simple fix to enhance bass weight in hi fi

Dude, are you serious?

Tell me about it dude! "my be" indeed, pffft...

Nice one. I've recently been trying the same thing & so far am really enjoying the added bottom end.

Got to say though, the more I get used to it the more I turn the subs down, less is more.

I found this article about sub integration that you might be interested in:

http://www.soundoctor.com/whitepapers/index.htm

The video is quite funny & there is  link to the white paper itself which goes into greater detail.

Have you considered buying two subs instead of one? Not sure what your budget is or what you consider a "small" footprint but I can recommend the JL Audio F110 sealed sub, packs a lot of punch for it's size.

You mean the link that is a promo for JL?

On a serious note, I've never been overly keen on subs for music until I bought my current sub (which will remain nameless so that I'm not seen to be shamelessly promoting the brand). If the sub can be blended seamlessly with the speakers so that you're not even aware you're listening to a sub, bingo

Sorry about that, meant to focus more on the integration aspect than the brand! Position / phase / level etc.

Have to say that the only other sub that I know of that offers a simliar level of on-board control is the velodyne DD+ range. And IMO the JL is much better VFM.

With-out giving away the brand name can you tell if your sub is ported or sealed? I found the part in the article about how porting creates it's own bass identity quite interesting. Haven't gone as far as plugging up the front ports on my speakers yet though.

I'm waiting on an active crossover to arrive which hopefully will assist with blending the subs. But in the meantime I have the crossover on the sub set down at 40 & the ELF trim at about -3dB. I found that less is definitely more.

hahaha.  

What system have you got OP?

not a fan of subs. Just get better speakers. 

i have a Rel Stampede hooked through the high input onto the speakers terminals and gives me a nice solid foundation...can't even imagine it not being there...at the same time it blends so nicely you don't notice it..

Sealed, of course

While I appreciate why people buy ported subs, I doubt I will ever have a ported sub in my system. I prefer speed and agility to ultimate depth. Although, depth can still be had...

Not recommended. Your speakers will have been designed as a ported speaker, and blocking them will alter the resulting sound drastically - so much so that they will sound quite different to how the manufacturer will have intended them to sound. I would recommend use of a partial bung (a bung with the centre removed, leaving an outer bung, so to speak), but not full bungs.

If the room size is too small for floorstanders it doesn't matter how much 'better' the speakers are bookshelves roll in the lower frequencies and can miss a large part of the musical message.. Infact even floorstanders most high end speakers are too lean

I just switched from floorstanders to bookshelves and I have been wiring in a sub (through the hi level outs) for certain types and music and loving it.  The integration is a little fiddly but really not that bad - certainly not as bad as some would make it out to be.  It has been the perfect compromise but I would certainly agree that less is definitely more. 

Added a small sealed sub and haven't looked back. It's amazing how much more complete the music sounds with just the bottom few registers filled in.

If I had more room I'd contemplate one sub for each channel. For the money I've spent, the sub + my bookshelf speakers gives me better performance than spending a similar amount on floorstanding speakers.

Yeah def agree.. Can't wait to get my listening room buy a xls200 and get it set up!! 

Or (same idea really) try stuffing the ports lightly with some accoustic damping material or loose wool fibres. That's the priciple behind the Variovent and other similar devices - create an aperiodic tuning by only letting certain frequencies through the port. In theory this should create a 3rd, rather than 4th order rolloff of the bass - in other words, a less steep decline that starts higher up. The idea is that the bass should more like a transmission line (which uses a long damped tunnel to do exactly the same thing). A sealed box starts to roll off even higher, but even more shallowly (2nd order) - but will behave very differently, changing the impedence of the system and thus, (possibly) messing up the crossover's performance. But by stuffing the port lightly and letting some air pass, it's a less radical way to tame your boomy bass.

One good way to excecute David's version of this suggestion is to take a piece of 1/2" or 13mm felt and cut it to fit the circumference of the port, leaving a hole down the middle. The only drawback is that Sonus Faber thinks they have patented the idea.

Almost all of these port tweaks will quite audibly change the sound of your system. It is absolutely worth trying.