Velodyne Servo Control Subwoofer S-1200-B

Yes, those are awesome. Assuming it's been well cared for it should provide excellent service.

LOL. The only thing about it on Google is this page.

I have since gotten the original owners manual and wow was this expensive brand new in 1990 ;-) retailed at 800 bucks!! 100w rms w/3500 corrections per second on the servo amp. i can hear a big difference when compared to my other 12" sub woofers with even more power than this. only thing wrong with this is its a little banged up but i think it sounds great, its not as loud as my other stuff but im living at home and my parents hate loud bass anyways. Might as well just keep it clean. i would love to get about 3 more ;-) i love loud explosions in movies, this doesnt seem that loud to me..

You could always use it as a computer subwoofer.

my whole setup is through my computer :-)

I have owned one of these for about 15 years and it worked well with my B&W CM-1 bookshelves. Today I am attempting to use it in a 5.1 surround system with my Yamaha SX-V1700 receiver. Here's the problem, the Velodyne has L + R input and L + R preout cables and a low pass crossover dial. The Yamaha has only one audio cable subwoofer preout. Will this single cable drive my Velodyne? What happens to the crossover dial? What should it be set at (100 - 40 hz)? I'm no technophile but I think I can set this up myself (with your help). THanks.

it will run off one RCA cable but you'll just have to turn the gain up a little higher.. i use a splitter so that i get both R + L. as far as the x-over that to me is personal taste but i think 70 - 100 would be fine depending on what kind of bass your bookshelves can make. there is an x-over built in on most 5.1 amps and nothing but bass comes out when there is a movie but i still suggest using the x-over on the sub. hope that helps.

Thanks Justin, I returned the Yamaha for a new Denon with 1.3a switching. In the mean time I use the subwoofer out on the Pioneer 5010 with the RCA as you suggested and I have actually tolerable sound while I wait for the new Denon. BTW, I had to set the Velodyne crossover at 60 because of the small plasma speakers. Maybe I'll try the splitter way when the receiver comes. Why do you need L + R, if I may ask?

it will run fine with just 1 of them but like i said your gains will be higher. nothing the volume knob cant fix. if you use both L+R the amp inside will have twice the signal from the denon or yamaha, and wont be amping noise as much. (not like youd really hear it) but it is still cleaner in general. they put 2 rca's on there because back in the day people could get just preamps and run the signal in the sub and back out to a 2 or 4 ch amp for the speakers. i think this sub still qualifies as an audiophile subwoofer. i love it.

Thanks for your help Justin. The Denon 3808 arrived and for the life of me I couldn't get the Velodyne to work with one RCA from the subwoofer preout. I asked for the free splitter offered from Velodyne (OK, I'm cheap) but was told the don't have a splitter for that model. ?! So I popped for a splitter from BB and voila! everything works great. The bass isn't exactly as tight as I would like but what do you want from a sub that has played Yes, Genesis, Pink Floyd, Jethro Tull, etc for 16 years? She has a little life still in her so I can't send her out to pasture just yet. I can't tell the difference between 60 and 70 hz so I'm going with 70 as you recommended. Thanks again Justin.

im kinda surprised that it wouldnt work well with just one RCA. the amount of gain i can achieve on mine is pretty high, i barely have to have the knob turned up and i get plenty of bass. if you ever get real curious, unhook the servo control wire on the inside on the woofer and you will have gain like there is no tomorrow, though it wont be anywhere near as clean sounding... i had to experiment when i got the sub to learn exactly what servo did.

True this sub is not very loud but try placing it in different areas to see what plays the deep notes, everything changes when its in the wrong spot acoustically...

Between figuring out the new plasma, new receiver, new DVR decoder and new PS3, I probably din't assign something right for the sub. But it seemed to me that all I did was add the splitter and it suddenly worked. Anyway, I have plenty of bass for stereo and surround now. I think I'll pass on the control wire modification because I prefer a cleaner bass. I will try moving it to the corner away from my console (my only other option) to see how it sounds. Thanks.

i wasn't really recommending the servo bypass, i just was sayin what happens when you unplug it. i still have mine in factory form....

i know its an old topic but... my subwoofer's voice coil has come apart from the rest of the speaker :-) apparently im a little rough on the volume.. i have since bought a subwoofer from partsexpress.com and its been working out great, though not on the original amp for the servo.