I recently bought a KSW-10 to augment the bottom end on my Heresy speakers which, although wonderful, don't have much bass. The KSW-10 does just what it should: provide a fuller bass response and make what was quite good much better. They AREN'T to be mistaken for over-$1000 subs meant for gi-normous systems, but are intended for, and good at, the purpose to which I have put them. The sound is clean, it does have a phase-reverse switch, which is a very good feature, and adjustable low pass. At full throttle, it really pumps out the bass, and the Heresys thank me every day for the help!

I apologize in advance if this is a double posting... I posted about two hours ago, and haven't seen my review listed yet, so I'll have to assume something went awry. Anyway...
I've had the KSW10 for about a year now, and overall it performs well. However, there are two issues I'm experiencing with the unit. I don't know if I'm being nitpicky, but I'm surprised I'm experiencing problems like these with a product from Klipsch.

First, unused RCA jacks on the back of the unit vibrate. The jacks have plastic insets for the color coding, and some of these are not seated firmly in their mounting. I returned one unit because of this problem, but the replacement had the same issue. I finally put a piece of tape across the jacks - not an elegant solution, but it works. I'll probably put a very small quantity of glue around the edges of the jacks as a more permanent solution. It seems to me that part of the good design of a subwoofer would be to eliminate all sources of vibration.

My other complaint is that the unit's power supply hums when powered off. Again, not a huge deal, but it is kind of distracting when you're trying to read quietly in the same room with the subwoofer.

The main reason I bought Klipsch vs. the comparable product from Infinity was the Klipsch unit's support for an LFE channel. I've since bought a Dolby Digital receiver, so my decision has paid off in that respect.

So, even with my nitpicky problems, I'll rate this one a "4".

I've had 2 of these subs for 4 months already (paid 250 a piece on-line). I paired these with maggies and they complement each other pretty good. Bass is fast and tight especially with movies. Produces good solid bass at mid and upper level bass. Although I had a problem with one of the subs, it produced a low hum even if when off so I returned it and they sent me another (no more hum). I got a great deal with these subs even though they're only rated 29Hz at the bottom.

Makes a nice table for drinks

junk

My buddy called me today and asked me to bring my Definitive
Pro 100TL sub over and compare it to his new Ksw 10 he bought at the Wiz for 360 dollars. He is using a Marantz 880 MkII, Definitive bp 10's,Definitive CC ? "huge",Energy bipolar rears,jvc 701.I brought the sub over and a few dvds, eagles dts, prvt ryan dts etc. Well, his system rocked but the Sub was a sad joke. Playing music it seemed to me like complete distortion, just vibration and mud at any adjustments. Playing a movie was a tad more forgiving but still very poor for something costing 350, horrible in my opinion but I kept my mouth shut. We hooked in the Pro 100 and played the same music and thirty seconds later he was digging through his desk for the receipt. Not even close, the definitive I bought for 375 totally destroyed it in all areas. After watching prvt ryan I had to pry my sub from his tight grip and go home, Needless to say his sub is going back tomorrow and he’s calling back to his definitive guy for a quote on the pro 100...buyer beware

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bad gas after dinner

It's lightweight enough to throw it out the window

It doesn't DO anything!

I bought this from a local dealer.. in hopes I would get
some serious bottom end to my music and movies. WRONG. This sub is capable of thumping out some bass but not unless you crank the knob on the back to "10" and even then you have to crank it up on your reciever or amp to get any kind of noise. I'm not too much of a basshead, I don't listen to rap, but come on.. a subwoofer should do its job right? When I do decide to crank up the music the sub tends to distort. I wonder if I got damaged goods, who knows. At the dealer he had it turned up to "5" and it was thumping pretty good.. something doesn't seem right.

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Polk PSW650, Paradigm PS1200

size and weight. It made it easy to return to the store.

Take your pick.

