Sonance Garden Series Subwoofer Placement

[Jerz]

I splurged and bought the Sonance 8.1 Garden Series but I'm kicking around the 10" subwoofer placement. I can't place it in the middle of the eight satellite speakers because of the 24" feature wall so wondering if anyone has any input? I thought about putting it up near the brick house but then I've got the 18" raised spa... see pic. I've labeled possible locations with A,B,C,D and the satellites are arrows.... Thanks.

 

[cowboycasey]

Subs are omni directional so they can be placed anywhere... but you will get waves of bass at certain distances away from the sub... it may be at 14 feet you will get a higher output than 8 feet.. If you have a way to try all the spots I would do that.. place it in A and walk around, then move it to B and walk around.. You will find a spot that you like much better that way.. If there is a solid wall behind A you may get a higher output there..

I have a Klipsch 10 inch sub in my front room that sounds great but the sound waves hits MUCH HARDER in my bedroom 40 feet away

 

[darkrider]

Definitely avoid B and E. I'd probably lean toward either C or D for positioning, assuming the center of the speaker placement is also the central listening position. While it's true that the lowest frequencies are omni-directional, somewhere around 80hz localization starts to occur. That's why the majority of AVRs default to 80hz as the crossover point, regardless of speaker size. It looks like the Sonance satellites and sub have a 100hz crossover, which could cause some minor localization. Additionally, you want your ideal listening position to be relatively equal in distance as the sound will travel at roughly the same rate. Position A would likely work well for the center of the pool and from left to right. However, you might run into timing problems if you have any seating that would be in back of A. I'd also worry about resonance with sound coming off the house.

 

[duckcmmndr]

As mentioned above...bass is mostly omni-directional. I have done subs indoors and in vehicles my whole life...but I don't have any experience outdoors. I think you might be surprised how it would sound centered behind the water wall.

 

[Jerz]

Definitely avoid B and E. I'd probably lean toward either C or D for positioning, assuming the center of the speaker placement is also the central listening position. While it's true that the lowest frequencies are omni-directional, somewhere around 80hz localization starts to occur. That's why the majority of AVRs default to 80hz as the crossover point, regardless of speaker size. It looks like the Sonance satellites and sub have a 100hz crossover, which could cause some minor localization. Additionally, you want your ideal listening position to be relatively equal in distance as the sound will travel at roughly the same rate. Position A would likely work well for the center of the pool and from left to right. However, you might run into timing problems if you have any seating that would be in back of A. I'd also worry about resonance with sound coming off the house.

Do you think I should consider another subwoofer and put one at C and one at D? Mind you that I haven't even listed to these yet but WERE supposed to be regrading around the pool this week but IDA isn't cooperating for us north of Atlanta, GA.... Music I'll be listening to will be classic rock/hard rock unless the wife demands Brittany... Hopefully I'll be trying these out in about two weeks depending on weather.... thanks for your input.

 

[Smalone]

Do you think I should consider another subwoofer and put one at C and one at D? Mind you that I haven't even listed to these yet but WERE supposed to be regrading around the pool this week but IDA isn't cooperating for us north of Atlanta, GA.... Music I'll be listening to will be classic rock/hard rock unless the wife demands Brittany... Hopefully I'll be trying these out in about two weeks depending on weather.... thanks for your input.

Fyi. Bestbuy has the 6 speaker with amp and sub on sale. I just installed the 4 spwith sub and it sounds great. Waaaay louder then I thought it was going to be!

 

[darkrider]

Do you think I should consider another subwoofer and put one at C and one at D? Mind you that I haven't even listed to these yet but WERE supposed to be regrading around the pool this week but IDA isn't cooperating for us north of Atlanta, GA.... Music I'll be listening to will be classic rock/hard rock unless the wife demands Brittany... Hopefully I'll be trying these out in about two weeks depending on weather.... thanks for your input.

I would try setting it up with the single sub first, and only consider adding a 2nd sub if it's either unbalanced or needs more bass. Trying to balance a 2nd sub in an open air environment could open a whole new can of worms, especially since the factory amp can't channel level or provide any correction. Your other option as others have suggested would be to put it directly behind the 24" feature wall. If you could bury it in the planter there about 12-18" out from the wall, I can almost guarantee that it's going to increase gain. It looks like the factory amp does have preset settings to decrease bass gain, if needed.

 

[Jerz]

Fyi. Bestbuy has the 6 speaker with amp and sub on sale. I just installed the 4 spwith sub and it sounds great. Waaaay louder then I thought it was going to be!

Yeah... I kicked the Mag 6.1 around but knew I'd need at least 8 satellites and the sub is an 8" instead of a 10" and it was $2400 at the time plus from what I read it looked like they rated it for 1500sqft so two of the systems would be 3000sqft which is still less than the 3500sqft the 8.1 garden series is rated for... but it looks like a fantastic deal for 1600bux... ... I'd love to hear the two systems side by side.

 

[Smalone]

You may want to lay out your speakers then hook everything up which won't take long, and then see what you think. I would just order a box of speaker wire off Amazon and use extra between each speaker so you can just move them around to see what sounds best.
The overall length of our pool is 58' and that system sounds good. I know my opinion of what sounds good and your opinion of what sounds good could be different, but I was in the home audio business for a long time and that system will definitely satisfy 95% of the people out there!

 

[Jerz]

You may want to lay out your speakers then hook everything up which won't take long, and then see what you think. I would just order a box of speaker wire off Amazon and use extra between each speaker so you can just move them around to see what sounds best.
The overall length of our pool is 58' and that system sounds good. I know my opinion of what sounds good and your opinion of what sounds good could be different, but I was in the home audio business for a long time and that system will definitely satisfy 95% of the people out there!

That's awesome... 4 speakers and a sub and it sounds great with that size pool? I'm sure your definition and mine are about equal; I'm definitely not an audiophile snob but outdoor audio is definitely something new to me and I likely would have been blown away with the Mag 6.1 but it was one of those nights after a couple or six beers and I kept going back and forth and I just said screw it and clicked 'add to cart' and 'checkout'. I've got the wire ordered already (14/4 direct burial) from a vendor we deal with and he found a partial roll of 482FT so I should have plenty to play with. I know these wire daisy chain but wondering if I could put the sub on a separate homerun to the same terminals of the SR 2-125 amp without any adverse effects? That way I could get the satellites installed since they shouldn't need to move and just move the sub to different locations easily since I'd have a dedicated wire to it.

I'm probably overthinking these speakers just like how many outlets I really need in the backyard... lol... that's another project but 18 outlets around the perimeter just sounds like a lot.

 

[darkrider]

It looks like the amp will take up to 12 gauge speaker wire on each set of terminals, so you likely won't be able to do 2 separate runs of 14 gauge from the same terminals. However, the manual says you can do the parallel/daisy chain runs at any point in the chain for the sub install. If you want maximum flexibility, you could tap for the sub early in the chain from left and right at the point where the wiring leaves your house. You'd want to leave enough wire for the sub for any possible final install location, so you'll use more wire overall, but it will give you maximum flexibility.

 

[Jerz]

It looks like the amp will take up to 12 gauge speaker wire on each set of terminals, so you likely won't be able to do 2 separate runs of 14 gauge from the same terminals. However, the manual says you can do the parallel/daisy chain runs at any point in the chain for the sub install. If you want maximum flexibility, you could tap for the sub early in the chain from left and right at the point where the wiring leaves your house. You'd want to leave enough wire for the sub for any possible final install location, so you'll use more wire overall, but it will give you maximum flexibility.

Yeah... now that I think of it; the sub connects to all 4 wires so it wouldn't matter where you connect it... thanks.