I was always told a wider baffle gives you a more accurate sound with less coloration, whilst a narrow baffle gives you generally better imaging but slightly less accurate sound.
Another approach is multiple boxes with baffle size optimized for frequency range. Think high end Wilson. Separate boxes or open baffles also allow for time alignment and isolation of vibration between baffles. I think the main driver for the multiple small drivers is cosmetic. A big baffle does not fit in most listening areas. If cost was no object I'd have a dedicated listening room with Aries Cerat horn speakers in a 20x30 room.
That is what I noticed. They are confusing the two different ones into one. There are woofers. There are Subwoofers. This is what a Subwoofer looks like. ua-cam.com/video/2mL9eNee53M/v-deo.html
if you have dsp available you can get away with using smaller drivers, then you get the midrange sorted and the deep bass extension you normally only get from large heavy cone. 5" woofers can be great replacement for something close to a pure midrange unit. but i have also played around with subwoofer drivers(10"), and crossing them over right to the tweeter with very pleasing result but also odd sounding.
Frequency, cone area, excursion and dB are all connected (there's calculators online that you can try this with). On one hand it's difficult to make a large cone and on the other hand it's also difficult to make a high excursion motor, and therein lies a problem. The same thing with progressive crossovers for multiple drivers, each crossover will create a phase problem. There's just no free lunch when it comes to speaker designs. 😂
I don't think they were talking about subwoofers, but rather the types of full range speakers that were common a few decades ago, with big 12 or 15 inch bass drivers, like Cerwin-Vega and Pioneer used to make. Even my first stereo as a teenager in the late 1980s, a Sears LXI, had 12 inch woofers, low quality to be sure, but I didn't know it at the time.
Interesting what you say about baffle size, my main speakers are more old school with a large base driver and accompanying wide baffle, they are of course not perfect, however I've been more blaming the crossover and thinking of a recap than anything else.. After this style we saw quite a few speakers come out with kind of triangular fronts, skinnier at the top where the tweeter and mid's were fitted, I always though it was just styling, trying to look modern, nothing about sound quality, so more info on this would be handy.
I have a pair of late-70's aDs 910s. They have a large baffle with dual-10.5" bass drivers installed into their own separate enclosures inside the cabinet, thus the 130lbs w/stands. The sound is exceptional and the bass works great in the sealed cabs, but the soundstage is not pin-point accurate even though the instrument separation is well-done, probably due to the large front. They're still my end-gamers!
The baffle should ideally be narrower with mids and tweeter hence the " triangular " front baffle. The smaller the front baffle, the better the imaging potential.
If your speakers are more than 20-25 years old, replacing the capacitors is a good idea anyway, not for increased performance over the original specs, but to get back to those specs. Caps (and many other parts) age slowly but steadily, so it can be hard to notice that your originally great-sounding speakers are merely good now. Just as an old light bulb is dimmer than a new one, the ESR (Equivalent Series Resistance), which can’t be checked with a regular multi-meter, will have gradually increased over the decades, so popping in a new set of caps should be seen as maintenance. When I replaced the caps in the crossovers in my 34-year-old Klipsch La Scalas, the sound was immediately clearer and cleaner, and I was well pleased. At the same time, if your woofers, and maybe your squawkers (mid-range drivers), have foam surrounds, it could be time to inspect them very closely for any defects, like cracks or holes. If they do have any visible defects, the surrounds can be replaced for a reasonable price. I have another pair of speakers, each with two 10-inch woofers. Re-surrounding all four woofers by a shop cost only $160 ($40 per woofer), and the speakers did sound a bit better without little flaps of foam waving with the beat. It was also much less embarrassing to look at them. They were 24 years old when I had them re-surrounded, so now I’m good for a couple more decades. As for the La Scalas, with their 15-inch woofers, the surrounds are made of doped paper, like guitar amplifier speakers, so they’ll outlive me with no attention to their surrounds.
i have jbl 4343B 4 way studio monitor with tweeter, mid , 10inch mid bass driver and 15inch low freq driver. they get down to 35hz on paper, probably not so much in my room though, still sound amazing to me!
Well, I got thre 18 inch alnico woofers, based on JBL. Mounted in the floorstanding speakers. I like the sound of them, bass like I never heard before. But the mids are wider than the woofers, so no worries about baffles here.
Simply put. Larger size = more power im the extreme low frequencies..more range of extreme low frequencies. Smaller woofer = weaker range on extreme low frequency but come with higher dynamics and lower gaps with your midrange. It might be a good idea for home theater to have 1 powerful sub in the back next to where you sit to listen watch movies. And have another smaller sub in front that is more dynamic that mix match better with your 2 front speakers. I would setup the smaller one to be in phase and the big ine in the back to be in reverse phase. And then manually adjust the power of the rear subwoofer for optimal effect. Probably in the range of 60hz crossover in manual mode. And the smaller one around 90hz in auto mode.
@@louisperlman8030 Maybe you should read some research from Floyd Toole and Earl Geddes... Earl Geddes build two-way loudspeakers for imaging with a 15" (or 12") woofer and a tweeter in a waveguide!
If I put a 12" unit in each side of the cabinet and the magnets are close together the magnets will repel each other. Will that make a stronger magnetic field or will it reduce the magnetic field in the coils?
Hi Paul. Love this videos. I have in my garage a very bad system i created with a china's 50€ radio, an used car amplifier, two sony 4 way speakers and a bass box i made 20 years ago with no math at all. Very big mess........But the sub's, 15" and 12" (in the same box one is like passive) just give me that sound you feel in your body! In my car, with a very expensive system i can't fell the same. It's more punchy in the ears and.......You know all that. In the same application, same scenario, 10", 12", 15", 18"?????? Hard question......Sorry my bad english, best regards, Daniel from Portugal.
You would think that if you wanted the best sound each component would have its own isolated cabinet tuned in size and shape but even the most expensive speakers i ever see are almost always one big cabinet. Is ther a reason?
