SVS PB13 subwoofer Review

[iSonics]

Introduction

Subsonic sounds, a US based company started in very small scale few years ago thru’ only internet channel has grown up as the pioneers in Subwoofer arena. They have established roots across Europe, Australia & Asia. Their products have huge fan base in US & Europe, mostly tech savvy bass heads.

Product range

Mainly SVS subwoofers are classified into Ported box (PB) & Ported cylinder (PC). There is one exception in the box variant, which is a very compact sealed box, which is SB12+. Equally performing products from competitors in the market costs more than double the cost of SVS product range.

PB13 Ultra

SV Sound's latest offering in 13” (or 13.5") subwoofers range is amazing, if not breath snatching. Being voted best sub maker in under 2k category for almost 2 years in a row by the bass heads, the SVS people are quite bullish about the quality they offer now, the PB12-Ultra. The 13” subwoofer is so powerful that it can take head-on with almost every top-tier subwoofers of its class, costing far more than what PB13-Ultra costs. The quality and performance is nothing lesser than the best. It provides you with the performance which you find in theatres or media rooms. The best thing about SVS products is that it is totally independent on your room’s acoustics. That means that it will give you not less than the best performance, without any dependence on dimensions of your room. If your hall of installation is huge, then probably you can install two of these monsters (that seem to be the perfect word to explain its performance).

Also the Ultra comes in cylindrical flavour, which is 46 inch tall and 17" diameter. This will be a real advantage for those who has less floorspace and not worried too much of a huggable figure standing in living-cinema room

The driver, the amp, enclosure and the design; everything blends with each other perfectly. This displays the effort SVS put in designing the product till the minutest detail has been attended. The assembly is done by hands and the parts being used are mostly made in US or Canada, with some equipment sourced internationally. The box comes in dimensions of 27”x 20.5” x 22” w/o the grill and weighs hefty 155 pounds. These extra pounds would keep it stable and grounded when it produces deep heart thumping basses. Let’s discuss in details all the features of the monstrous PB13-Ultra.

The driver it packs is a 13” one made at the company’s Ohio based factory. It surely is an aesthetic wonder with its die cast basket, which holds the components developed painstakingly by SVS. The woofer driver is capable of almost 3” excursions, which means that it can seriously move a lot of air. It translates to more precaution for your glassware in your house. The air intake is through the three 3.5” ports, covered by foam plugs, present on front of the box. The cone of the driver is make from stitched foam/glass composite (polymethacrylimide), which ensures continuously long high-excursion thumps without any risk of tear.

Being it is an active subwoofer, it includes an amplifier made exclusively for it by Indigo (savannah) BASH, one of the world’s leading makers of audio amplifiers. The amp features solid 750watts RMS, which is quite sufficient to resonate with your heartbeat. Within its price class, the amp provides unmatched performance. The variable crossover with bypass ensures that it has no compatibility issues with any sound system. The parametric equalizer provides fine tuning for advanced users. The amp is unprecedentedly advanced for the price it comes at. It also has a room compensation switch to fine tune the acoustics according to the room ambience. The amp runs extremely light and cool so that you can enjoy carefree continues beats for long time without any risk of overheat or fire.

The enclosure of the sub is made from furniture grade parts, which perfectly blend with the hi-class décor of your rooms. The finishing and beauty of the sub stands perfectly unmatched. This is what the makers call the SVS way. There are no cheap plastics being used in making this great sub. Probably several manufacturers use plastic feet for their subs, but with a lot of vibrations happening with the subs during its operation, it probably can damage the wooden or expensive flooring so SVS choose elastomer cone feet to make base perfect for just about any surface. The sub comes in hand-finished hardwood box construction designed using complex Computer Aided Design (CAD) technique and a lot of simulations with the design, which has resulted in robust and acoustically inert enclosure. Minutest details have been taken care of like the carefully rounded edges and invisible seams. Enclosures are handmade using 1” medium density fiberboard, with a choice of having four finishes namely textured black, gloss black, oak and rosenut.

