I've been a 110% fan of Definitive Technology from their first months of operation about 15 years ago. Their first product, the original Definitive Technology BP-10 simply blew me away on sound quality, build quality and of course as ALL married males know, the all important "WAF" ... aka, Wife Acceptance Factor.

Since those first days, I've watched as this little spunky company has created one innovative product CATEGORY after another. How do they do it? They seem to figure out what I ... and other consumers want ... before we know that we want it!

The SuperCube lineup of subwoofers is a great example of this audiophile pulse taking on the part of DT. Home theater is clearly driving the audio portion of the consumer electronics industry. Heck, "Stereo Review" magazine CHANGED their name to "Sight & Sound" Magazine a few years ago, clearly as a reaction to this fundamental market change.

So what does the SuperCube ONE have to do with all of this? BASS ... and plenty of it IN A SMALL, ATTRACTIVE PACKAGE. Home theater without bass is like driving a sports car on a gravel road ... with recaps. Can you say oxymoron!

When I watch a movie, I want to EXPERIENCE it. I want to feel the bass, I want feel like that twenty year old Maxell poster (apologies to younger readers ... you have to be at least 35-40 on this one) dude with my martini glass sliding backwards on the table as my hair is at a 90 degree angle to my head.

But I'm about to get greedy. Rap/hip-hop isn't my bag so I want extreme bass but also want it laser tight too.

A contradiction? Well, for most subwoofers that I've heard the answer is a resounding yep, but here's the point of this review ... the SuperCube ONE (and to a lesser degree, it's little brother the SuperCube TWO) gives me all the bass that I can handle and it is batten down the hatches TIGHT, DEFINED and VERY, VERY, VERY, VERY LOW (DT claims that this woofer makes it to 13Hz!!!) ... all in a SMALL, attractive cube.

How small? DT's official specs: 14-1/4" W x 14-1/4" D x 14-1/10" H. How's that for small? 2.25" larger than a cubic FOOT!!

How can it be? Have the laws of physics been rewritten? I'm not an engineer (sorry, a bean counter by degree) so I'm not competent to comment on physical or metaphysical issues. Call if voodoo, magic or clever engineering, but the end result is still the same. This little, couldn't possibly do much more than sit on the floor and look cute subwoofer, will rock your world, crack your walls and expose every room rattle/resonance that exists.

Before you bring it home, apologize to your wife (don't try to sneak it in, like I've been known to do) and warn your neighbors, because the first time that you fire it up ... they'll know that you're up to no good. If you live in a duplex or apartment complex, unless you have really, REALLY cool neighbors, don't even think about bringing this dynamo into your home.

THE TECHNICAL:

As stated above it's essentially 14.25" cubed in size

Weight: Sixty-three pounds

Warranty: Three years on electronics. Five years on the cabinet and active/passive woofers.

Finish: Black grill with either highly polished gloss lacquer black end caps or cherry gloss end caps.

Internal Drive Configuration: ONE active VERY long throw 10" woofer and two highly damped 10" "passive" woofers. The active woofer is located on the front of the woofer cabinet and the two passive woofers located on either side of the cabinet. The electronics (more about them in a minute, are on the backside of the woofer).

Internal Power: One THOUSAND - FIVE HUNDRED Digital Watts (that's 1500 watts) connected to the one active woofer in the cabinet. Why so much power? Power and control.

Crossover Data (from DT's website)
Low Pass Crossover: 24 dB/octave continuously adjustable variable (40 —150 Hz) plus Unfiltered LFE direct-coupled input

High Pass Crossover: Low level Inputs: 12 dB/octave continuously variable (40 — 150 Hz)

Speaker level: 6 dB octave (80 Hz)

Translated - you can hook this woofer up in a variety of configurations. IF your audio amplifier doesn't have a subwoofer or preamp output, you can feed this woofer a "high level" aka speaker wire input and then use a bass filtered speaker wire output to your main speakers.

OR you can feed a LFE (Low Frequencies Effects) RCA/Line level connection into the subwoofer.

OR you can feed a full range preamp level signal to the subwoofer and then utilize the subs internal crossover control to select the appropriate frequency for the woofer to play UP TO (called the LOW PASS) AND if you elect to use the sub's RCA HIGH PASS controls you can then feed this OUTPUT RCA signal to your main speaker amplifier. This configuration, has the added benefit of allowing you to exactly select the frequencies that the woofer plays and allows you to limit the bass frequencies that your main speakers have to reproduce. Yes, one's typical A/V receiver/preamplifier has similar controls, but typically not with the same choice of frequencies, or with the same steepness of crossover (24dB/Octive Low Pass & 12dB/Octive High Pass).

