Solid suggestion, if I remember correctly the sub does have a gain control but I don’t know if it affects the pass through level to the tops.
Generally if the XLR connector is “through” it means that it is connected in parallel to the other. And the gain control affects the subwoofer amplification. Then the subwoofers also have an additional XLR output with high pass filter to be sent to the full range speakers.
If we’re talking about my KSub still, it only has a bass level/amplification knob, there is no dedicated input or output gain. It just passes through what it gets from the mixer. The K8’s have input gain, and again if the P4 master is set to 0, the K8’s have to be at the lowest possible setting (essentially -9db as -10db kills all output).
My understanding of unity in the sound engineering space is that input volume should equal output volume, which is why I was confused why the P4 with 0 gain on the channels & master appears to be amplifying the signal drastically to the sub & speakers when they are also set to 0 gain.
It’s really not a huge deal and adding the Behringer mixer in front of the sub has helped considerably in sort of “forcing unity” between the devices. Now I’m keeping the P4 master at 0 gain, which allows me to visually see master levels correctly on the unit, then lowering output through the mixer to the sub by about -10db so that the sub and speakers are set back to 0 gain as well, and everything sounds great. I definitely don’t hear any sound coloration due to this being a “cheap mixer” - there is no processing going on other than volume reduction which is not affecting my bass, mids, highs, etc.
AFAIK this issue is now resolved, but it would be nice to hear from Denon if my experience is how everything should be normally, or if there might have been something up with my unit. I do have one of the problem units where the left deck stops playback randomly and am STILL working with support on a replacement unit (trying since July of 2019, no joke), so I wouldn’t be surprised if this could have been related to that.
Ok, this needs to be said: only way you would really have a problem is if you would need to keep your P4 master volume under -10db on the master VU meter because that would mean you could not run the volume where the VU meter scale is most sensitive and where you could most easily see if your mixing and fx is affecting the volume.
Any other reason on a digital mixer is ■■■■■■■■ (“my mixer sound the best at 0db because that is the unity”).
Exactly. Previously, my master volume knob was so low that I couldn’t see any meters, so I had no way to know exactly how much total volume was being outputted to the sub. While I know a lot of this is just personal preference, I like to see the master meters as a reflection of each channel being mixed together, rather than having to look at the separate channel meters and make an assumption.
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