Exaggerating the subwoofer? Perhaps not!

[MD1032]

I've figured it out. I don't know why I didn't see it before, but I've figured out why it's so damn loud. It's my musicmatch equalizer. When I've got my equalizer engaged, my bass signal is comsiderably boosted, and I'm guessing my sub is about 2-3x louder when my equalizer is engaged, because there's so much bass signal being sent to my speakers that it gets really loud. If I turn my equalizer off, I have to turn my sub up to around 1/2-2/3 to get the volume I did before with the equalizer engaged and the sub at 1/4. I'll post pics of my equalizer settings as soon as possible, but this explains a lot. It's like when you plug your walkman into your speakers and put the bass boost on in the walkman...the sub basically explodes.

[MD1032]

OK, here are my settings. I get some pretty damn good sound with this equalizer setting, it sounds so much better than flat. Also, it should be noted that no equalizers or anything of that sort are engaged in my Santa Cruz console. Anyway, "people exaggerate the subwoofer" because of their own stupidity of leaving the bass too high.

edit: Sorry, my little spectrometer thing's bars didn't show up, but the lines are still there so you can see them. Fell free to steal the music on my playlist, I like The Who a lot.

[InnovaZero]

Well that looks a lot like the EQ from Winamp. In any case, I'd seriously becareful with EQ settings, good way to overdrive the amp and blow something. Just be careful is all I'm saying.

[MD1032]

Be careful? How? Overdrive? How can I tell? Anyway, I'm using MusicMatch plus, and its sound and equalizer are SUPERB compared to all of the other media players I've used.

[fivelitermustang]

"Be careful? How? Overdrive? How can I tell? Anyway, I'm using MusicMatch plus, and its sound and equalizer are SUPERB compared to all of the other media players I've used."

I'll sum this up real fast:

It's called a clipped signal... you can blow your amp and your speakers.

Software equalizer settings sounds like garbage... the only way to equalize is to buy a nice hardware equalizer.

Musicmatch Jukebox is not very good... you need to run Winamp with the MAD HQ decoder plug-in.

The sub is exaggerated... it's not what it's hyped up to be and it would never come close to the quality1 and power of an HT sub.

[pinipig523]

5liter is right. too much hype and too little performance in comparison to the hype.

whoa... watch yourself with the eq... that is one way u can blow your amp.

[MD1032]

So you would reccommend I switch to winamp? I personally like musicmatch, and its equalizer works very well, much better than any other program I've used. Better than WMP or the EQ in my SC console. BTW, if I switch to winamp I'm obviously going to need a non-spyware version, so can you give me a link to one? Anyway, I know the sub isn't going to sound as good as basically ANY non-MM subh out there, but I'm saying this is what was causing my volume exaggeration, because this thing does get too loud when there's too much bass input, and that explains why it bangs on its stand when I turn it up too high.

[fivelitermustang]

I suggest you just keep it flat and keep the subwoofer on the standard 11 o' clock position.

[MD1032]

Can I still boost my highs and dip my lows? It sounds good that way. BTW, should I get winamp or what?

[n2v]

Just get winamp 2...no spyware that I know of.

Winamp.com -- click on the upper right hand corner to go to the winamp 2 download area.

Try it, demo it out, and if you like it, keep it. If not, ditch it. You decide buster.

[justin_tx_16]

Yes, you are better off with WinAMP. I bought MMJB Pro (all future upgrades) just "cause". It is nice for burning CD's and ripping them, but CDEx does a better job ripping and MediaJukebox does a heck of a better job as a jukebox and MP3 organizer.

And yes, get WinAMP 2, WinAMP 3 is far too bloated with useless things. WinAMP is best when stripped down, with the exception of a few fun plugins.

Also check out Foobar2000. Best sounding MP3 player I have used.

[fivelitermustang]

Winamp is better... you should grab version 2.9x but nothing 3.xx

Then you should grab this plugin:

http://www.mars.org/home/rob/proj/mpeg/mad-plugin/

That 3rd party decoder is sick.

[MD1032]

OK, thanks a lot. Bear with me as my ears have a lot of fluid in them today and are ringing terribly as well as feeling cloudy (I feel my earphones rattling but don't hear much bass).

edit: All right, got everything up and running. First of all, that MAD plug-in kicks @$$. My quality is SO much better. I just clicked on MUSICMATCH and I clearly like Winamp's quality better. Musicmatch hisses and crackles a lot in comparison, which I never noticed before.

Complaints:

1) UGH, just stop already! Whenever I press pause it fades out for about 2 seconds intead of just stopping. There must be a way to stop this, any help?

2) Bass response sucks. It's there all right, but I'm only getting about half the bass output of musicmatch and the output overall is *really* weak. I like the equalizer, although as I said, it has weak output.

edit: BTW, I love that Winamp demo "Winamp...it really whips the llama's ***!" lol

edi2: All right, for now, winamp is going into the recycle bin. I can't stand sacrificing my low range for a bit more detail. I mean, literally. Winamp and MM have the same 10-band equalizer but winamp's just plain sucks. Sure, there's more detail, noticably so, but here's my comparison.

Musicmatch

1) Quality is OK, it gets by. A little hissy and crackly sometimes, but unnoticable unless compared to winamp.

2) Good and very powerful equalizer. I can keep the settings low and still get what I want

Winamp

1) Superior clarity

2) Equalizer isn't the best, and when using the settings I have on musicmatch, it doesn't get much better, it's still very muddy.

3) The low end is GONE. I do not kid you. Say both equalizers use -14db to +14 db (winamp uses 12 to 12). I usually keep my (60) musicmatch equalizer band at 10 or less when using my speakers, because the subwoofer has to be turned down more when it's higher. I have the winamp band all the way on the left (60) at MAX and the subwoofer sounds like it's struggling and I'm guessing that frequencies below 60 actually start to fall off and die. The bass sounds VERY present and LOW on musicmatch, which is the way I like it.

I'm using KSC-50 earphones and PM4.1's to do these tests. I literally can't believe this. There's GOT to be something I'm doing wrong. Maybe I have winamp set up wrong because even WMP9 puts out more bass. I would really love to use winamp for music because it's a better format and it has better clarity. If my bass is going to die, though, the recycle bin gets emptied.