Additionally, the subwoofer allows the user to preciously match the phase (timing) of the woofer with the bass/mid-bass output of their main speakers. This is an interesting control because it has the potential to make an enormous difference in the quality of bass. In a nutshell, due to amplifier design, it is possible that out of the box, this woofer could be "out of phase" with your main speakers. A design flaw? Not really. Here's what can happen.

Depending upon how YOUR separate amplifier or receiver amplifier section is designed, it MIGHT "invert" the phase (remember - phase means timing). Think of a sine wave crossing the x axis (horizontal line on the graph). The waveform moves from the positive part of the graph to the negative. Inverting phase simply means that what was positive is now negative.

IF your amplifier inverts phase (and many do), then this woofer will now be out of sync with you main speakers ... unless you use the nifty adjustment to bring the woofer back in phase with your speakers.

If this wasn't problematic enough ... and it is ... it is still possible for everything to be ELECTRICALLY in phase (meaning that your existing amplifier doesn't invert phase) but because of woofer/speaker placement in YOUR room, the sub is ACOUSTICALLY out of phase with your main speakers.

Again, the built-in phase switch can be a lifesaver.

How do you use it? Here's how I do it. Put on some music with a repetitive base line. Sit in your favorite comfy chair and convince a family member/friend to sit behind the woofer and slowly move the sub's phase knob from one extreme to another. Because of crossover selection/room placement issues, in many instances you will hear NO difference when this knob is twisted. However, in some cases the difference will be significant. If you're in the latter camp, then have your knob twister person, slowly move this knob back and forth, until you find the spot that it sounds the best. That's all there is to it!

CONSTRUCTION:

Did you note the weight of this woofer? A bit over SIXTY pounds. The cabinet has enormously thick motor boards (that's the wood that the woofers are screwed into). They look to me to be 1.5" thick. Given the tremendous movement of the woofers as any car bass enthusiast will tell you the thickness of the cabinet IS important to the ultimate sound quality. Cabinet design is akin to the wood and construction used when making a musical instrument. Cheap cabinet = boomy, nondescript sound.

Taking the black sock off the woofer is interesting too. Each of the "passive" woofers instead of conventional cone material is essentially a moving block of Medite, which is the same compressed wood material that the woofer cabinet is made out of. This very heavy, very damped design is no doubt one of the reasons that this woofer is as quick and tight sounding as it is … and one of the reasons for a 1500 watt amplifier. To overcome the extreme mass of the drivers, Definitive needed to utilize an extreme amount of power. Fortunately, over the past few years, high powered digital amplifiers that are well suited for bass amplifiers have become relatively affordable.

All electronics in this woofer appear to be first class. In fact the back of the thing glistens like a jewelry store with gold plating found on speaker jacks and RCA inputs/outputs.

THE SOUND:

All of the techno babble aside, as I've already telegraphed above, this woofer is killer. Pick an adjective ... I know that I have a whole host and have bestowed them on this small gem.

Have I heard better? Sure ... and DT's bigger brother the SuperCube Reference IS better, but here's the point on this review. The SuperCube ONE is small and elegant enough to win the "WAF" battle, pushing affordability at $1200 retail, but still affordable if you really want a keeper of a product … and it performs. The "Reference" is better but it's also hundreds more and starting to get big. Better than even the "Reference" SuperCube. Yes, I've heard better, but figure that you'll need to add a zero to the end of the price of the SuperCube to get it!!

Boy does it perform. Throw just about anything (sorry, I just can't bring myself to try out rap on it) and the result is little short of magic. Tchaikovsky's 1812 Overture. Check out the howitzers from Telarc's brilliant recording (multi-channel SACD version please). NO problem ... and I've seen more than one speaker freak-out on that recording. Bela Fleck's Flight of the Cosmic Hippo ... one of my favorite "ultimate" bass torture tests. NO problem. Some of the classic Oscar Peterson jazz recordings (Live at the Village Gate), NO sense of boom or bass overhang. Acoustic Rock like my favorite CSN&Y, sounds very natural, again with no boom.

And finally, let's talk about movies. One of my favorite tests for bass with a movie sound track is found near the end of Saving Private Ryan. Near the end of the movie, Tom Hanks uses his sidearm to shoot at an advancing German tank as it crosses a bridge towards Capt John Miller (Hanks). Back this scene up a bit and listen as the tank begins to rumble into the scene (it's off camera for quite some time before you actually see it). The energy and tightness of this bass is spellbinding and VERY difficult to reproduce. The SuperCube ONE makes it look and sound easy. Try this same scene on just about any other subwoofer and you'll be shocked at how poorly most woofers handle this scene.

Enough ranting. IF you're even close to being willing to spend the money for a woofer of this caliber, you owe it to yourself to test drive this amazing product.

If you can't afford it, don't listen to it, you'll have taken a bite out of the apple and believe me, it's hard to put that genie back in the bottle.

ENTHUSTICALLY RECOMMENDED.