New Products

Sensational Subs
The lowdown on the bottom end

Nothing else in audio gives you the thrill ride that a good subwoofer does, which is why manufacturers keep on bringing innovation and creativity to the category. We're expecting several interesting new models to arrive on our doorsteps this year, some including features we've never seen in S&V's decades of reviewing subs.

I think of MartinLogan as a maker of big electrostatic panel speakers, so I was surprised to learn that about 35% of the company's sales come from subwoofers. Its new Balanced Force 210 and 212 subs might increase that figure. Both feature opposed drivers to cancel vibration; both include the Perfect Bass Kit room-optimization feature; and both have internal crossovers that can be optimized for any MartinLogan speaker. Just download the frequency/slope data from MartinLogan's Website, copy it onto a USB stick, and plug it into the sub.

But the best feature of the Balanced Force subs is their built-in rattle tester. When you activate it, a tone sweeps slowly between 20 and 100 Hz to help you find the rattles in your room. When you hear a rattle, you can freeze the tone at that frequency, making it easier and faster to locate rattles than it would be with a test CD. Prices weren't available at press time, but they won't be cheap.

The slim profile of the REL Habitat lets it fit flat against a wall. It's wireless, so there's no need to run a cable to your system. A wireless interface box provides the same connections found on other RELs, including a Speak-On connector for speaker-level connections, plus RCA-type subwoofer and full-range inputs. Two 6.75-inch woofers and a 10-inch passive radiator pump out the bottom end. Price is expected to be around $2,000.

If a $2,000 sub would bust your budget, SVS will help save your finances with its PB-1000, which as I discovered in my recent review is easily one of the best subs you can buy for $499. The ported sub has a 10-inch woofer, a 300-watt RMS amp, and an internal digital signal processor (DSP) that allowed the company to fine-tune the PB-1000's response. That response, by the way, is rated down to 19 Hz. A more compact, sealed-box model, the SB-1000, reaches down to 24 Hz and costs the same.

We think of subwoofers as something for home theater, but Soundmatters is now offering one designed for use with personal audio products, such as the company's own FoxL Bluetooth speaker. The 6.3-inch-wide FoxLO ($149) connects to the sub output of a FoxL or the company's new Dash 7 Bluetooth speaker, and it can also interface with other audio products through a wired connection. A tiny woofer and a racetrack-shaped passive radiator pump out more bass than most portable audio products can muster. (We have one in for review right now.)

Surely the new sub most unlike the FoxLO will be the Revel Rhythm2, possibly the most beastly sub ever. Get this: The Rhythm 2's 18-inch driver has dual voice coils, so it can connect to two 1,000-watt amplifiers. It also includes digital room correction capability, but for $10,000 a pop, that's the least you should expect. I hope I can get my hands on this one, because I'm betting it'll set a new standard for 20-Hz performance on CEA-2010 subwoofer output measurements. But given its 177-pound weight, I don't look forward to moving it.