Here we go again - we are in for some more shake, rattle and boom! Another view of another subwoofer willing to do battle against my torture tests and destructive taste in films. In a short period of time I put an innocent piece of equipment through ordeals that many owners would not dare. I probe for weaknesses and look for strengths so that you, the reader, can decide whether or not the item under review is worthy of your dollars. The subwoofer up for assessment this time is the SW-250 from Accusound Australia which at $1,299 is priced squarely in the middle of the subwoofer market.

The SW-250 uses a 10-inch (250mm) driver that Accusound states is of the long throw variety, sporting a serious voice coil. I could not actually see nor get to the driver for the front grille cannot be removed, but I knew my listening tests would certainly confirm whether the driver would cut the mustard.

The Accusound is a ported design that has two long ports running down either side of the sub's front baffle. Its 250 watt on-board amp has its heat sink at the back of the unit. This is also where the controls lie.

This SW-250 makes no pretensions of being anything but a home theatre subwoofer by eschewing speaker level input and output controls which are the type normally used by those with LFE outputs - ie. owners od stereo receivers or integrated amplifiers.
 

Further reinforcing its home theatre-led design is the fact that it has only a single RCA input and output, not a stereo pair. So those with stereo pre-outs won't be able to feed them in a loop back into their power amplifier. The single output is so you could daisy chain to another subwoofer for added grunt. The SW-250 does sport a rotary phase control (rather than a flip type zero or 180° control), for making sure its bass is not working against your main speakers around the crossover frequency. This means that wherever you happen to place the Accusound in the room, relative to your front stereo speakers, its bass won't cancell out the main speakers. It also has a power switch that allows for the sub to turn itself off and on automatically. As usual with today's subwoofers, there is a low pass filter for adjusting how high the subwoofer will operate in terms of frequency so you can better match it to the bass output of your main speakers. I set the Accusound SW-250 up in exactly the same spot that suits all the subs I have tested have been placed. Near the front left corner of the room just behind the left main loudspeaker.

Accusound's substantially built sub is a perfect match for big action movies By Gavin Womersley

While setting up the sub and adjusting its level so that it measured the same as my main speakers using a sound metre and my DVD copy of the Video Essentials disc, I perused the brief manual. Some things were explained clearly and accurately but other parts of the manual said things that did not ring true. The manual tells you to turn all your speaker settings to small on your amplifier and also suggests setting the volume to five on the volume dial. This assumes that all users' main speakers have bass response that is not going to be adequate or of a lesser quality than its own low frequency performance. In many cases, yes, but definitely not all.

Secondly, with the review sample at least, I found the level that gave me accurately matched performance in my room with my loudspeakers was in fact one out of ten. I use a large room and have large and efficient main speakers, so for many purchasers, less than one may be accurate. I'd only recommend you use the manual's figures as a rough guide, and actually try setting the volume by ear, as I did. Having got that off my chest, lets see just how the SW-250 actually sounded.
 

T e c h n o t a l k

ProductType: Active subwoofer Enclosure: Bass reflex, twin front ports Driver Complement: 1 x 10" (250mm) long throw woofer with 50mm voice coil Amplifier Power: 250 watts RMS Class A Frequency Resonse: 19-200Hz Variable Low Pass Filter: 40-200Hz Inputs: Mono RCA (line level) Outputs: Mono RCA (line level) Phase Control: Variable, 0-180° Cabinet Finishes: Black woodgrain and Rosewood side veneers Technotalk specifications and recommended retail prices are supplied by the manufacturer.

This must be the only subwoofer that has given a higher maximum level reading at 40Hz than at 45Hz. I got 110dB at my listening position four metres away from the sub with the 45Hz tone. As I normally do, I raised the volume control until the sub stopped getting louder or protested in some fashion at each 5Hz frequency down to 15Hz. It jumped to 115dB at 40Hz! I checked all my gear and settings and did the test a second time for the same result. This was serious output and it sounded quite clean too. The figure dropped to 108dB at 35Hz and still sounded clean, but fell away dramatically below that to under 100dB at 30Hz. The figures at 30Hz and below were filled with port noise and other sounds. The (measured) numbers this subwoofer achieved are definitely higher figures than achieved by the average $1,000-$1,500 subby. I played a variety of pieces of music through the SW-250, starting with some dance music at loud volume levels. The Accusound had no trouble throbbing its way through without protest. Union Jack's very clean sounding track LollipopMan was next up. I have often used it to asses a subwoofer's performance as it contains many brief pulses of quite deep bass and many subs make it sound loose and dull the transients. The SW-250 did this to a certain extent as well, but I've found that only very expensive subwoofers are able to tighten their presentation of this track. Yet some more dance music, with a bass which in one continuous movement, drops from the 60-70Hz area down into the nether regions below 30Hz. My 18-inch (450mm) Velodyne subwoofer is one of the few subs that can track it all the waydown to the point that doors and windows rattle. The Accusound had the same level of initial impact stopping short only at super subsonic levels. For a subwoofer with its attributes and price, the SW-250 cannot be expected to do what a no-holds-barred $6,000 sub can. Remember, this is a $1,299 product and the fact that the Accusound SW-250 performs as well as it does is a tribute to its design. I played several classical and jazz pieces and found that the sub blended in fine with my other speakers.

Although it performed okay with music this thing was made for movies, and preferably those of the action variety. Here it lapped up the tough stuff. U-571, The Haunting, Event Horizon, Independence Day were all swallowed whole without trouble at reference level. It is here that its abilities in the 35 to 100Hz region allowed it to muscle in on the action. Most Hollywood films don't have bass at earthquake frequencies but are concentrated in the couple of octaves above. Here, in its element, the Accusound played loud and proud. Explosions boomed and roared through my lounge room with a satisfying level of savagery. This is a real movie subwoofer, doing exactly what it was designed to. The Accusound plays loudly over all but the very deepest of frequencies. Accepting the fact that the lowest notes are very expensive to produce cleanly at any audible volume. Most should find the quality of the Accusound bass more than satisfactory for music but definitely better suited to the likes of Big Arnie running amuck and others.

The SW-250's rear control panel

		O p i n i o n
"U-571, The Haunting, Event  Horizon and Independence  Day were all swallowed whole without trouble at reference level...Here, in its element, the Accusound played loud and proud. Explosions boomed and roared through my lounge room with a  satisfying level of savagery. This is a real movie subwoofer, doing exactly what it was designed to."	The SW-250 is constructed well and is definitely worth checking out if you want to add some real "oomph" to your home theatre without needing to remortgage the house in the process. At $1,299 the Accusound SW-250 subwoofer represents truly excellent value for money, is "up there" in the performance terms and is built like the proverbial battleship. AVL Ancillary Equipment: Rotel RSP-985 AV preamplifier, NAD 208 THX & Parasound HCA2003 power amplifiers, Toshiba SD-2109 DVD player, Celestion A3 loudspeakers, Toshiba 46WH08 Widescreen TV	The "Opinion" expressed here is that of the reviewer, summarised in the form of a 5-star rating system, and should be considered as an integral part of the full contents of this Audition Equipment Review. As such, each category should be judged on its own merits and not necessarily used as a comparison with other equipment reviews in this, or other editions of Audio & Video Lifestyle magazine. Shocker Average Good Excellent Perfection "The (measured) numbers this subwoofer achieved are definitely higher figures than achieved by the average $1,000 - $2,000 subby." Performance Build Quality Compatibility Value for Money ½