings and kick drum.

Granted, the twin 350s pack a wallop as well.

There may indeed be something wrong with the subs driver/amp but my guess is that this is the EP600's limiter kicking in (to protect the driver from over excursion) on those intense bass scenes. I had similar issues with the 600 and other subs I have owned. The only answer is to turn it down or add more woofage.

Axiom gets an amazing amount of output from a single 12" driver but I'm afraid that this design is a bit dated considering the increased LFE in movies and what other manufacturers are doing.

limiter? The 600 is able to hit 122dB's without distortion because of the DSP chips management. I highly doubt either of you have exceeded these limits. I know in my 8,000 cubic ft room I have not.

I suspect there's a screw loose or a cable hanging down and touching the woofer causing the vibration. I tightened all of the screws on my EP350 before powering it on, using the included allen key.

Well, the definition of what 'punch' and 'slam' is, is obviously subjective. (Poor grammar!)

My view of punch is the kick drum area of FR, around 60 to 80hz I believe. My crossover is set at 80hz.

Great summary Randy. You nailed it.

All this talk of slam and punch should be directed at how well the subwoofer is integrating with the speakers. The fault lies with speaker/sub implementation not with one componenet. Replace slam and punch with mid and high bass. Several things will mess it up incuding: wrong crossover point resulting in improper phasing , poor sub placement relative to the speakers, FR anamolies, room acoustical problems, use of mono instead of stereo/dual subs. A single sub will always sound inferior to a pair.

If your sub and speakers are out of phase near the crossover point because of placement or room issues, you aren't going to hear that crisp pluck or snappy snare drum. Also for that purpose, the brickwall filter is actually beneficial since the sub stops contributing any output to the upper harmonics which are more deftly handled by the speakers. If you are using a mono EP600 with M80s with music, I would strongly suggest not going higher than a 60hz crossover and ideally with a 40hz crossover since the M80s can easily handle the stereo bass duties down to 30hz. I'm assuming also that you have a powerful enough amp to drive the 80s as they will need more power with the lower crossovers. Lowering the crossover should reduce artifacts which are likely caused by several of the above noted problems.


Interestingly at a blind sub shootout last year with several newer subs, the EP600 held its own very well during some very demanding scenes, with one participant choosing it as his favourite sub.

Also make sure the feet are tight and in place. Any air escaping through those small holes where will also contribute noise.

How would I check which firmware I have?

Also, Jakeman, sroode, and others, thanks for the detailed responses. I'll use the 30 days to experiment more and see how much improvement I can work out. I've also downloaded the REW software and will give it a run as well.

Jason

60Hz is what I settled on months ago. And no I can't turn the volume up on the 80s because I'll go deaf.

I have no problem with the 600 during movies. It's music that is problematic. I've spent countless hours tweaking as many of you know to no avail. I cannot hear attack no matter what I do.

What finally convinced me that this is an EP600 issue is the fact that my Sony doesn't suffer this problem in my large room. And also that I've had other subs in here that give good thump but, as I've discussed before, suffer from other issues. Thump, thump, thump all the time is frankly boring. I witnessed this with the SVS that Jason brought over.

As much as I dislike Sony, the 150W sub that I have (albeit with Mojo tweaks sanctioned by the non-Sony designer) is absolutely awesome for music in a small room. It balances texture with thump which I haven't heard any other sub do. There's lots of texture in the 600 due to what I believe are low order harmonics that I frankly don't mind at all.

And as for 122dBs without distortion...absolutely no way. Not even from an inch away. Not that I need it but I don't want anyone believing they can pull 122dBs cleanly out of this sub.

I'm starting to wonder now if the combination of my Denon and the 600's low input impedance has something to do with this. I've been meaning to connect my audiobyte amp to the 600 but it's a bit of a pain in the butt now. I need an excessively long cable.