Treat the sub plus your desk monitors as a single pair of L and R full-range speakers. Don't try to use any frequency-splitting or other spatial separating outputs from the computer. I have the KRK 10S, and if that is the model you have, it's an excellent sub and works well when connected up in the way it expects.

The correct wiring configuration is to use balanced connections between the XLR or TRS inputs of your L and R monitors and the XLR outs of the sub. I would be wary of trying to use the RCA outputs from the sub to your desk monitors, but that may work. Take the audio output of your interface to the line ins on the sub, where you have the choice of balanced XLR or TRS jacks or unbalanced RCAs. I suspect from what you say about using a 1/8" stereo jack that you are using a computer sound card rather than a recognised audio interface, but the KRK sub is flexible and non-judgmental, and you should be able to get your configuration to work.

However, I am confused by your saying "The speaker test worked fine". Does this mean that the Windows sound card configurator was able to play white noise through the sub when sent to the front L and R speakers? If this is the case, you have the sound card to sub connections correct and it becomes a matter of sorting out why the high-pass filtered output from the sub does not reach your desk monitors.

Windows and the sound card have no knowledge that you have a sub in the route to your monitors, so if you can get the configurator to work, then conventional audio output should work as well. If not, you have something wrong inside the PC setup. Be sure to set front L+R speakers only and turn off all (un)helpful equalizer, loudness and other gizmos.

Thanks for the reply.

As I suspected, the solution to my problem was simpler than I thought. I was listening to some music while fiddling with the Realtek Audio Manager on my PC. Upon checking the box next to "Enable Bass Management," my sub kicked on. I was doing some reading on this and apparently it sends lower frequencies only to the speakers that can handle them? Would this behave in a similar way to sending the signal through the sub and high-pass filter to the monitors?

Yes, I am using a computer sound card. As of now, the only configuration that seems to work is using the front speaker output for the monitors, and the center/subwoofer output for the sub. How much would splitting the signal like this affect the accuracy of the mix? It sounds great to me, but I am relatively new to this, and I don't believed I've developed the ears for mixing yet. :biggrin:

I have also encountered a new problem. When using ASIO4All, my sub does not work. I can deal with this for now, even though my PC seems to work less efficiently using the other options, but does anyone know why this might be happening?

Again, thanks for the help, I've been reading this forum for a while now and it has been a very crucial resource for me.

I'm glad you found a configuration that seems to work, but I'm suspicious that you will not have got a correctly balanced sound. Maybe it's OK for what you want to play through it.

I would start saving for an audio interface that you can use instead of your sound card both for loudspeaker monitoring and also for recording (where the soundcard's shortcomings really start to show up). An external two-channel USB unit need not be very expensive, so come back here giving us an idea of budget and what your main activity is in the audio field, and we can make some recommendations.

I'd say my budget for an interface would be in the 200-250 dollar range. I have been using an Alesis usb mixer to record guitar/bass/keys etc., but I have had noise problems so I haven't been focusing on that lately. As of now I make hip-hop and electronic beats and do some mixing of my friend's indie rock stuff. Ideally I would like a setup that could work for everything from acoustic to death metal to bass heavy rap beats, but I know this might be too much to ask.

As for having a correctly balanced sound, I was reading about room modes and realized that my project studio is essentially a cube. I have positioned my equipment in such a way that I think might slightly combat this problem, but I still definitely need to invest in bass traps and the like. At this point I'm just trying to get the equipment to work properly, and then I can move on to that whole mess of problems. :cool: