A “large” front speaker sounds like it should handle the bass on its own. In the Lyngdorf bass management setup inside the MP-40, MP-50 and MP-60 processors, that label is more misleading than it looks, as Roland Hoffmann, Director Product Marketing at Steinway Lyngdorf, demonstrates — and understanding what it actually means is the key to getting a proper multi-subwoofer system to work the way it should.
What “large” and “medium” really mean in the speaker menu
Inside the setup menu — Setup, then Speakers and Room, then Speaker Setup — a typical configuration might show large front speakers, a medium centre channel, an LFE channel, and two small surround speakers. That looks like a normal, sensible starting point for a 5.1 layout, and it can just as easily be extended to 7.1 or 9.1.
But clicking into “edit configuration” and opening the detail for a speaker labelled “large” reveals a crossover point, for example 40 Hz. Look at the response curve next to it, and the speaker is often already rolling off well before that, around 50 Hz.
That gap matters, because film soundtracks, game audio and music routinely contain content down to 20 Hz — well below what even a “large” speaker actually reproduces. Whatever the speaker cannot deliver in that range does not disappear. It gets redirected by the Lyngdorf bass management setup to the LFE channel, and from there to the subwoofer. The same logic applies to a centre channel marked “medium”, which might only extend to around 80 Hz, and to small surround speakers with an even higher crossover, commonly around 100 Hz.
The subwoofer is carrying more than you think
Add that up across a five-speaker layout — front left, front right, centre, and two surrounds — and the subwoofer output is no longer just the dedicated LFE (low-frequency effects) track. It is the accumulated bass from every one of those speakers below its own crossover point.
That is the core point behind proper Lyngdorf bass management setup: a subwoofer in a modern multi-channel system is not a small box in the corner reproducing occasional explosions. It is doing a large share of the actual musical and low-frequency work for the whole system, which is exactly why sizing it — and how many of them you use — deserves real attention, a question covered separately in our Tech Talk on whether one subwoofer is enough.
From one LFE to a genuine 0.2 system
The most basic step is to add a second subwoofer purely as a second LFE output. That already brings more headroom and lower distortion, since the load is shared across two amplifiers. But it comes with a limitation: both subwoofers reproduce an identical, mono LFE signal, even though they physically sit in different places in the room — and by that point, the LFE channel is also carrying redirected left/right content from the front and surround speakers, so a purely mono feed is not accurate either.
The more capable step is to remove the duplicate LFE assignment and instead assign a left subwoofer and a right subwoofer output. That produces a genuine 5.2 configuration: each subwoofer reproduces both the mono LFE content and whichever redirected bass actually belongs to the left or right side of the mix, keeping stereo and surround bass information intact instead of folding everything down into a single mono feed in one corner of the room.
The same principle extends further with rear-positioned subwoofers for a system carrying more surround information, all crossing over at the same point as the rest of the layout — around 100 Hz in a typical setup.
For anyone who already has left and right subwoofers and is looking at what to add next, one practical upgrade is a dedicated centre LFE unit purely for low-frequency effects, positioned separately from the left/right pair, so the stereo subwoofers continue handling redirected musical bass while the LFE unit handles only the dedicated effects channel.
Beyond that, some Lyngdorf and Steinway Lyngdorf systems also support assigning an LFE output to a tactile transducer — mounted under a seat or sofa rather than as a conventional subwoofer — which is then automatically excluded from RoomPerfect’s speaker correction signal, since it exists purely for the lowest, felt frequencies rather than for measured room correction. This is also the setting that makes a genuinely true 0.2 or 0.4 system possible, rather than two subwoofers simply duplicating the same mono signal.
Frequently asked questions
Is this menu the same across the MP-40, MP-50 and MP-60?
Yes. The speaker and room setup menu structure is effectively identical across the MP-40, MP-50 and MP-60 processors — the walkthrough of setup, speakers and room, and speaker setup applies to all three.
Why does a “large” speaker still send bass to the subwoofer?
Because “large” only describes the crossover point the processor uses, not a claim that the speaker reproduces everything below it cleanly. A speaker set to 40 Hz can already be rolling off by 50 Hz, and film, game and music soundtracks routinely contain content down to 20 Hz, so that missing range is redirected to the LFE channel and the subwoofer — exactly what a proper Lyngdorf bass management setup accounts for.
What is the difference between two LFE subwoofers and a true left/right subwoofer setup?
Two LFE-assigned subwoofers reproduce an identical mono signal from two different room positions, which does not reflect where the redirected bass in the mix actually belongs. Assigning dedicated left and right subwoofer outputs instead lets each unit reproduce the bass that genuinely belongs to its side of the mix, in addition to the LFE content, which is the whole point of a correctly done Lyngdorf bass management setup — a true 0.2 configuration rather than a duplicated mono one.
Can a subwoofer output be excluded from RoomPerfect correction entirely?
Yes, in the specific case of a tactile transducer assigned as an LFE channel. Because that channel exists purely for the lowest, felt frequencies rather than for audible room correction, it can be taken out of RoomPerfect’s speaker correction signal in the LFE settings.