Actually, that is a good idea and some high end speakers do have individual boxes for each midrange and treble driver (but not usually for the woofer(s)), all inside the main box, so you don’t see them.
I use 21" subs for music in main system and depending on which speaker is in the rotation, vary the crossover from 40Hz to 80Hz without issue. I also use 24" subs crossed at 80Hz for Home Theater.
My JBL S412PII had 12 inch woofers, if I remember correctly. I absolutely loved those speakers, although the bass could still have gone a bit deeper for my taste. Now I am looking at some bookshelf speakers that go about as deep as those huge floor standers, but I see they have single 6 inch woofers? I have no idea how those could compete to my old beloved JBL's but I am still interested.
The little 6 is going to be working a lot harder. Chances are the old style would sound more effortless under the same conditions especially with percussive bass. This is assuming the old cabinets were tuned properly.
Oh it applies to subs as well. People overlook the inarguable fact these days that high excursion drivers create massive amounts of IM/HD. That’s exactly what guys like Paul Klipsch effectively eliminated with high efficiency fully horn loaded speaker designs, essentially turning the 15” woofers into large compression drivers. When you barely have to tickle a driver to get a large amount of output you lower distortion by a factor of ten or more. Direct radiating, high excursion drivers flapping around to create bass are for the people who think quantity of bass translates to quality of bass. It doesn’t. To this day there has been no conclusive evidence to support anything other than horn loading is the absolute primer method of reproducing sound in spite of what all these companies building their ridiculous space odyssey looking speakers like to claim they have accomplished using low budget direct radiator technology. Anyone who has ever heard an exceptional horn system immediately understands the difference.
Is there a formula for what multiple smaller drivers add up to an equivalency of one larger driver? For instance, I know that two 6.5 inch base drivers don't equal a 13in bass driver (or do they?) - so what is their equivalence to?
Area of a circle = Pi (3.14) multiplied by the radius squared. Radius is half of the diameter. Using your example, the 6.5 inch driver has a radius of 3.25 inches. So 3.25 x 3.25 equals 10.5 inches. Now multiply that by Pi, which is 3.14, to arrive at the total square area of about 33 inches (for one 6.5 driver). Now multiply that times 2 because you have two drivers, and you have 66 square inches total. By comparison, the 13 inch driver has 133 square inches! i hope that helps.
@@danmarjenka6361Also linear movement of the drivers Xmax should be considered as well. In order to compare bass drivers one needs to know driver's (air) volume displacement (Vd = Sd * Xmax, where Sd is a surface area of a driver cone ).
Is this a sarcastic comment? He definitely takes baffle size into consideration. Or is your comment based on how he goes into very great detail - because I know he does that lol.
Perhaps they may distort less as you approach the midrange but in the low range it is the opposite as they have to travel much farther getting into more non-linear regions of the suspension and magnetic field.
This is the best rule of thumb you are ever going to find with questions like these. He who can move the most air, with the least distortion and power, wins. Period. End of story.
Distortion from a bass driver can be significant especially when playing louder. But often it takes a sine wave test signal to realize you can pinpoint the location of the speaker playing sub bass due to driver induced harmonics or even port airflow noise. Some times it becomes very audible at a specific frequency. I’ve often played a sine wave sweep from my Sigma Studio mobile audio app on audio systems and people are shocked how much bad sounds can come not only from the speakers but often from things in the room resonating at some specific frequency. When you listen to music these things smear the details but you won’t know why. I’ve seen decorations rattling loudly where you had to use a test signal to pinpoint it. In cars you can often realize various panels resonating loudly when you do a sine wave sweep with manual panning to dial in the exact resonance points.
@@GTRxMan exactly. It’s shocking the change in surface area as you go up in cone size. I love that big drivers are coming back. You can’t replicate the feel or sound of a 12 or 15” driver with multiple small ones, IMO. It’s not just numbers.
The simple answer to the question asked is *NO* as there are numerous variables involved. This guy should have walked around AXPONA to *actually see* what is currently on the market!
"This guy should have walked around AXPONA to actually see " - oh please. Paul's seen more speakers than you ever will. His statement(s) about large transducers are accurate.
@@user-od9iz9cv1w "Acora and Estalon" - how many of the flagship speakers do you think Valereo sells? How many of the big Estelons are sold? Paul never said speakers with large woofers are never made (just look at Cerwin Vega is you want to see the market leader it really big woofers.)
@@Skye_the_toller I get it. It makes no sense. But with decent headphones and sound card it is surprising how much you can tell about the sound signature of a given system from a video clip taken on a phone.
"Cumulated" or effective air radiation area can also be realized via horn-loading that acts as a force multiplier for a given driver diameter. Say, a 15" driver horn-loaded will yield an effective air radiation area much larger than what the driver emits as a direct radiating device, depending on the given horn implementation; a 1/4 wave folded front loaded horn with a non-truncated mouth area has the higher efficiency (i.e.: ~105dB's on up) and thereby larger effective air radiation area vs. mouth-truncated 1/4 wave folded FLH . The former will also need to be much larger compared to the latter for a given tune, so there's a size-price to pay for higher eff./larger radiation area in addition to more bandwidth and smoother frequency response. Then there's the tapped horn principle, patented by Danley Sound Labs, which is really a high-order bandpass design that takes advantage of both the front and back wave of the driver; the front wave shoots into a folded horn path, while the backside of the driver is exposed near the mouth and will sum/synchronize its back wave output with the output coming through the horn from the front wave. Sounds a bit complicated, but it works and sounds great, if well implemented. Tapped horns are still big (say, 20cf. volume for a just below 25Hz tune with a ~97dB eff.), but I prefer them over the truncated FLH. The downside with a tapped horn is limited bandwidth, but they have cone excursion minima at the tune (contrary to a FLH that has excursion maximum here with the driver in a sealed chamber) which translates into very low distortion. Listening to the bass from a tapped horn is hearing a fully effortless, smooth bass, which is also what you hear from a FLH - its non-truncated iteration not least. Bass isn't just bass, and direct radiating bass with typically low eff. only gets you so far where the energy needed is prodigious.
