MARTINLOGAN DYNAMO 1100X SUBWOOFER

WHEN I WAS a kid, the closest thing my family had to a remote control was me. As the youngest child, it was my job to get up off my butt and turn the knob if someone wanted to watch a different TV channel. Today, it seems that just about any device that plugs in can be remotely operated with a clicker from the comfort of your chair, but a subwoofer? Isn’t that the kind of set-and-forget product that completely takes care of itself? As it turns out, remote control adjustment, a key feature of Martinlogan’s revamped Dynamo line, can be a really handy feature in a subwoofer, but we'll talk more on that in a bit.

Sound & Vision’s coverage of the Dynamo series subwoofers, including my own 2015 review of the previous-generation 1500X flagship, dates back to when the first model launched some 14 years ago. Now in its fourth generation, the Dynamo lineup comprises five models, with the 1100X ($1,099.95) that Martinlogan sent me to review sitting just below the 1600X flagship. Going down in size, there’s also the 800X, 600X, and the Dynamo 400, which loses an “X” designation because it doesn’t include the remote control, room correction, and wireless connection features.

The 1100X’s sealed cabinet has an almost cubic shape, with a sharp-edged Euro-chic look and a smooth satin black finish. There are no other color options— as Henry Ford would have said, you can have any color as long as it’s black. The subwoofer as shipped is set up for downward-firing operation with its four feet on the same cabinet side as the long-throw driver. You can also convert it easily into a front-firing design by moving the feet to the rear panel and flipping the sub on its back. I didn’t hear much difference between the two orientations, but the front-firing mode is handy if you plan to install the sub in a cabinet. The feet themselves are a pretty slick design, with hidden spikes that can be exposed and used if your room has thick carpeting. MartinLogan also includes a grill so you can cover the driver in a front-firing orientation.

Because the 1100X’s adjustments are done mostly by remote, controls on its back panel are deceptively simple: level knob, power mode switch, and a second switch to select between local or remote control. Connections, on the other hand, are plentiful, with speaker- and line-level stereo inputs, a mono LFE input with both RCA and XLR connections, and a slot where you can fit the optional $200 SWT-X wireless connection module. Rounding out the connections are a 12-volt power trigger input and a USB port that can be used when running ARC room correction software from a PC.

One nice feature of the 1100X is that it allows you to simultaneously connect stereo and LFE inputs to individually optimize setup for movies and music. Since the sub’s LFE input bypasses its built-in crossover, it can be configured with your surround processor for multichannel movie playback.

Once that’s done, you can then fine tune the sub’s blend with your main speakers for playing stereo music.

REMOTELY SPEAKING

The Dynamo 1100X is hardly the first remote-controlled sub to come along, but it’s certainly one

of the most versatile. Instead of supplying a dedicated handset that will likely end up lost between sofa cushions (as well as adding to the sub’s cost), the Dynamo uses Martinlogan’s Subwoofer Control app. This runs on your smartphone or tablet (IOS or Android) and connects to the sub via Bluetooth to deliver a level of fine control that most subwoofers can only dream of. Naturally, you get all of the standard adjustments for level and crossover point, but you can also change the crossover slope and finetune phase to within one degree. There are separate playback modes for Music, Movies and Nighttime, and there’s also a bass tone sweeper to help you locate any rattling fixtures in your room.

Unlike a typical subwoofer where you have to make adjustments by leaning over and twiddling knobs on the rear panel, the Subwoofer Control app lets you make adjustments from the listening position. This simplifies the setting of crossover point and phase— you evaluate small changes as you make them to hone in on the optimal settings. A subwoofer may be a set-andforget part of your system, but in this case app control makes the “set” part of the process so much easier.

TUNING UP

I set the Dynamo 1100X up in the front left corner of my room, which is where most fully adjustable subs tend to perform their best. To take advantage of its dual inputs, I connected the LFE output of a Denon AVR-X8500H receiver to the RCA LFE input, and the front left and right preamp outputs to the stereo line-level input. I normally run my PSB Synchrony One speakers in full-range mode anyway, so with this setting I was able to optimize the subwoofer's crossover for music playback.

When I reviewed Martinlogan’s Motion 60XT speakers with the Dynamo 1500X subwoofer three years ago, the sub used a room EQ system called Perfect Bass Kit (PBK) that at the time was kind of clunky and had a pretty steep learning curve. Martinlogan must have noted both my concerns and the concerns of their customers, because the whole process has now become an object lesson in simplicity.

While the subwoofer itself is controlled using the MartinLogan Subwoofer Control App, the room correction functions require a separate ios/android app called ARC Mobile. This generates a series of low frequency sweeps that you measure from various positions in the room. Correction filters are then generated by the app and uploaded to the subwoofer via a Bluetooth connection to automatically fine-tune frequency response. While all that might sound a bit convoluted, I found the app to be very intuitive and easy to use. In its standard form, ARC Mobile uses the built-in microphone on your IOS or Android device. To take things to the next level, you can add an optional external microphone, or even go with the full PBK which has its own calibrated microphone and software for making corrections. I used basic ARC Mobile with my phone’s built-in microphone and found it did a great job of flattening out the 65Hz peak that I often end up with in my listening room.

PERFORMANCE

One of my favorite music tracks for testing subs is “Flight of the Cosmic Hippo” by Béla Fleck And The Flecktones. Bassist Victor Wooten’s solo, played on a five-string fretless Fodera bass, has him moving up and down the scale and reaching incredibly deep notes. Any discontinuity between your main speakers and the subwoofer is instantly heard, and only a tight, fast sub can sound tuneful as Wooten plumbs the bottom end of his instrument. Streaming the track on Qobuz, the 1100X had plenty of power to shake the floor, yet there was no hint of a one-note quality or overhang. Even though I was using the Subwoofer Control app’s supposedly lower-impact but more tuneful Music setting, the 1100X was able to move plenty of air and cause my listening chair to thrum and vibrate along with the bass. There is one additional Subwoofer Control app adjustment I didn’t mention— a Deep Bass level setting that allows you to boost or cut the very bottom half-octave from 20Hz to 30Hz by up to 10 decibels. I found that by carefully tweaking this setting I was able to dial in a perfect amount of heft to the sound without introducing boominess or bloat.

Of course, subwoofers and action movies go hand in hand, so I next switched to the Movie setting and loaded up Lone Survivor. A scene from the movie where the Taliban shoots down a Chinook rescue helicopter provides an exhaustive workout for any subwoofer, with plenty of gunfire and rocket grenades punctuating the pulsing thump of the helicopter’s rotor blades. In my moderately sized 17 x 14-foot home theater, the 1100X showed no signs of stress, even when I cranked the level up to well past what I normally consider comfortable. In fact, the sub’s clean impact and dynamic wallop made me want to turn the volume up even more.

CONCLUSION

When doing initial research for this review, I was surprised to learn that subwoofers have become Martinlogan’s bestselling product. I’ve always thought of Martinlogan as the electrostatic speaker company, but with a subwoofer as greatsounding and flexible as the Dynamo 1100X, it’s no wonder that subs have become a key part of their business. This latest generation of Dynamos will surely consolidate that success, and with the company’s appbased remote control and Anthem Room Correction, you won’t need a youngest-child helper to turn the knobs.