Do i need a sub with large speakers?

[EngineerNate]

Awesome. So the bass response is good enough for that dude. And it sounds like you're happy with it too.

I'm sure you'll be able to hear something at 20hz. My contention is simply that there's no way they're flat to 20hz. Especially not on 110w.

There are tons of people on this forum who run pure two channel and are perfectly happy. For music a set of big full range speakers is often quite good. Unless you're listening to Bach's toccata and fugue in D minor, most music outside of the electronic genres has very little content below about 40hz.

But I thought we were talking about subs because you were unhappy about the bass performance of the Bose+CV without the KLH. If you're unhappy with the bass you either need bigger mains or a sub. No way around that.

As an aside-it's generally not a good idea to run two sets of speakers at the same time. Horizontal arrays of drivers playing the same signal (essentially what you're creating) create beaming patterns that are far from ideal. It'd be better to turn the Bose off completely when you're running the KLH.

 

[quiet]

Well since you made it this far I might as well tell you. I had your speakers many years ago. Please forgive me for this, but......
The cabinets are junk, no damping inside (none) and the woofer was bottoming in both directions. Soooooo........
I glued, braced and sealed the cabinet, plugged the vent hole, and stuffed it with insulation. Hugh improvement.
But that didn't make them any smaller or look any better.
My apologies.

 

[Ross moran]

Well since you made it this far I might as well tell you. I had your speakers many years ago. Please forgive me for this, but......
The cabinets are junk, no damping inside (none) and the woofer was bottoming in both directions. Soooooo........
I glued, braced and sealed the cabinet, plugged the vent hole, and stuffed it with insulation. Hugh improvement.
But that didn't make them any smaller or look any better.
My apologies.

You sure there the same. You said vent hole these have 2 'vent holes' ports. Mine have dampening inside? Piece on bottom of box back and sides. Mine have never bottomed and when I run just 2 speakers my amp puts out an extra 10 watts per channel so that' 120 . Never experiened any issues with that cabinets they seem decently built and says there made in USA
Clearly I know these aren' the best speakers ever but they certainly are pretty good and I PAID 50 off a friends dad. I have read alot of posiive reviews on these . I dunno deffinatley holding on to these beasts

 

[robgmn]

"Need" a sub? The only reason you "need" a sub is if you MUST play frequencies that your mains speakers can't effectively reproduce (uhmm, maybe that new CD you bought is nothing but pipe organ notes from 20Hz to 50Hz and your speakers are 10dB down below 80Hz?)

Weird circumstances notwithstanding, whether you WANT a sub is solely up to you.
1. Get a decent one (beg, borrow, rent, buy with a return policy).
2. Set it up properly (VERY important step)
3. Play a few of your favorite albums/CDs/playlists.
4. Disconnect the sub and play 'em all again.

If you miss it (and it's almost guaranteed that you will), then you will want to keep it.
If you are married, then that "want" will have to be transformed into "need" so you can keep it

 

[quiet]

Yes KLH-9154. Yes, 2 inch port hole. Mine had ZERO damping inside, wonder where it went. Piece on bottom, back and sides is not enough, tried that.
Your cabinets are very poor as made.
Good news. There is much room for improvement.
As you go forward you will understand.
Bad news. You like them but they don't fit your room.

 

[Ross moran]

Yes KLH-9154. Yes, 2 inch port hole. Mine had ZERO damping inside, wonder where it went. Piece on bottom, back and sides is not enough, tried that.
Your cabinets are very poor as made.
Good news. There is much room for improvement.
As you go forward you will understand.
Bad news. You like them but they don't fit your room.

. Had them about 4 years . Even ran one as a sub in the back of my Honda crv before and handled some power on a bridged bass amp and are still going

 

[quiet]

The good news, you like them and they can be improved..
The bad news, you say you can't use them in the room.
The Best news, there are much better used speakers out there that are smaller.
I have stopped short of saying get rid of them.