That’s true. Efficiency numbers are usually in the 2%-20% range, with the highest numbers going to all-horn-loaded speakers. When it comes to sensitivity, which is measured in dB, powered by a precise 1 watt, measured at a metre from the speaker, and written as dB/W/m, most sealed box direct-radiating speakers measure 90 dB at best, with bass reflex speakers doing better, but only rarely measuring above 95 dB. To get very high sensitivity (and efficiency), horn-loaded speakers seem to be the only way to go. While their economy/entry Klipsch speakers are hybrids, with direct-firing woofers and horn-loaded tweeters, the Heritage Series speakers, which were designed by Paul Klipsch himself, are the only all-horn-loaded speakers they make, and among the very few affordable horn speakers. There are two exceptions to those two points. First, the Klipsch Heresy, going from the original ones (which can still be found for sale used), which first appeared in 1957 as the world’s first centre speaker, all the way to the current Heresy IV, which has a direct-firing woofer. Even so, its sensitivity measures around 100 dB in the Heresy III onwards. The Heresy is the exception because of its direct-firing woofer. The other speaker is the exception because it’s not affordable for most of us. That would be the Heritage Jubilee. It’s the culmination of Paul Klipsch’s plans for an ultimate speaker, using components that were not available when he started out. Of course, as several amateur engineers have commented here, there’s no such thing as a free lunch. In the case of the Heritage Jubilee (there was an earlier Jubilee, but it was for professional stage use), the “ups” are that it can reach from the highest treble all the way down to a genuine 18 Hz (no subwoofers needed), and it has that amazing 105dB sensitivity, so you don’t need monster amps to drive it. The “downs” are that it’s 5 feet 8 inches tall and 4 feet wide. Also, it’s price is $36,000USD per pair. Yes, that’s past affordable for most of us, but they’re selling well, so clearly some people have good taste to go along with their fat wallets. However, when you get into that level of performance, that price is a relative bargain. For the rest of us, we can call it our aspirational speaker, the one we’ll have when everything comes together, and we have a big enough room to accommodate a pair of these giants. Or five of them, if you enjoy surround sound. Dream big, right?
@@nomorokay Agree with you but remember klipsch lies about the sensitivity of all their hybrid horn speakers and the Jubilee is EQ'd which is why it goes down to 18Hz. Additionally sensitivity should be measured with a 2.83 volt input rather then 1 watt as a true 4 ohm speaker will be at an advantage over a true 8 ohm on paper unless compensated for. At 4 ohms 2.83 volts equals 2 watts.
@@nomorokay " .. In the case of the Heritage Jubilee (there was an earlier Jubilee, but it was for professional stage use), the “ups” are that it can reach from the highest treble all the way down to a genuine 18 Hz (no subwoofers needed), and it has that amazing 105dB sensitivity, so you don’t need monster amps to drive it. The “downs” are that it’s 5 feet 8 inches tall and 4 feet wide. Also, it’s price is $36,000USD per pair." The earlier jub's differed mostly in the chosen MF/HF driver and the specific implementation of the W-folded bass horn. The Celestion Axi2050 unit in the "domesticized" Jub's is an engineering marvel though in the need of some HF-attenuation, but where the earlier pro Jub's have their dual 12" woofer placed in sealed cabs firing into the horn (as per usual here), the home version has the similar sized woofers ported INTO the horn, and not on the outside as been seen elsewhere with W-bin horns - that is: the combined pressure of the front wave + the out-of-phase back wave via the ports is horn-loaded into a summed output. Apparently it provides for somewhat better, and impressive extension, but I would have to believe transient response is impacted by the chosen coupling. Indeed, there's no free lunch. "Yes, that’s past affordable for most of us, but they’re selling well, so clearly some people have good taste to go along with their fat wallets. However, when you get into that level of performance, that price is a relative bargain." Oh, I agree. Compared to much else from JBL and others the new Jub's would seem to offer a better value. Here they actually care about a large sized mids/HF horn that controls directivity all the way down to the crossover point. They're actively configured to boot, all-horn at that, though as a horn-loaded design down through the bass there is the inevitable truncation of the mouth area, or else - extending this low - a non-truncated design would've been positively huge and in no way fit for most any domestic environment. I'd wager though they still perform exceedingly well down through the upper bass to the lower octaves. "For the rest of us, we can call it our aspirational speaker, the one we’ll have when everything comes together, and we have a big enough room to accommodate a pair of these giants. Or five of them, if you enjoy surround sound. Dream big, right?" Certainly, dream big. Personally I'd lose some of the extension down low and go with a "purer," non-truncated approach, and from sealed cabs as well, but that's just me.
As much as I’m a fully horn loaded guy for the sake of smoothest bass and absolute minimal distortion, I’d take Cornwalls over anything utilizing 8” drivers. I don’t care if there’s a hundred 8’s in the pile of crap 🤣
@@machrider2333 “properly resolving” is your own friggin’ opinion ! NOT sorry! Btw, setup is important no matter what your configuration is, so that it a matter of design and preference.
Seems like you have never heard a resolving system. It’s fine. Not many have. You probably still think a USB cord cannot have any effect on SQ and will die on that hill. Have a Day.
Paradigm’s top subwoofer has six sides, and two drivers, one above the other, on every second side. This cancels any vibration, keeping the sound clean. The amplifier in the sub puts out something like 4500 watts. It would be great to have one or two of them, but they cost $13,000CAD for one, so I’ll stick with my Seismic 110s for now.
