1/23/2012

Boston Acoustics Classic Series CPS12Wi Wireless Ready Powered Woofer (Cherry) Review

Boston Acoustics Classic Series CPS12Wi Wireless Ready Powered Woofer (Cherry)
Average Reviews:

(More customer reviews)
This is my 1st ever home audio sub so I will have to compare it to my car sub and my dads home sub. My car sub is a 12" MTX on 380 Watts in a sealed box in the trunk. My dad's home sub is a Vandersteen 2WQ assisting a pair of expensive Talons. Compared to the MTX the CPS12Wi is ported and plays lower notes well (20-30hz) that the MTX struggles with. It is also more musical less bone jarring.
Compared to the Vandersteen it's crossed over at a high frequency (my choice based on my setup) and therefore you can guess where it is in the room when blindfolded. It's actually louder than the $1000++ vanderdstien but that's probably due to the higher x-over and also the port. Not to mention the 2WQ was never intended to be loud at all as far as I can tell.
If you are looking for something bone jarring, this is not your sub. However, for authoritative and musical ultra lows, it's great. So on the MTX to Vandersteen scale, it's closer to the Vandersteen.
I dont plan on using WiFi. I picked this sub because it was on sale for under $300 at amazon. I'm very pleased, no regrets.
Couple tips: 1. Place sub in corner of room, it makes a difference. 2. Use a RCA splitter to plug in both left and right inputs. This will basically give you a better starting point when you tune the volume level because you will start at double volume. In my case my L/R speaker have high sensitivity so without the splitter I wasn't able to set the volume where I wanted it. This is a negative.
My favorite test is playing "the longships" by Enya. The drum is so low you visualize it as having a 14ft diameter. My MTX sucks at this song compared to the CPS12wi. Maybe it just wont work right in a car or maybe it requires a ported sub.
Finally, just a thought, I used a tone generator to test this thing at 20hz. Definitely audible. It's rated at 25hz because that's where you start to lose significant loudness. I tested it at 16hz and still heard it, only because it was making something else vibrate in the room. That 16hz is not audible by humans.
UPDATE 3/28
I've had some more time with this unit and have decided the port diameter is too small. During intense low frequency movie scenes you can hear a high pitched wooshing sound in the port. For this price range and box size that is totally normal. However, it can be avoided with a larger port (which also requires a larger box). I did compare the unit side by side to a much larger sub with 4 ports of the same diameter. It wasn't really a fair comparison because the other unit was a 15" driver in a 13cf box weighing 190lbs.


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