Posted by Al Sekela on April 04, 2003 at 13:33:56:
In Reply to: Re: Re: Renaissance-3 posted by Lew on April 04, 2003 at 12:39:10:
I heard the R3/Buggtussel setup and did not care for it. I do not like the voicing of Buggtussel speakers in general, and these subs offered very little for their enormous size. IMHO the Virtual Bass Technologies subs, which are much smaller, are possibly a good match for planar and Sound Lab electrostats.
Conventional wisdom is that subs are "too slow" to keep up with fast near-full-range speakers. This may be true for the cheap subs made for home theater, where the cone loading is accomplished with a resonant air mass and/or the impedance rise at resonance is poorly accommodated.
However, I have personal experience that acoustic feedback from the sub to the main power amp(s) may also be responsible for a muddy bass. My InnerSound ESL amp has a single large power transformer mounted nearly in the center of the steel bottom panel. This panel is not supported except where it is attached to the sides and back of the amp.
Visualize a fat monk meditating in the center of a trampoline. Now visualize this combination in an earthquake. The primary mode of response will be the monk vibrating up and down. This appears to be the primary response of the InnerSound ESL amp's bottom panel with transformer. Removing the amp's feet and mounting it on a rigid wooden panel, which is spiked to the floor, with an intermediate layer of Deflex (urethane) damping polymer, does much to remove this response mode and cleans up the bass with the sub (a REL Stentor II) engaged.
Problems with integrating subs with fast speakers, where the sub is found to be adequate by other users, may be due to acoustic feedback and this should be investigated before any equipment exchange.