Like comparing a 42” tv to an 80” tv, yup. Built nightclub speakers for years and with speakers bigger than a car. Listen to a 15” vs 60” and concerning audio, will undoubtedly sway 99 out of 100 people 😂
6.5" Woofer. 🤣🤣🤣 Maybe for a computer monitor or desktop. If you are going to do a 2 way probably 8-10" is the best you can do. Otherwise 12-18" is the sweet spot. Any larger and it is difficult to control the cone. I suppose you can do 4 10" drivers but if you put them in a square for best coupling you have thrown away your anorexic cabinet. The other option would be to mount two of them in the back but you can't go very high on those back facing drivers.. To move enough air for realistic bass you need to move a lot of air. For a single driver it has to be big or have a long throw. Long throw is detrimental to distortion above subwoofer frequencies. For effortless bass it is big driver or big horn. Many builders have used a panel that narrows as it goes up to get the skinny sound. That seems like a reasonable option. Of course a small room at low volume is a different animal.
The bass driver excursion is dictated be several things. The bass driver suspension design, crossover capacitance (caps for roll on and off), the magnetic response (how fast the bass driver pushes air) and voltage requirements. Also timbre matching requires the bass driver to "match" sonically with the midrange driver (mostly). The deep bass presents (slam) comes from the pushing of large amounts of air very quickly, and the design/size of the bass driver. The faster, the better and the larger diameter bass driver, the better (deeper low range presents down to 20hz). The problem with most high end speakers using multiple 6 or even 8 inch drivers I have found is that they can not extend the bass presents down past 28 to 26hz. That's fine for basic low end presents. The true sonic low end presents (down towards 20hz) is where the bass presents extends to the "feel" of very deep bass. Audibly, we can hear the frequencies down to around 26hz sonically and feel that level of presents. Beyond that is the deeper felt presents and extension. 6 and 8 inch drivers lack deep presence even when hitting 26hz. Even sonically, the timbre rolls off around 30 to 32hz. Bigger bass drivers means more power and better caps (capacitors) to extend the bass driver down towards 20hz. I have heard 21" bass drivers that can't extend down to 20hz. There design and speed (excursion/suspension design) is just not fast enough. And, large bass drivers require A LOT of power. Even HT subs have speed issues when reaching 20hz or lower. This is why multiple 6 and 8 inch bass drivers are used in stereo speakers. However, there is a magic size that not only reaches towards 20hz, but can also be just as fast with multiple 6 and 8 inch divers. The super 10 inch! My stereo speakers have just 1 10" in both speakers. The cabinet is elongated at the bottom to accommodate the 10" driver. The suspension and driver (magnet/coils) are huge and heavy with tightly controlled crossovers/caps that timbre match beautifully. Frequency response down towards 20hz effortlessly with very deep presents creates a full deep presents. I don't like the speaker and sub combo set up systems due to the fact that the timbre sonics are just off (not matched) to me. Very few full range speakers (for me at least) can create that sonic presents with deep bass well. Sorry for the long rant. Just passionate about sound reproduction.
@@bearclaw5115 en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hearing_range#/media/File:Animal_hearing_frequency_range.svg Sorry, but no. 26hz is on the exceptional side of human low frequency hearing. As the chart here lists; 31hz to below 19khz (dependent on age).
@@bearclaw5115 But the low C on a 32' pedal stop is 16Hz which can definitely be felt. So I consider full audio range to be 15Hz and up effectively. 32Hz covers the 16' pipes so for mains I would consider that adequate. At my age 12.5kHz is about my limit but considering that one octave above that is 25kHz I am not missing much. So even for a young buck I would say 15Hz-25kHz is more than enough and even 18kHz probably covers any normal music situation.
Paul isn't up to speed when it comes to all speaker brands... My JBL 4365s use 15-inch woofers. That model was discontinued about 6 or 7 years ago and the latest (in that line.) are 4367s they also use 15-inch woofers. JBLs top of the line speakers use 2 ,15-inch woofers per cabinet. I'm sure the Klipsch guys will chime-in and tell us all about Klipsch's 15-inch woofers used. LONG LIVE THE BIG BOY WOOFERS!
I was always told a wider baffle gives you a more accurate sound with less coloration, whilst a narrow baffle gives you generally better imaging but slightly less accurate sound.
Another approach is multiple boxes with baffle size optimized for frequency range. Think high end Wilson. Separate boxes or open baffles also allow for time alignment and isolation of vibration between baffles.
I think the main driver for the multiple small drivers is cosmetic. A big baffle does not fit in most listening areas.
If cost was no object I'd have a dedicated listening room with Aries Cerat horn speakers in a 20x30 room.
Y’all in the comments are confusing the woofer that is part of the main baffle and subwoofer that is usually separate.
That is what I noticed.
They are confusing the two different ones into one.
There are woofers.
There are Subwoofers.
This is what a Subwoofer looks like.
ua-cam.com/video/2mL9eNee53M/v-deo.html
@@davidfromamerica1871 Car "audio"? Hahahahahaha... ha no.
if you have dsp available you can get away with using smaller drivers, then you get the midrange sorted and the deep bass extension you normally only get from large heavy cone. 5" woofers can be great replacement for something close to a pure midrange unit.
but i have also played around with subwoofer drivers(10"), and crossing them over right to the tweeter with very pleasing result but also odd sounding.
I suggest Paul should take a holiday and visit a JBL or Klipsch dealer in Prague. 😁
Frequency, cone area, excursion and dB are all connected (there's calculators online that you can try this with).
On one hand it's difficult to make a large cone and on the other hand it's also difficult to make a high excursion motor, and therein lies a problem.
The same thing with progressive crossovers for multiple drivers, each crossover will create a phase problem.
There's just no free lunch when it comes to speaker designs. 😂
Thank you Paul.
I don't think they were talking about subwoofers, but rather the types of full range speakers that were common a few decades ago, with big 12 or 15 inch bass drivers, like Cerwin-Vega and Pioneer used to make. Even my first stereo as a teenager in the late 1980s, a Sears LXI, had 12 inch woofers, low quality to be sure, but I didn't know it at the time.
Interesting what you say about baffle size, my main speakers are more old school with a large base driver and accompanying wide baffle, they are of course not perfect, however I've been more blaming the crossover and thinking of a recap than anything else..