 

[Ross moran]

Not bad

 

[Ross moran]

I wish there was an app for my phone to test hz levels

 

[EngineerNate]

What's that pyle thing in there and what was there originally?

 

[Ross moran]

A pyle super tweeter I put one In each. With inline capacitor. They have 30 ounce magnets. Supposedly titanium . I forget now some tiny mid or tweeter

 

[Ross moran]

Got them brand new from.a army surplus store

 

[EngineerNate]

Wait, so you replaced a mid with a super tweeter? (The tweeter is still on the top there...)

Not exactly doing yourself any favors on the frequency response of these guys by doing that. Especially when it goes Woofer->Mid->Supertweeter->Tweeter in the stack up. If you hooked up to the wires originally hooked up to the mid, I wouldn't be surprised if those Pyles are doing basically nothing between your inline capacitor and the original crossover that's going to be feeding all the highs to the existing tweeter...

Speakers are the sum of their parts. You can't just willy nilly replace drivers and expect to get good results, especially when you're replacing with a driver designed for a totally different range of frequencies.

The fact that KLH thought that they needed a 4-way design with that little tiny mid and a dome tweet should tell us much about the design process going on here. Not to be harsh, but these have "modern day kabuki" written all over them.

 

[Ross moran]

.

 

[Ross moran]

Was just experimenting. Oh well they sound good too me . It was either a mid or another tweeter

 

[Ross moran]

And then the gems . Bose 301 series iii

 

[gladiator335]

The klh play down to 20hz lol. Very loud and deep chest pounding bass . Coming from someone who's had cerwin Vega at-15s ,multiple car setups including a jl 15 . The klh deffinatley have good bass for the 50$ I paid . I just have high standards for bass. There also made in America. And the pyle tweeters deffinatley add more detail and clarity. Id say they for sure help.. And not sure id be giving these away just yet .. Bose 301s series 3 go for around 500$ Online and I think they sound great .

I would be very careful with the statement "Bose 301s series 3 go for around 500$ Online". have nothing against Bose, but check complete eBay sales and you will be surprised (unplesantly).
I went through countless speakers with large, medium and small woofers (you name them - I probably had them or heard them) and very few can really go down anywhere to 20 Hz.


Want to hear real bass? Those:



So you might like your KLH for now, but I would suggest: don't buy anything, but look around and listen...Maybe there are a few AKers in your area and maybe you will discover a few new things along the way...

 

[EngineerNate]

I would be very careful with the statement "Bose 301s series 3 go for around 500$ Online". have nothing against Bose, but check complete eBay sales and you will be surprised (unplesantly).
I went through countless speakers with large, medium and small woofers (you name them - I probably had them or heard them) and very few can really go down anywhere to 20 Hz.


Want to hear real bass? Those:

View attachment 1133280

So you might like your KLH for now, but I would suggest: don't buy anything, but look around and listen...Maybe there are a few AKers in your area and maybe you will discover a few new things along the way...

I think horizontally arranged mids are generally a terrible idea, but I still want to hear these.

 

[gladiator335]

If you are ever in Central Connecticut - you welcome to....

 

[Nixxuz]

Whether or not you "need" a sub really just comes down to if you are already satisfied with the bass that you get from your speakers or not. Seems that without the KLH speakers, you are not satisfied, so a subwoofer is probably a good route.

I run 3 different pairs of JBL speakers in my music room, and the bass is very good with any of them, and especially with all of them. Yet despite that, I got a pair of subs recently and I don't regret it.

For something cheap yet very capable, I would recommend this:
https://www.parts-express.com/dayton-audio-sub-1500-15-150-watt-powered-subwoofer--300-634

I assume that they ship to Canada but not 100% sure.

I hate to be the fly in the ointment, but i recently had dual SUB1500s, and found myself underwhelmed coming from a BIC RTR EV1200. Some thing about the amps on the Daytons made me sit and scratch my head a lttle. They just dont get very loud. I tried a number of configs, and no matter what i did, they still sounded thin. For the money, I'd say that either a BIC F12, or the aforementioned RTR, would be a better value for their level of performance.