All subwoofers sound equally fast because rooms, not drivers, dominate bass time response

Evidence

The notion of “fast” subwoofers is misguided, in that the time-domain performance of minimum-phase systems is predictable from the amplitude response. With an 80 Hz bass management crossover frequency, all subwoofers are equally “fast.” So, what we confront in the real world is essentially “fast” subwoofers communicating through “slow” rooms. — , Toole, Floyd E - Sound reproduction-…, 1017

Categorization

• CANDY: A great one-liner for a hi-fi conversation: there is no such thing as a ‘fast’ subwoofer — all are equally fast, it’s the room that’s slow.
• XREF: Relates to psychoacoustics of resonance perception covered in Section 4.4 and 4.6.2 discussed earlier in this book. — connects to: Subwoofers aid rather than harm good sound reproduction; Subwoofer time-domain speed is set by amplitude response, not driver design; Equalizing subwoofers individually yields unpredictable combined in-room response — , Toole, Floyd E - Sound reproduction-…, 1045 (+6 more)

Related

• Subwoofers aid rather than harm good sound reproduction (similarity 0.91)
• Subwoofer time-domain speed is set by amplitude response, not driver design (similarity 0.88)
• All subwoofers are equally fast at 80 Hz and rooms slow them down (similarity 0.87)
• Equalizing subwoofers individually yields unpredictable combined in-room response (similarity 0.84)
• Multiple independently-processed subwoofers tame room resonances for wider listening areas. (similarity 0.84)
• Opposite-polarity subwoofers can null a specific room mode’s coupling (similarity 0.81)
• Subwoofer placement itself can be optimized alongside DSP settings (similarity 0.81)
• Multiple identical subwoofers reduce seat-to-seat bass variation (similarity 0.81)
• Optimized multi-sub systems can use much smaller subs at some locations (similarity 0.81)
• Room reverberant fields typically rise in bass, necessitating bandwidth-matched equalizer cuts for distant miking (similarity 0.80)
• Subwoofer placement severely impacts the electrical power needed for equal low-bass output. (similarity 0.80)
• Bass management lets small loudspeakers deliver full-range sound (similarity 0.80)
• Bass rises in reflected room sound for all forward-firing loudspeakers (similarity 0.79)
• Room low-frequency resonances make expensive audio systems sound muddy or boomy (similarity 0.79)
• Subwoofer mode cancellation needs no equalization to fix boom (similarity 0.79)

Broader Connections

• Headphone and loudspeaker bass targets converge on the same in-room response #expands (0.75)
• Room reverberant fields typically rise in bass, necessitating bandwidth-matched equalizer cuts for distant miking #corroborates (0.75)
• Subwoofers exploit poor low-frequency directional hearing to shrink speakers #expands (0.75)
• Delayed, inverted subwoofer arrays can cancel standing waves in rectangular rooms #complicates (0.72) — Toole, Floyd E, Sound reproduction- the acoustics and…, 1604
• Reverberant rooms make loudspeaker directivity important for sound quality #expands (0.72) — Ville Pulkki, Matti Karjalainen, Communication Acoustics- An…, 474
• Equalizing subwoofers individually yields unpredictable combined in-room response #complicates (0.70) — , Toole, Floyd E - Sound reproduction-…, 1045
• Opposite-polarity subwoofers can null a specific room mode’s coupling #complicates (0.70)