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Bass is bad


Pauw

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I can't believe how many in college/elsewhere rate a horrid speaker system as great just because it has

an incredibly overpowered bass and massive watt rating. After hearing audiophile systems first hand, what is the

draw to eardrum cracking loudness, and the overpowering boom a subwoofer gives off?

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I think the thing about those cheap PC speaker systems is that people just don't realize what they're missing. They hear the bass in those systems that isn't present in, say, their laptops, and associate it with an improvment in sound. Personally, I started off with such a system, one of those Logitech 2.1 crapos. It wasn't great, but at the time it was such an improvement over the crappy PC speakers I had at the time that I liked the sound. Then I got into headphones and Head-Fi and realized I was missing a lot, so I got the PM4.1's. That pretty much flipped my wig right there.

Bottom line, I think people liking those systems just stems from a lack of knowledge more than anything else. My solution is to just bring people to my apartment, show them my Forte II's, and say "this is how it should sound". The Fortes are easy to impress people with due to their insane bass but curiously the most frequent first impression I get is "oh my gosh, I've never heard that <insert subtlety> in the music before". Yes, folks, there's much more to sound than bass, although bass is certainly a lot of fun.

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Ideally speaking, a subwoofer should have absolutely no "boom" whatsoever and should blend naturally with the speakers. Having said that, powerful bass is nothing negative. I'm not sure what "college/elsewhere" ratings you are talking about, but if has anything to do with the mainstream in general, you can rest assuredthat any wattage rating or SQ observation will rarely be valid. Just go to your local Big Box electronics retailer and read the wattage ratings for any home theater in a box system."1000 watts max power?" Not in it's wildest fantasties.

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Our youngest daughter had a dance at her middle school tonight. Said the DJ was terrible, too much bad bass and couldn't hear the rest of the music. I'm so proud. She said it sounded worse than the cars with too much muddy bass and not much else [:S] I can't figure it out.... a lot of the teenagers often seem to automatically crank up the bass until it sounds bad.

A good subwoofer, used properly, doesn't give off an overpowering boom unless that's what is called for.

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