I took this subwoofer back to the store in less than a week. After testing it with several of my cd's and movies it was clear to me that even at maximum volume it did not produce the bass I was looking for. I compared it head to head with my 10 year old Yamaha sub that did not have half the power rating or price(I am replacing it). My old sub out performed it every time. I was very disappointed with this sub. Although it had a very clean and quick response it just did not seem to have enough power to "feel" the bass in my very small home enterainment room. I would look elswhere for a subwoofer

•Quality is great. It survived severe damage to the shipping carton.
•small & compact, you can easily find a spot for it.
• blends with music rather than overpowering it (which is a good thing if you have family or neighbors who don't want to be disturbed)
• Works well with DVD
• Auto on-off feature
• Tight, not boomy bass
• Klipsch provides helpful customer service.

• This sub puts out frequencies that are so low, they’re almost imperceptible when listening to music that isn’t heavy on those frequencies. (Which is no surprise given that the acuity of the human ear drops off noticeably below the 20hz-20khz range).
I notice the absence of the KSW 10 when I unplug it, but when it's plugged in, its not exactly earthshaking. (The manual recommends placing the unit in a corner for improved performance, which I have yet to do, so I really can't call my last comment a weakness at this point).
• Klipsch, like so many other audio manufacturers, does not authorize many online retailers. Unauthorized retail sales result in a voided warranty, so buyer beware!

I can't speak for how the KSW 10 will sound with other receivers or if it can compete with speakers of the tower sort because I've only used the KSW 10 with full-range (but excellent) front and rear loudspeakers (KSB1.1s). With my HarmanKardon AVR 510, the combination works well in conjunction with Monster cable and a few tweeks on the sub/receiver.

Based upon the other reviews, I would say that anyone looking for something to rock the house will be happier with a larger sub. That's not to say there's something wrong with the KSW 10 because there isn't. But in my experience, a lot of the store demos will train your ear to expect something that drowns out just about everything else. Drowning out everything is not what the KSW 10 will do. This speaker is designed to complement other speakers, not compete with them. If that's what you want, that's what you'll get.

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n/a

Adjustments and auto-on

Downward firing might be worse with carpet

I just hooked this up to my HT. I've got full range front speakers with 12" woofers that already put out lots of bass if needed, but I wanted a sub to just work the LFE sound from DVD. I figured it might relieve the receiever amp of a bit of work too. Well, it did seem a little quite at first, but when I used a Y adapter and ran the subwoofer out to both line inputs, the thing got loud (placed in the corner of course). I then recalibrated my speaker levels and setup the subwoofer with AVIA and I had to turn the level down to 3 to match the the upper frequencies (so that it doesn't get stpuid loud at low frequencies). I then disconnected the Y and am now running it between 6 and 7 and it sounds great. If I want some impressive bass just to prove I have some, I can put it up to 8 or 9 and it's get-my-lease-canceled loud. And I haven't even touched the subwoofer gain on the receiver. It seems to really provide some consistent low end (below 100 Hz) that my front speakers were having problems with and most gratifying is that the center channel sound now sounds much better since there is some good low end now.

My room is 12 x 20 and has a carpeted floor and I am pleased with it.

it looks cool

any time i want bass, it just goes brmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm.

Ok first, I have a yamaha rx-v520 which i bought at magnolia-hifi for $380 (ripoff), and the klipsch quintets that were $529 (rippppofffffff).

This sub does nothing but brmmmmmmmm. It has no tone to the bass, it just shakes things. When watching the matrix; the sub would just start shaking things when a low-tone song or sound was in the mix, something like a door opening, or anything that should'nt shake the room...

So after that, i knew i had to do some adjusting, i adjusted it so it would stop shaking everything, and now i have almost no power, and the big black box is useless.

I really wish my dad would have researched before he bought on impulse from a guy that thinks bbking is rock.

Excellent for movie effects, auto on works (see below), just the right amount of bass to accompany the Klipsch quintets.

Not the best musical sub. Plenty of thump but lacks tonal quality.

The key I found to using this sub is to add a Y-adapter so that the subwoofer port on your receiver connects to both the L/LFE channel and the R channel on the sub. This gives you 6dB more power (its in the manual). I also found that this solved the auto on problem I was having with just the L/LFE connected. So go and spend 10 bucks and get the Y-adapter.

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Yamaha subs, Polk subs