Sticking socks in Sub's porthole made it more musical.

[Smokey]

After locating the best place for sub in my room (by crawling on the floor), I still wasn't satisfy with its performance regarding different type of music or movies. My listening habit vary greatly from County, Blues, Rap, R&B to Rock and Reggae. On some type of music, sub sound seem to be perfect with right amount of bass and thump. But on other types of music such as R&B, the sub just takes over the main speakers and I find my self keep tweaking sub level to bring it in line.

Any way after a while, constant tweaking of sub's level gets very old (especially if you have a cigarette in one hand and beer in the other ), so a solution was needed.

So I stuck a big sock in sub's port hole (down firing), adjusted the sub's level accordingly, and now the thumb seem to be gone. The sub seem to be giving more "linear" performance over great range of music types, especially with heavy bass music such as rap or reggae. Without the porthole stuffed, the porthole output (frequency response) was much louder than sub's speaker output, and when slightly pushed, the porthole sound took over more delicate sound of the mid bass notes coming from the sub.

So now with sub porthole being stuffed, the thumping is gone (even with rap), and bass notes (especially the mid bass) are more distinct and refine, and I don't have to get up tweaking anytime there is change of music genre

[JDaniel]

Smokey - you pervert you!

[kingdaddykeith]

That sounds like Room Modes to me, or a poorly designed enclosure, I have 4 subs in a small room 2 sealed and 2 huge vented/Sealed sonotubes and the they sounded very similar to what you were explaining (some music good others too much boom) it didn't matter if the Port was closed or open, same problem. Then I added a Behringer Feedback Destroyer and Viola, everything is sooo much better and my SPL measurements back it up. I'm within +/-3db's from 15Hz to 80Hz, and now when I close the port (different correction values) it sounds very tight, although I still think the vented version sounded smoother, and I actually prefer the Vented sound to the Sealed for most Music and all Movies.

[TinHere]

C'mon Smokey,

Maybe what you did worked, but there must be an expensive audiophile solution to the problem.

[Grandpaw]

Hey Smokey, do you know if it matters whether the sock has a hole it the toe or not? If it doesn't make a difference I might just put all my old socks up for sale on E-Bay. Do you think $29.95 for a pair for such an improvement would be to much to ask?

[F1]

Hey Smokey, do you know if it matters whether the sock has a hole it the toe or not? .......

It will make the woofer rotten very fast! hehe..

[piece-it pete]

Grandpaw,

You've hit the next big thing in audio magic!! But you're thinking of charging MUCH too little.

"The strategically placed, sonicly matched 'smoothing spot' on these fine, carefully broken-in port stuffers will definitely restrict 'bloom' and mellow out the harshest subwoofers. Cynical? So were the many well-respected Audiophile reviewers who now all use this wonderful product, calling the $399.99 'tweak' among the best bang-for-the-buck audio product available.

Want to go that extra step? Cryogenic treatment now available for only an additional $100.00!! A bargain?! Let your ears decide!!"

Pete

Btw, Smokey, it's quite possible (likely even:) that you are experiencing room nodes. You're very serious about this hobby - get a DB meter & test disc (if you haven't already:) & see what your tweaks are doing. "Bassnut" RG mentioned that he prefered sealed enclosures, and that the most noticable difference would be in sharp hits like kick drums.

[kelsci]

Smokey; Many products have a varying amount of variability in handling particular situations. I would say that subs are one of those items in dealing with audio. I am sure that you have read test reports on reviewers who tried out systems and commented what the sub did on this and that form of music. Some had minimal variations, others had variations that probably left the reviewers shaking their heads in disbelief. I believe the word we are dealing with here is COMPLIANCE. In the case of a sub, it may be possible for a unit to fit very comfortably handling all kinds of bass, from all kinds of music, fed by the sub output of all kinds of receivers and blending with all kinds of satellite speakers to say that a particular sub was very COMPLIANT with a host of systems. Judging from your finding of your own sub, it was acting fairly compliant overall. You like me are experimenters in this hobby. As time goes on, you may notice something that needs improvement and while thinking come up with a possible solution or solutions. Over time, you will know how well your new solution worked because you will know it worked if you do not have to keep experimenting. When the solution is a rather cheap one and easy to do, it helps one's ego and in turn, allows you to give other's advice that might work for them down the road. To me, that may turn out to be the best part of an experiment; that my experiment helped others even if the experiment turns out only to be an idea in your mind.

[nick4433]

Hey Smoke, how are you buddy? Good to see you are still stuffing socks in holes/ports and smoking and drinking (LOL)

[Smokey]

Thanks guys for responding and glad to see the old gang still hanging around and advising.

I don't have an SPL or test disc to check out the frequency response of the system. Mostly I like to do it by ear and old fashion tweaking. I stuck a sock in main speaker port hole also, but the jury is still out on that as I am still tweaking that one.

But socks in sub's porthole made alot of difference though. The sub is not of high price one (10 inch 120w RCA), but it can get loud and excellent for movies. But for music, its porthole put out too much bass for its own good (if it is not stuffed).