Best in Class Award – avforums.com
Building on the Strengths of a Legend
The REL Acoustics 212/SX powered subwoofer builds on the strengths of the legendary 212/SE.
Upgraded alloy drivers with carbon fiber blades are stronger, a new flat passive radiator extends even deeper, and REL's PerfectFilter™ delivers crushing low bass with greater speed and air – taking 212/SX well beyond its illustrious predecessor.
Brings to Life Hard Slam as Well as Gentler Moments
While the 212/SX thunders and shakes foundations, it also resolves detail and restores midrange warmth to its correct balance. Delivering 1,000 watts of power with four 12” drivers, the 212/SX drives rooms hard and in multiple modes, which allows it to create richer bass everywhere in a room.
Refinements to both REL's legendary ultra-fast filters and newly developed drivers produces harder slam and brings to life quieter, gentler moments, improving system performance at both extremes. It pays brilliantly with both high end two-channel and large power theater applications.
Award-Winning Excellence
The 212/SX won a Best in Class Award from avforums.com. According to reviewer Martin Dew, "Harnessing bass in a small room can be laced with problems. A large commercial space, by contrast, can allow bass waves of all lengths to dance merrily across its dimensions. But to find a subwoofer which sounds good pretty much wherever you put it in a small cinema is a revelation. The REL 212/SX can cast its net of bass frequencies seemingly in a massive orb radiating out in all directions."
"But perhaps most important of all, this subwoofer is musical, detailed and subtle when it needs to be. It’s a delight to feel that a sub is acting as a true complement to your satellite speakers."
"An Entirely New Level of Bass Reproduction"
"The REL 212/SX subwoofer simply offers an entirely new level of bass reproduction in both 2-channel and home theater applications," observes Todd Cooperider, Secrets of Home Theater and High Fidelity, February 9, 2022.
"I have tried a lot of subs in the past in my systems, and while they certainly added a 'fun factor', I never felt that they made my entire system better…until now! What REL is doing with their subwoofer design and development, particularly with how they utilize high-level input signals, they are single-handedly raising the bar in the audio industry on what can be accomplished in low-frequency reproduction. "
Doubles Down with Twin Bass Engines
Lightweight carbon fiber blades firmly attached to the rear of each active alloy cone serves to both strengthen the cone and quiet it. The twin 12” active drivers now offer an additional .5" of stroke and also benefit from updated suspension geometry and greater power handling. And a brand-new double-spider, high powered passive unit on the bottom delivers floor rippling low bass.
The result is a major step forward in the 212 design, an already brilliant performer now playing louder with greater ease, while better preserving the tiniest details of air and space with even greater precision.
Dual Continuous Carbon Passive Radiators
REL's uniquely tuned passive radiators use special suspensions, now with an additional 1.2" of linear travel, to produce performance far beyond conventional subwoofers. The new SuperProgressive™ passive radiator produces extremely long travel allowing for very loud output while retaining the variable stiffness of its suspension.
The down firing passive produces deep, floor-crawling bass that makes a room shudder. Mounted above the amplifier panel on the rear is the second passive. This unit produces wrap around 'atmospheric' bass that adds air and shimmer to the sound. Coupling with either the rear wall or the rear corner of a room allows for bass to develop exceedingly long wavefronts and adds an ease and effortless quality unique to single-box designs.
NextGen 5 1,000-Watt Digital Amplifier
With incredible reliability in units now numbering in the thousands, the NextGen 5 Class D amplifier is a paragon of extreme power and reliability. At 1,000 watts of output, plus the ability to connect both High Level and .1/LFE simultaneously with optional state of the art wireless, 212/SX delivers the goods at scale. It does so with incredible grip and control in the extreme deep bass where most amplifiers get loose and lose control.
The 212/SX has an almost limitless sense of power, coupled with precision. Where others offer brute strength, REL delivers massive power and every secondary category of performance with ease and effortless versatility. Deafening output in a concert video or blockbuster movie? Check. Beautifully rendered female vocals accurately placed within a stone abbey? Check.
Futureproof Wireless
REL seized the opportunity to develop a new high resolution, audiophile-grade uncompressed wireless system for the 212/SX and its newer offerings in the Reference range.
Airship™ is a new 5.8 GHz military-based wireless system built into a monolithic LSI chip that delivers incredibly fast bass. REL delivers full bandwidth, not just bass, through this system that includes two channels. The first channel handles the High Level Input and can be used for both stereo bass or use of a single channel with monoblock amplifiers. Simultaneously, Airship will process the .1/LFE channel necessary for special effects in film so both RCA and XLR inputs are provided.
In the future, REL anticipates adoption of more active wireless loudspeakers reaching the market, so the company included stereo low level inputs. With Airship, you’re ready for the future.