After this style we saw quite a few speakers come out with kind of triangular fronts, skinnier at the top where the tweeter and mid's were fitted, I always though it was just styling, trying to look modern, nothing about sound quality,
so more info on this would be handy.
I have a pair of late-70's aDs 910s. They have a large baffle with dual-10.5" bass drivers installed into their own separate enclosures inside the cabinet, thus the 130lbs w/stands. The sound is exceptional and the bass works great in the sealed cabs, but the soundstage is not pin-point accurate even though the instrument separation is well-done, probably due to the large front. They're still my end-gamers!
The baffle should ideally be narrower with mids and tweeter hence the " triangular " front baffle. The smaller the front baffle, the better the imaging potential.
If your speakers are more than 20-25 years old, replacing the capacitors is a good idea anyway, not for increased performance over the original specs, but to get back to those specs. Caps (and many other parts) age slowly but steadily, so it can be hard to notice that your originally great-sounding speakers are merely good now. Just as an old light bulb is dimmer than a new one, the ESR (Equivalent Series Resistance), which can’t be checked with a regular multi-meter, will have gradually increased over the decades, so popping in a new set of caps should be seen as maintenance. When I replaced the caps in the crossovers in my 34-year-old Klipsch La Scalas, the sound was immediately clearer and cleaner, and I was well pleased.
At the same time, if your woofers, and maybe your squawkers (mid-range drivers), have foam surrounds, it could be time to inspect them very closely for any defects, like cracks or holes. If they do have any visible defects, the surrounds can be replaced for a reasonable price. I have another pair of speakers, each with two 10-inch woofers. Re-surrounding all four woofers by a shop cost only $160 ($40 per woofer), and the speakers did sound a bit better without little flaps of foam waving with the beat. It was also much less embarrassing to look at them. They were 24 years old when I had them re-surrounded, so now I’m good for a couple more decades.
As for the La Scalas, with their 15-inch woofers, the surrounds are made of doped paper, like guitar amplifier speakers, so they’ll outlive me with no attention to their surrounds.
@@nomorokay They probably sounded cleaner and clearer due to better caps rather than out of spec caps.
I would just rebuild the whole crossover. Caps, resistors, inductors, and even the binding posts can be suspect on old speakers.
I like 10" for subwoofer personally. I built myself a single 10 reference driver that digs extremely deep but is also musical.
here in philippines..21 inches bass subwoofer use for battlesounds
😂😂👍🏻
i have jbl 4343B 4 way studio monitor with tweeter, mid , 10inch mid bass driver and 15inch low freq driver. they get down to 35hz on paper, probably not so much in my room though, still sound amazing to me!
Another excellent explanation. Thanks Paul!
My pleasure. Thanks for watching!
@@Paulmcgowanpsaudio edit over the answer, I’m in agreement with Cesar, and yet they are still fighting iver the andwer, lol. Fools..
Well, I got thre 18 inch alnico woofers, based on JBL. Mounted in the floorstanding speakers. I like the sound of them, bass like I never heard before. But the mids are wider than the woofers, so no worries about baffles here.
Great info, as usual...Thank you, Paul!
Simply put. Larger size = more power im the extreme low frequencies..more range of extreme low frequencies.
Smaller woofer = weaker range on extreme low frequency but come with higher dynamics and lower gaps with your midrange.
It might be a good idea for home theater to have 1 powerful sub in the back next to where you sit to listen watch movies.
And have another smaller sub in front that is more dynamic that mix match better with your 2 front speakers.
I would setup the smaller one to be in phase and the big ine in the back to be in reverse phase.
And then manually adjust the power of the rear subwoofer for optimal effect. Probably in the range of 60hz crossover in manual mode.
And the smaller one around 90hz in auto mode.
JBL L100 Classic 12" bass driver
15”!
@@JerryRutten 30cm is about 12 inch
@@D1N02 Yes, 30.48 cm. So?
And I doubt if the typical L100 (or Klipsch) owner cares much about soundstaging)
@@louisperlman8030 Maybe you should read some research from Floyd Toole and Earl Geddes... Earl Geddes build two-way loudspeakers for imaging with a 15" (or 12") woofer and a tweeter in a waveguide!
I am very pleased with the 12” woofer and the 15” passive radiator of the Klipsch Forte IVs, they move air big time so the bass is brutal.
If I put a 12" unit in each side of the cabinet and the magnets are close together the magnets will repel each other. Will that make a stronger magnetic field or will it reduce the magnetic field in the coils?
Hi Paul. Love this videos. I have in my garage a very bad system i created with a china's 50€ radio, an used car amplifier, two sony 4 way speakers and a bass box i made 20 years ago with no math at all. Very big mess........But the sub's, 15" and 12" (in the same box one is like passive) just give me that sound you feel in your body! In my car, with a very expensive system i can't fell the same. It's more punchy in the ears and.......You know all that. In the same application, same scenario, 10", 12", 15", 18"?????? Hard question......Sorry my bad english, best regards, Daniel from Portugal.
You would think that if you wanted the best sound each component would have its own isolated cabinet tuned in size and shape but even the most expensive speakers i ever see are almost always one big cabinet. Is ther a reason?
Multiple cabinets as in Wilson are ugly and expensive.
Actually, that is a good idea and some high end speakers do have individual boxes for each midrange and treble driver (but not usually for the woofer(s)), all inside the main box, so you don’t see them.
18 inch for a subwoofer in a Ripole enclosure is the max you can go if you want to safely reach up to 80 Hz
I use 21" subs for music in main system and depending on which speaker is in the rotation, vary the crossover from 40Hz to 80Hz without issue. I also use 24" subs crossed at 80Hz for Home Theater.
@@carlosoliveira-rc2xt oi carlos, 24 inch subs god queria conhecer seu sistema
21" ipal, 30" M-force
My JBL S412PII had 12 inch woofers, if I remember correctly.
I absolutely loved those speakers, although the bass could still have gone a bit deeper for my taste.
Now I am looking at some bookshelf speakers that go about as deep as those huge floor standers, but I see they have single 6 inch woofers? I have no idea how those could compete to my old beloved JBL's but I am still interested.
Better excursion.
The little 6 is going to be working a lot harder. Chances are the old style would sound more effortless under the same conditions especially with percussive bass. This is assuming the old cabinets were tuned properly.
Or build it as a pyramid shape.. That also works great
My understanding other then sub woofer that somewhat noticeable excursion creates distortions.
than, not then
Oh it applies to subs as well. People overlook the inarguable fact these days that high excursion drivers create massive amounts of IM/HD. That’s exactly what guys like Paul Klipsch effectively eliminated with high efficiency fully horn loaded speaker designs, essentially turning the 15” woofers into large compression drivers. When you barely have to tickle a driver to get a large amount of output you lower distortion by a factor of ten or more. Direct radiating, high excursion drivers flapping around to create bass are for the people who think quantity of bass translates to quality of bass. It doesn’t. To this day there has been no conclusive evidence to support anything other than horn loading is the absolute primer method of reproducing sound in spite of what all these companies building their ridiculous space odyssey looking speakers like to claim they have accomplished using low budget direct radiator technology. Anyone who has ever heard an exceptional horn system immediately understands the difference.
Is there a formula for what multiple smaller drivers add up to an equivalency of one larger driver? For instance, I know that two 6.5 inch base drivers don't equal a 13in bass driver (or do they?) - so what is their equivalence to?
Area of a circle = Pi (3.14) multiplied by the radius squared. Radius is half of the diameter. Using your example, the 6.5 inch driver has a radius of 3.25 inches. So 3.25 x 3.25 equals 10.5 inches. Now multiply that by Pi, which is 3.14, to arrive at the total square area of about 33 inches (for one 6.5 driver). Now multiply that times 2 because you have two drivers, and you have 66 square inches total. By comparison, the 13 inch driver has 133 square inches! i hope that helps.
@@danmarjenka6361Also linear movement of the drivers Xmax should be considered as well. In order to compare bass drivers one needs to know driver's (air) volume displacement (Vd = Sd * Xmax, where Sd is a surface area of a driver cone ).
Eminence NSW6021-6 21 inch neo sub, provided you have enough room for it 🤘🏽
Informative
Yeah, talk to Andrew Jones about woofer and baffle size. That will be fun..
Is this a sarcastic comment? He definitely takes baffle size into consideration. Or is your comment based on how he goes into very great detail - because I know he does that lol.
Also, smaller drivers are stiffer and produce less distortion than larger ones.
That's why they can cross over higher to the midrange. Paul mentioned this but didn't exactly explain it.
Perhaps they may distort less as you approach the midrange but in the low range it is the opposite as they have to travel much farther getting into more non-linear regions of the suspension and magnetic field.
Great example.... Vintage Bose 901's
Bose is crap and always was
@@vincentpedalino618 but it made bass, right? out of 5s
8 or 9 inch are fast and couple great…
This is the best rule of thumb you are ever going to find with questions like these. He who can move the most air, with the least distortion and power, wins. Period. End of story.
Hmm, sounds like horn-loaded drivers are the answer.
Pretty much but multiple drivers do add interaction issues to the equation.
Distortion from a bass driver can be significant especially when playing louder. But often it takes a sine wave test signal to realize you can pinpoint the location of the speaker playing sub bass due to driver induced harmonics or even port airflow noise. Some times it becomes very audible at a specific frequency. I’ve often played a sine wave sweep from my Sigma Studio mobile audio app on audio systems and people are shocked how much bad sounds can come not only from the speakers but often from things in the room resonating at some specific frequency. When you listen to music these things smear the details but you won’t know why. I’ve seen decorations rattling loudly where you had to use a test signal to pinpoint it. In cars you can often realize various panels resonating loudly when you do a sine wave sweep with manual panning to dial in the exact resonance points.
Old school speakers had the big woofer across the front. It made the front baffle too wide.
So, can two 8's do the job of 1 15" woofer?
No
All other factors being equal, no. The area of a 15" woofer is 176.7 sq. in. The area of 2 8" woofers is 100.5 sq. in.
Yes
@@GTRxMan exactly. It’s shocking the change in surface area as you go up in cone size. I love that big drivers are coming back. You can’t replicate the feel or sound of a 12 or 15” driver with multiple small ones, IMO. It’s not just numbers.
@@tylerhackman6832 so big subwoofers drive have exclusive quality?
Mickey Hart thought "Planet Drum" was the right size.
JBL 4367 speakers
Aura sound 18"s from the 90's with the paper cone. Ported box. Old school.
The simple answer to the question asked is *NO* as there are numerous variables involved.
This guy should have walked around AXPONA to *actually see* what is currently on the market!
Right on. Based on UA-cam demos, very good sound came from Acora and Estalon. Two very different approaches to driver and baffle size but great sound.
"This guy should have walked around AXPONA to actually see " - oh please. Paul's seen more speakers than you ever will. His statement(s) about large transducers are accurate.
@@user-od9iz9cv1w "Acora and Estalon" - how many of the flagship speakers do you think Valereo sells? How many of the big Estelons are sold? Paul never said speakers with large woofers are never made (just look at Cerwin Vega is you want to see the market leader it really big woofers.)
It is always fun to read people saying that what they ear on Ytube was great 😅😅😅😅😅😅😅😅😅😅😅😅😅😅😅😅
@@Skye_the_toller I get it. It makes no sense. But with decent headphones and sound card it is surprising how much you can tell about the sound signature of a given system from a video clip taken on a phone.
No, not talking about a JBL sub... talking about the wide baffle JBLs.
"Cumulated" or effective air radiation area can also be realized via horn-loading that acts as a force multiplier for a given driver diameter. Say, a 15" driver horn-loaded will yield an effective air radiation area much larger than what the driver emits as a direct radiating device, depending on the given horn implementation; a 1/4 wave folded front loaded horn with a non-truncated mouth area has the higher efficiency (i.e.: ~105dB's on up) and thereby larger effective air radiation area vs. mouth-truncated 1/4 wave folded FLH . The former will also need to be much larger compared to the latter for a given tune, so there's a size-price to pay for higher eff./larger radiation area in addition to more bandwidth and smoother frequency response.
Then there's the tapped horn principle, patented by Danley Sound Labs, which is really a high-order bandpass design that takes advantage of both the front and back wave of the driver; the front wave shoots into a folded horn path, while the backside of the driver is exposed near the mouth and will sum/synchronize its back wave output with the output coming through the horn from the front wave. Sounds a bit complicated, but it works and sounds great, if well implemented. Tapped horns are still big (say, 20cf. volume for a just below 25Hz tune with a ~97dB eff.), but I prefer them over the truncated FLH. The downside with a tapped horn is limited bandwidth, but they have cone excursion minima at the tune (contrary to a FLH that has excursion maximum here with the driver in a sealed chamber) which translates into very low distortion. Listening to the bass from a tapped horn is hearing a fully effortless, smooth bass, which is also what you hear from a FLH - its non-truncated iteration not least.
Bass isn't just bass, and direct radiating bass with typically low eff. only gets you so far where the energy needed is prodigious.
No such thing as 97dB efficiency, you mean sensitivity.
That’s true. Efficiency numbers are usually in the 2%-20% range, with the highest numbers going to all-horn-loaded speakers. When it comes to sensitivity, which is measured in dB, powered by a precise 1 watt, measured at a metre from the speaker, and written as dB/W/m, most sealed box direct-radiating speakers measure 90 dB at best, with bass reflex speakers doing better, but only rarely measuring above 95 dB.
To get very high sensitivity (and efficiency), horn-loaded speakers seem to be the only way to go. While their economy/entry Klipsch speakers are hybrids, with direct-firing woofers and horn-loaded tweeters, the Heritage Series speakers, which were designed by Paul Klipsch himself, are the only all-horn-loaded speakers they make, and among the very few affordable horn speakers. There are two exceptions to those two points. First, the Klipsch Heresy, going from the original ones (which can still be found for sale used), which first appeared in 1957 as the world’s first centre speaker, all the way to the current Heresy IV, which has a direct-firing woofer. Even so, its sensitivity measures around 100 dB in the Heresy III onwards.
The Heresy is the exception because of its direct-firing woofer. The other speaker is the exception because it’s not affordable for most of us. That would be the Heritage Jubilee. It’s the culmination of Paul Klipsch’s plans for an ultimate speaker, using components that were not available when he started out. Of course, as several amateur engineers have commented here, there’s no such thing as a free lunch. In the case of the Heritage Jubilee (there was an earlier Jubilee, but it was for professional stage use), the “ups” are that it can reach from the highest treble all the way down to a genuine 18 Hz (no subwoofers needed), and it has that amazing 105dB sensitivity, so you don’t need monster amps to drive it. The “downs” are that it’s 5 feet 8 inches tall and 4 feet wide. Also, it’s price is $36,000USD per pair.
Yes, that’s past affordable for most of us, but they’re selling well, so clearly some people have good taste to go along with their fat wallets. However, when you get into that level of performance, that price is a relative bargain. For the rest of us, we can call it our aspirational speaker, the one we’ll have when everything comes together, and we have a big enough room to accommodate a pair of these giants. Or five of them, if you enjoy surround sound. Dream big, right?
@@nomorokay Agree with you but remember klipsch lies about the sensitivity of all their hybrid horn speakers and the Jubilee is EQ'd which is why it goes down to 18Hz. Additionally sensitivity should be measured with a 2.83 volt input rather then 1 watt as a true 4 ohm speaker will be at an advantage over a true 8 ohm on paper unless compensated for. At 4 ohms 2.83 volts equals 2 watts.
@@carlosoliveira-rc2xt Sorry, my bad. I know the difference and distinction, but the hour was late and I was tired. Thanks for the correction.
@@nomorokay " .. In the case of the Heritage Jubilee (there was an earlier Jubilee, but it was for professional stage use), the “ups” are that it can reach from the highest treble all the way down to a genuine 18 Hz (no subwoofers needed), and it has that amazing 105dB sensitivity, so you don’t need monster amps to drive it. The “downs” are that it’s 5 feet 8 inches tall and 4 feet wide. Also, it’s price is $36,000USD per pair."
The earlier jub's differed mostly in the chosen MF/HF driver and the specific implementation of the W-folded bass horn. The Celestion Axi2050 unit in the "domesticized" Jub's is an engineering marvel though in the need of some HF-attenuation, but where the earlier pro Jub's have their dual 12" woofer placed in sealed cabs firing into the horn (as per usual here), the home version has the similar sized woofers ported INTO the horn, and not on the outside as been seen elsewhere with W-bin horns - that is: the combined pressure of the front wave + the out-of-phase back wave via the ports is horn-loaded into a summed output. Apparently it provides for somewhat better, and impressive extension, but I would have to believe transient response is impacted by the chosen coupling. Indeed, there's no free lunch.
"Yes, that’s past affordable for most of us, but they’re selling well, so clearly some people have good taste to go along with their fat wallets. However, when you get into that level of performance, that price is a relative bargain."
Oh, I agree. Compared to much else from JBL and others the new Jub's would seem to offer a better value. Here they actually care about a large sized mids/HF horn that controls directivity all the way down to the crossover point. They're actively configured to boot, all-horn at that, though as a horn-loaded design down through the bass there is the inevitable truncation of the mouth area, or else - extending this low - a non-truncated design would've been positively huge and in no way fit for most any domestic environment. I'd wager though they still perform exceedingly well down through the upper bass to the lower octaves.