There is an option of either having a metallic grill in front or no holds barred “naked” look. There is however negligible loss in performance with the protective grill up in front of the sub. The grill is fastened to the body in rather innovative way, with a couple of small, but powerful magnets holding the grill snuggly. The three front flaring ports for sucking the air inside, crave for attention. The ports cover the flares with form plugs to protect the parts inside the sub from getting damaged.

Connection & setup

AV Receiver out is connected straight to BFD FBQ2496 and from there branched to 2 PC+ subs & PB13 Ultra, all connected via Mark Grant cables [Y splitters are Mark grant & QED reference]. Before hooking up the sub setup I’ve made sure response curve is not that bad to start with. I’ve some serious peaks between 10 & 22 Hz and 70 & 80 db. 10 Hz tuning seem to be the best in my room, plugged in 2 port bungs in both the end ports.

Movie time started with Matrix ultimate series HD - Opening scene Gun shots, highway chase (Revisited) & final fight scene of Neo & Smiths. I love to hear that scenes in my dual PC+, but PB13 taken me to a different level of experience, which is very accurate & tight. Felt like the gun shots hitting my chest straight. One thing noted was 50 Hz range sounded similar to my old PB12+/2 (thanks marc C), but lower frequencies sounded very different to PB12+/2! My SPL meter hits up to 115db during these scenes.

Other tight & quick bass scenes in my list were U571 depth charge scene, Spider Man 3 - all performed well as expected. Compare to other SVS family, the newly designed ultra driver is very quick

Moved on to War of the Worlds - The lightning scene, my favourite LFE - It is just like the lightning struck at my house - amazing experience!! Skipped to Pod emerging scene, another bass heavy scene - hits the SPL > 115db without any sweating or odd noises. This is a real trouser flapper !!! Hairs on my leg had some kind of feeling

Darla taps & Monster inc boo laughs pressurised the whole room, but i turned down the level as I don’t want to do any damage to my newly DIY’d room

Slide the Transformers HD to the player, skipped to the Qatar attack scene. PB13 delivers a lot more detail in lower end with quality!!. Iron-hide flip was just like it happening in my living room, hits SPL around 120db

And finally, Pulse - computer scene shows lot of excursion on driver, though I’ve noticed this in Keith’s video (Stevep posted), reproduced the sound as expected without any farting noise (spl 115db / HD version).

And the musicI always had the complain that I’m missing the *punch* factor on SVS cylinders. Low frequencies always appeared timed out (or phased out) from other frequency ranges. Now PB13 fills that gap, i got the integrity back, It is tight and punchy. (worth to mention SB12+ was good in music)

Eagles - Hell freeze over DTS, a different level with great detail in low frequencies, especially drum rolls. Now I can feel the kick on my chest, Joss stone snake & ladder given a good workout to the driver - I’m sure I cannot hear some frequencies, this is one of the best ear testing music tracks

The experience with PB13 ultra is quite customizable with up-to two ultras which can be coupled to each other for thunderous performance. The sub can be even configured produce even lower sub-sonic sounds, which can be either at preconfigured 20hertz, monstrous 15 hertz or glass shattering 10 hertz. Be it music or home theatre experience, this sub is far better than most of the subs available in market, even above its class and price. Having said that, don’t get over excited (movie experience) if you owned a PB12+ or higher version. The LFE is much more *clean and powerful, <30Hz in particular, but not huge improvement in mid LFE areas. But when it comes to music there is day & night difference with ultras and other family of SVS subs (that I heard!).

This sub-woofer retails for MSRP of $1499 for fine textured black finish going up till 1699 for gloss black finish. Natively it comes with 110v power supply, but european versions carry 230v power supply with CE certification, hence carries a slightly higher price tag. SVS don't have dealers in India, but they will ship their products internationally.