Extention is impressive,efficient,an honest 25hz in my room. Much better with a great amp and properly crossed over.

slow in pace and rythm compared to the best and much more expensive. Recommended HSU amps or a great one with high current and high damping factor. Remember, this is a 4 ohm voice coil.

Having access to any Subwoofer I wanted for my musical listening, the HSU for me with my original amp a NAD 2400, the HSU was adequate but slow and boomy and lacking control. Great for my home theater but not so for my music. Jazz,Classical and some pop. I bought the HSU 250 watt True Subwoofer amplifier. Wow, what a difference. For $400.00 the HSU now sounds closer to the ideal for me. Much more control, better articulation and a bit more pace and speed. Obviously it can't rival a top notch Velodyne, or REL acoutsics etc. but I didn't want to pay for these financial giants. My system consist of the Sony XA7ES Compact disc player, the Dynaco PAS-4 and a pair of Push Pull Sonic Frontiers SFM-75 tube monoblocks. I bought the above pieces for a fraction of the retail price. I couldn't be happier. So while playing some acoustic string bass like Rick Bromberg, and some of my David Benoit stuff, and some even some of my old Sci-Fi soundtracks by Telarc, and Star Trek the Motion Picture. Track 3 has a fundamental around 40hz that rattled the place but with control too. So over all instead of buying another Subwoofer, I was able to make the HSU my music Sub once again. Though not perfect, I must say that I am much happier with the HSU once again. So if you have one of these subs hopefully you have the HSU amp or a great Amplifier to drive this round bruiser of a sub.

Similar Products Used:

B & W, Velodyne, HSU

I had to return two of the amps (apparently from the same production run) that had problems, but Dr. Hsu quickly replaced both and followed up with his OEM mfg. source.
Once I set the HRS12VA up in my system, my music collection was transformed. I have auditioned several subs costing up to 3x as much and none are as clean and tight.

Use of the amp/crossover between my pre and main seems to narrow the soundstage slightly, but my friends claim it's my "wannabe a snooty audiophile" imagination...

This product is a steal for the price.

Awesome bass..with proper crossover,or just cheat alittle..needs an amp with great damping factor

big big big,could use it as a coffee table if you aren't playing it but you may spill when the cannons go off

It is amazing how this now discontinued subwoofer will add life to anything you listen to. Home Theatre buffs are well served with all the punch and vigor that their DVD and better laserdiscs punch out,and even VHS hifi users could see the beef in their tapes too. The HSU is a passive dual port 12" subwoofer. It could be had with their cross-over at a mere $450.00....OUCH!! I understand that the crossover uses high quality discrete components and great build....but come on now..$450.00...get real. I did the next best thing. I had an ADAT calibration tape and found where my Kef C-80s' rolled off at,and where the HSUs' gave up the ghost on frequency sweeps. An s.p.l. meter helps here too. So with my mixer, I dedicated a "direct out" to the subwoofers amp,and piped in the recievers' input to the same channel and set the eq. point to the appropriate point and voila, I have discovered the HSUs' true potential. I got reasonable bass before but the HSU was playing...or trying to play everything,instead of just the low of the lows. This solution worked great and best of all was free. Now the HSU really cooks and shakes the room like it should. My classical has never had so much impact,my jazz never so much depth,bass guitars and drums now have life. My home theatre which I bought this subwoofer for in the first place now just is grand entertainer on any low percusive info,and makes the movie take on a more exciting personality. You can see it sure,but feeling it too is fun too. The footsteps of a T-rex or the battle at Normandy with "Saving Private Ryan",just priceless. My computer games are more exciting too with this sub. I bought the "Quake 3 Arena" for mindless fun,what else,and the gun fire with the HSU is incredible. I know, a waste of resources,but it it fun nonetheless. Afterall isn't getting abit closer to reality with your equipment supposed be at least alittle fun anyway?? I hope so. The HSU gives you clean shake the room lows and dynamics that all your great sources have and deserve to be reproduced. So go and check out the www.hsuresearch.com website and see what is new. The newer subs still kick some serious...@#$$ Just in a smaller package thank you. Have a grand time with the HSUs' in your entainment system. I know I do,everytime I go out to the movies at home. V.C.

Similar Products Used:

Velodynes...most of them

Extremely smooth and accurate bass

physically large, needs a good amp to drive it

It's unfortunate that some insecure imbecile has to put in his 2 cents (closer to 1 cent) worth on a product they haven't apparently heard or seen. This is a review site for products we've tried, not for personal agendas.
Notwithstanding the useless reviews, or trying to "balance out" whatever real or perceived injustice these dweebs have had inflicted upon them, I'd like to provide my (actual) review of a product I've lived with for about 3 months now.
The 12v is an extremely effective sub, that needs good placement and a decent amp to work to its best capability. The placement issue should not be underestimated since it is a large unit that takes a lot of real estate.
I'm using it with the HSU 150 watt amp, which seems adequate, but I can tell that the HSU 250 watt amp I also have is much more effective.
After spending some time getting all the placement and crossover issues straightened out, I'm enjoying the piece very much. While it doesn't have the immediacy of the REL, it seems to blend better. It is certainly orders of magnitude more natural and musical than the 1 square foot boom boxes that I've tried.
For the price these units are available for, it would be very hard to find something more effective. Also note that HSU still supports you on placement and general questions even though these have been out of production for some time.
If you can get a good price, and have the room for it, I'd heartily recommend you try this piece.

