Magico Q3 or S5 with Good Subwoofer

[The Sandman]

Originally Posted by clee

good to know. May i know the approx. Size of your room?

16' x 30' x 8'.

[4RE]

It's not about the need for more bass, or better bass, or any Magico beeing bass shy. Just forget the Bass thing for a moment.
It's about soundstage and laying a solid foundation on which the music is served.
REL's do that thing better, just because the time and phase domain is adressed in the concept. Spent time on it since early 90's.

[CLEE]

Originally Posted by The Sandman

16' x 30' x 8'.

Hi Howard, that's a good sized room. Did you use the equalization program provided with the JL subs?

--Charles

[dcvibe]

Originally Posted by 4RE

+2.

Would also strongly be against one subwoofer, all those experiences are right: boomy bass, bad integration, localisation et cetera. Don't do it!

So far the advise for the one eared audiophile, and if mono is king..

V2 is great speaker, adding stereosubs transforms into world class system. G1's is very nice, but G2's have much smaller footprint and deliver 95% of G1's.
So personally would buy G2's now, if starting over.

You think you don't need subs, until you actually experience.. unfortunately the stereo sub demo's are not there, because marketing told us to buy monosubs for two decades. It's like Bose marketing, but on an elevated level.

Would you disconnect one of the woofers on your mainspeaks if someone told you it makes no difference?

Great information… thanks for sharing. I do not have two subs so I can't say what that would sound like in my current situation but I will say that the Sasha along with a watchdog sub sounds better than without it. Also placing the sub in the front of the room was much better in my rectangular (15 ft x 20 ft x 8 ft) room. I did a lot of comparing with and without sub on and now I just leave it on for everything. I also do a lot of home theater so for LFE I need the sub in place anyways. I think if I ended up with G1's or Alexia I would probably turn the sub off while listening to music. Not sure that would be the case with magico q3/s5, or Rockport Avior.

[Number95]

Originally Posted by dcvibe

Great information… thanks for sharing. I do not have two subs so I can't say what that would sound like in my current situation but I will say that the Sasha along with a watchdog sub sounds better than without it. Also placing the sub in the front of the room was much better in my rectangular (15 ft x 20 ft x 8 ft) room. I did a lot of comparing with and without sub on and now I just leave it on for everything. I also do a lot of home theater so for LFE I need the sub in place anyways. I think if I ended up with G1's or Alexia I would probably turn the sub off while listening to music. Not sure that would be the case with magico q3/s5, or Rockport Avior.

I would say, given the speaker range from Vivid to Magico to Rockport to Wilson, using a sub or not would not be my priority as all of these speakers having a different presentation over music. You better need to listen to them if possible with different preamp/amp combinations to get a better sense.

[jazzman]

Originally Posted by dcvibe

I think if I ended up with G1's or Alexia I would probably turn the sub off while listening to music. Not sure that would be the case with magico q3/s5, or Rockport Avior.

Not sure I follow your logic... what makes you think that the Alexia (8" + 10" paper woofer, the "best" material you can use for woofer if you LOVE bass distortion) would have more bass than the S5 (two 10" alloy-carbon bass, bigger membrane surface, lowest ever measured bass distortion by Soundstage)? The S5 goes lower, flatter, with a much better defined bass (at 10-20% distortion on a paper woofer, good luck hearing bass texture). Just take measurements... or listen to a good live recording from Marcus Miller., the anbswer is so obvious to my ears.

If there is one speaker which would benefit more from a sub it is the Wilson. It is the lack of linearity in the bass (typical bass hump in the 80Hz region) which fools you into believing they have more bass, but it is not true. Given the cheap woofer used on the Alexia, adding a sub may help the woofer working better (you would cut it at a higher frequency, which would limit the frequency range it has to cover and therefore distortion). But if you ask me, it is finding a compromise solution for a problem which you wouldn't have in the first place if the speaker was better designed, with better quality drivers. Why they didn't at least use the W-sandwich material of the XLF? cheap.

[jazzman]

Originally Posted by Number95

I would say, given the speaker range from Vivid to Magico to Rockport to Wilson, using a sub or not would not be my priority as all of these speakers having a different presentation over music. You better need to listen to them if possible with different preamp/amp combinations to get a better sense.

+1

[The Sandman]

Originally Posted by CLEE

Hi Howard, that's a good sized room. Did you use the equalization program provided with the JL subs?

--Charles

I did.

I'm also using the Pass Labs XVR-1, crossing over at 29 Hz.

[CLEE]

Originally Posted by The Sandman

I did.

I'm also using the Pass Labs XVR-1, crossing over at 29 Hz.

Thanks for the info. I may try to borrow my friend's JL for a trail.

[dcvibe]

Originally Posted by jazzman

Not sure I follow your logic... what makes you think that the Alexia (8" + 10" paper woofer, the "best" material you can use for woofer if you LOVE bass distortion) would have more bass than the S5 (two 10" alloy-carbon bass, bigger membrane surface, lowest ever measured bass distortion by Soundstage)? The S5 goes lower, flatter, with a much better defined bass (at 10-20% distortion on a paper woofer, good luck hearing bass texture). Just take measurements... or listen to a good live recording from Marcus Miller., the anbswer is so obvious to my ears.

If there is one speaker which would benefit more from a sub it is the Wilson. It is the lack of linearity in the bass (typical bass hump in the 80Hz region) which fools you into believing they have more bass, but it is not true. Given the cheap woofer used on the Alexia, adding a sub may help the woofer working better (you would cut it at a higher frequency, which would limit the frequency range it has to cover and therefore distortion). But if you ask me, it is finding a compromise solution for a problem which you wouldn't have in the first place if the speaker was better designed, with better quality drivers. Why they didn't at least use the W-sandwich material of the XLF? cheap.

Thanks for your comments. The reason I am making an assumption about Alexia not needing the sub and Magico needing it is because in Stereophile Recommended components they list Magico Q5 as Class A but limited in the lowest frequency (I assume Q3 would have less bass than Q5). Alexia and G1 were listed as Class A full range without limitation in low frequency. However, I have an open mind and agree that Magico's drivers appear to be of better quality. I guess I'll find out this weekend. Thanks for your opinion. I still think Wilson makes a good overall product.