Elevating Rythmik sub?

Just wondering if anyone has experimented with elevating their sub off the floor, either with an Auralax Subdude or similar?

I was chewing the fat with the owner of a local hi-end A/V shop when the subject came up. He said raising the sub will eliminate a natural bump in a certain frequency range, making the bass clearer and more linear. He did say that keeping the sub out in the room rather than near room boundaries also helped.

I found a box full of books, about 10" tall, and placed my sub on it to try it out. I still have the back of the sub about 4" from the wall. I am leaving it like this for now to get familiar with how it sounds. If I decide to try it back on the floor I will have become accustomed to the sound this way and will have a reference point.

I must say, streaming Pandora via my iPod Touch, which sends a digital signal to my Marantz AVR through a Cambridge Audio iD100 digital dock can sound surprisingly good. If you have streaming audio capability such as this, I highly recommend creating a "Techno bass" channel to really see what the Rythmik is capable of. Some of the stuff played literally rattles all the ceiling tiles in my basement, and that's from the 12" Rythmik in a 1,600-1,700 Sq.Ft. finished basement!

That guy is mis-informed.

The only reason for isolating a sub from the floor is if the floor is resonant.

Otherwise, it is as if you are just re-positioning the sub in relation to the room.

Hmm. It did alter the sound when I raised it, but that is to be expected. I will have to pick his brain some more to clarify what he meant. Maybe I just interpreted it the wrong way.

The room at the store with the hi-end setup has a sub between the speakers, well out into the room. It's a tall sub(An ADAM model) but I'm not sure if it is raised from the floor other than its own feet.

I'm using an Auralex Great Gramma under my F15SE for the sole purpose of decoupling. Unfortunately, the "best" position for a sub in my room is also directly between floor joists. With no iso in place, a LOT of vibration was transmitted through the floor. It bordered on annoying. With the iso riser in place, the vibration is noticeably reduced (I'd estimate 80%). Of course, when I'm in the mood for loud music, everything in the room will vibrate, but that is more acceptable (and means I'm getting my money's worth :cool:). However, at normal playback volumes, a vibrating floor became a nuisance.

I'm not one for snake oil, but from a purely geometrical perspective, that guy might have a point. Technically, the floor is just another wall, a sixth side in a rectangular or square room. We don't think twice about moving a sub away from a wall or corner if it will improve sound quality. Therefore, raising the subwoofer off the floor is movement along a vertical axis instead of a horizontal axis.

Granted, due to weight and other factors, most people will not raise their sub. But from an experimental point of view, I would be very curious if there would be measurable gains from raising it up.

I read where a guy actually put his sub on a fishtank stand to get it away from the floor. Interesting idea.

With my unscientific testing in my room, my sub is elevated (sits on a table) as it seemed to reduce the accentuation of the resonance around the 90hz region, which might be a floor/ceiling related dimension.

Having the sub in the exact centre of the room (on all x, y and z axes) really makes a huge difference compared to being hard up in the corner, so this is a sort of compromise that helps to keep it out of the corner. Of course, this starts to give me issues with the table rocking as its sitting on carpet with solid timber side panels for legs.

This may not be the correct reason, but it does seem to make a difference when I was experimenting with various locations. Really still need a second sub for the other side of the room, but need to give time for the bank account to recover.