Similar Products Used:

REL, a/d/s, m&k, sunfire, velodyne

This subwoofer is the "passive" model from HSU research. Found these folks in Stereophile magazine. This big cylindrical device makes for exciting home theatre with its tight deep bass. Down to 20hz with the crossover,40hz without. Makes T-rex in Jurasic park or Lost world "tons" of fun. More dynamics for the killer digital stuff out there. Lets not forget the awesome analog stuff too. Sheffield labs stuff,etc.. This sub is big with a 12" woofer,twin ports. It is ready to boogie down low. When run with my NAD 2400 bridged to mono,making 440 watts in 4 ohms,yes,this guy runs at 4 ohms,makes me wonder why I waited so long to buy one. I purchased mine as a "blem",cosmetic,fully functional though. No other defects otherwise. Makes the moans,and creaks realistic on Titanic too. I want to try the dvd of dragonheart with the dragon flyover. I hear,that it really challenges a sub/amp combo. Way reccomended for the price for any home theatre fan out there. Sold factory direct. From Santa fe springs ca,562-404-3848. Try it,you'll like it.

Best and true subwoofer for music and video!!I have compared it at home with Velodyne F-1500R and Mirage BPSS210.
At low level sound, the velodyne sound strong with mid-bass (100Hz) and probably best with movie/video at low level (80dB SPL). However, for hi-level sound (100D SPL) the velodyne does not produce the low (20-40Hz) but rather just increase the (80-100HZ) bass. This HSU truly produce the low (20-40Hz) and bone shaking level but not hurting your ears. For music, the HSU produce the low like no other!! tight and I mean really low!!!

Deep clean bass

Weak amp, wood veneer damages easily

I have the original HRSW12V, which is discontinued. I bought it with the optional wood top and 80Hz Xover, which added to the price.

I bought this sub many years ago and have grown to knows its strengths and weaknesses. The first weakness is the construction. The separate amp blew out on me (but Hsu repaired it in short order) and just recently I blew out the driver. I have been driving the sub with a bridged ATI 1502 and either the 450W was more than the little driver could take, or the amp lost it and killed the driver. I think that the only practical way to use this sub is to have a preamp that does the crossover. Any other way and you won't get a good match with your mains, or you have to pass the signal through the Hsu Xover, which I don't find ideal.

On the positive side, this sub pumps out smooth clean bass. Not that noisy boomy distorted stuff your friends think is bass (but is just noise). This sub goes so low and loud, without distortion, that you can feel your chair shaking and not be able to actually hear the bass! It goes deeper than I think most humans can hear.

I'm getting my original driver (that I blew) replaced with a 12VA driver from Hsu this week and I should be back in business. I had the opportunity to upgrade when I blew the driver, but I really don't know what else I'd get. I like the deep clean bass and I even like the look with the wood top (which is admittedly cheap and damages easily).

The sub without an amp is a great steal. Adding the cost of the amp and crossover, which I don't use, makes it less of a deal. I would suggest you get a Hsu without the amp/Xover, if your preamp has built in Xover (like most home theater processors).

Recently I acquired a used HRSV12 subwoofer with the 150W power amp. Now I've got a very important question to ask you. There's three plug in module inside (rp1,2,3 does it refer to low pass, left, right, high pass etc) and another row of (1-8) unconnected pins. I went to a shop and asked them for the 43hz, 34hz, 28hz module. The original ones came with 14 legs but theirs has 16 legs. They told me that it is compatible except that two of the legs would be protruding out and left unused. Is this correct? when I use the 43hz, 34hz, there was still some output of around 80-40hz, is this okay? Next, regarding those (1-8) unconnected pins, when I looked into the new 500W amp, the pins had jumpers, for the old 150W amp, do the jumpers need to be connected as well, as mine did not have any jumpers. If it need to be connected, how do I connect them and which pin to which pin and what is the function (eg, low pass, high pass etc etc)?
I'm using this sub to opment my B&W matrix 801 and I need to supplement only below 40-30hz, thank you very much.

Kam, I think you are outnumbered. My friend has this sub and I was quite impressed considering the price. My Pacemaker blows it away, but its substantially more expensive. I consider this to be a rel bargain and two of them may outdo my sub forhalf the price! Well, maybe not, but close! Give it an audition. A true bargain. Chris

What can I say but BASS,BASS and more BASS. WOW! this subwoofer is the real thing. Check it out if you haven't all ready!