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The Aura Bass Shakers -- Are they worth it?
Installation:
I flipped over my couch and removed the undercloth by pulling the staples out all the way around. Then I cut two boards that measure aprox 6" x 6" x 1.5" and screwed them to the frame of the couch, one at each end, with 1 1/2" wood screws.
FYI: I had to pre-drill the holes with a 1/4 drill bit to keep from splitting the wood. I found this out after the 1st one, which I did not pre-drill -- Ooops!
Next, I mounted one shaker to each board with 4 1/2" wood screws. No Pre-drill necessary.
Now for the wiring:
Since only one channel of my adcom is functional right now, I hooked up my DVC Subwoofer and both Shakers to one channel in a Serial/Parallel config to give me a single 4 Ohm load at the amp. This should produce somewhere around 160 watts or so to the 12" Passive woofer and 2 Aura Bass Shakers.
So how do they sound? ....err Feel?
I popped in 5th Element for a couple reasons
1) it's one of my favorites, and ...
2) it's one of the only ones my Yami player will still recognize.
So what did I think? Well, I didn't care too much for the shaking when there was background music happening. These things were bouncing my couch around with the slightest bass effect.
I think this is due to my configuration though, and not necessarily the shakers themselves. I would say that I either have way too much wattage going to them, or I need to cross them over around 40Hz or so. Right now the only crossover in the chain is my Yamaha 795's LFE channel cut off -- which I believe is 80Hz.
But, during the action scenes these things are awesome! When Zorg is demo'ing that weapon (ZR-71 or something) these shakers really added to the experience. Especially when the net shoots out -- WOW! The THUMP produced by the subwoofer is magnified 10x by the motion you feel from the shakers! Much more than I expected!
My final thoughts
I'd say they are worth the $8.95 a piece I paid for them. I will definitely get a separate amp though; something around 50 watts mono or 25w stereo and cross them over close to 30-40hz. I think the best feel would be to get that extra Umphhh only with the very low bass hits.
80Hz is just way too high.
Finally, as far as music listening? I did not like them turned on with music at all! I will turn these things off when listening to music and on when it's movie night.
There's my 2 cents .......
Thomas.
Installation:
I flipped over my couch and removed the undercloth by pulling the staples out all the way around. Then I cut two boards that measure aprox 6" x 6" x 1.5" and screwed them to the frame of the couch, one at each end, with 1 1/2" wood screws.
FYI: I had to pre-drill the holes with a 1/4 drill bit to keep from splitting the wood. I found this out after the 1st one, which I did not pre-drill -- Ooops!
Next, I mounted one shaker to each board with 4 1/2" wood screws. No Pre-drill necessary.
Now for the wiring:
Since only one channel of my adcom is functional right now, I hooked up my DVC Subwoofer and both Shakers to one channel in a Serial/Parallel config to give me a single 4 Ohm load at the amp. This should produce somewhere around 160 watts or so to the 12" Passive woofer and 2 Aura Bass Shakers.
So how do they sound? ....err Feel?
I popped in 5th Element for a couple reasons
1) it's one of my favorites, and ...
2) it's one of the only ones my Yami player will still recognize.
So what did I think? Well, I didn't care too much for the shaking when there was background music happening. These things were bouncing my couch around with the slightest bass effect.
I think this is due to my configuration though, and not necessarily the shakers themselves. I would say that I either have way too much wattage going to them, or I need to cross them over around 40Hz or so. Right now the only crossover in the chain is my Yamaha 795's LFE channel cut off -- which I believe is 80Hz.
But, during the action scenes these things are awesome! When Zorg is demo'ing that weapon (ZR-71 or something) these shakers really added to the experience. Especially when the net shoots out -- WOW! The THUMP produced by the subwoofer is magnified 10x by the motion you feel from the shakers! Much more than I expected!
My final thoughts
I'd say they are worth the $8.95 a piece I paid for them. I will definitely get a separate amp though; something around 50 watts mono or 25w stereo and cross them over close to 30-40hz. I think the best feel would be to get that extra Umphhh only with the very low bass hits.
80Hz is just way too high.
Finally, as far as music listening? I did not like them turned on with music at all! I will turn these things off when listening to music and on when it's movie night.
There's my 2 cents .......
Thomas.
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