"For the rest of us, we can call it our aspirational speaker, the one we’ll have when everything comes together, and we have a big enough room to accommodate a pair of these giants. Or five of them, if you enjoy surround sound. Dream big, right?"
Certainly, dream big. Personally I'd lose some of the extension down low and go with a "purer," non-truncated approach, and from sealed cabs as well, but that's just me.
I have a pair of Polk Audio monitor 10 A speakers that have to 6.5 " woofers and a 10" pasive radiator and the bass is great
Tell my Cornwalls that 15" is too big. lol
As much as I’m a fully horn loaded guy for the sake of smoothest bass and absolute minimal distortion, I’d take Cornwalls over anything utilizing 8” drivers. I don’t care if there’s a hundred 8’s in the pile of crap 🤣
Hey Papa's Cornwalls, your woofer is too big for a properly resolving system....sorry, not sorry.
🤔Tell my Wharfedale Rosedales their 15” woofers are obsolete! 👨🏻
@@machrider2333 “properly resolving” is your own friggin’ opinion !
NOT sorry!
Btw, setup is important no matter what your configuration is, so that it a matter of design and preference.
Seems like you have never heard a resolving system. It’s fine. Not many have. You probably still think a USB cord cannot have any effect on SQ and will die on that hill. Have a Day.
Many of the best powerful sub are made with multiple speakers instead of a big one… may be not an issue for HT bombes, may better for music and speed…
Paradigm’s top subwoofer has six sides, and two drivers, one above the other, on every second side. This cancels any vibration, keeping the sound clean. The amplifier in the sub puts out something like 4500 watts. It would be great to have one or two of them, but they cost $13,000CAD for one, so I’ll stick with my Seismic 110s for now.
Silly me. I thought the issue was woofers not subs. 😇
Like comparing a 42” tv to an 80” tv, yup. Built nightclub speakers for years and with speakers bigger than a car. Listen to a 15” vs 60” and concerning audio, will undoubtedly sway 99 out of 100 people 😂
13 inch svs ultra. Enough displacement for big bass and small enough to not be sluggish.
6.5" Woofer. 🤣🤣🤣 Maybe for a computer monitor or desktop. If you are going to do a 2 way probably 8-10" is the best you can do. Otherwise 12-18" is the sweet spot. Any larger and it is difficult to control the cone. I suppose you can do 4 10" drivers but if you put them in a square for best coupling you have thrown away your anorexic cabinet. The other option would be to mount two of them in the back but you can't go very high on those back facing drivers..
To move enough air for realistic bass you need to move a lot of air. For a single driver it has to be big or have a long throw. Long throw is detrimental to distortion above subwoofer frequencies. For effortless bass it is big driver or big horn.
Many builders have used a panel that narrows as it goes up to get the skinny sound. That seems like a reasonable option. Of course a small room at low volume is a different animal.
No he’s talking about full range floor standers with 15s like JBL AND Cerwin Vega XLS-215
A woofer goes woof, woof. A subwoofer roars.
The bass driver excursion is dictated be several things. The bass driver suspension design, crossover capacitance (caps for roll on and off), the magnetic response (how fast the bass driver pushes air) and voltage requirements. Also timbre matching requires the bass driver to "match" sonically with the midrange driver (mostly). The deep bass presents (slam) comes from the pushing of large amounts of air very quickly, and the design/size of the bass driver. The faster, the better and the larger diameter bass driver, the better (deeper low range presents down to 20hz). The problem with most high end speakers using multiple 6 or even 8 inch drivers I have found is that they can not extend the bass presents down past 28 to 26hz. That's fine for basic low end presents. The true sonic low end presents (down towards 20hz) is where the bass presents extends to the "feel" of very deep bass. Audibly, we can hear the frequencies down to around 26hz sonically and feel that level of presents. Beyond that is the deeper felt presents and extension. 6 and 8 inch drivers lack deep presence even when hitting 26hz. Even sonically, the timbre rolls off around 30 to 32hz. Bigger bass drivers means more power and better caps (capacitors) to extend the bass driver down towards 20hz. I have heard 21" bass drivers that can't extend down to 20hz. There design and speed (excursion/suspension design) is just not fast enough. And, large bass drivers require A LOT of power. Even HT subs have speed issues when reaching 20hz or lower. This is why multiple 6 and 8 inch bass drivers are used in stereo speakers. However, there is a magic size that not only reaches towards 20hz, but can also be just as fast with multiple 6 and 8 inch divers. The super 10 inch! My stereo speakers have just 1 10" in both speakers. The cabinet is elongated at the bottom to accommodate the 10" driver. The suspension and driver (magnet/coils) are huge and heavy with tightly controlled crossovers/caps that timbre match beautifully. Frequency response down towards 20hz effortlessly with very deep presents creates a full deep presents. I don't like the speaker and sub combo set up systems due to the fact that the timbre sonics are just off (not matched) to me. Very few full range speakers (for me at least) can create that sonic presents with deep bass well. Sorry for the long rant. Just passionate about sound reproduction.
Human hearing is generally thought to go down to 20hz not 26hz.
@@bearclaw5115 en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hearing_range#/media/File:Animal_hearing_frequency_range.svg
Sorry, but no. 26hz is on the exceptional side of human low frequency hearing. As the chart here lists; 31hz to below 19khz (dependent on age).
@@bearclaw5115 But the low C on a 32' pedal stop is 16Hz which can definitely be felt. So I consider full audio range to be 15Hz and up effectively. 32Hz covers the 16' pipes so for mains I would consider that adequate.
At my age 12.5kHz is about my limit but considering that one octave above that is 25kHz I am not missing much. So even for a young buck I would say 15Hz-25kHz is more than enough and even 18kHz probably covers any normal music situation.
Paul isn't up to speed when it comes to all speaker brands...
My JBL 4365s use 15-inch woofers. That model was discontinued about 6 or 7 years ago and the latest (in that line.) are 4367s they also use 15-inch woofers. JBLs top of the line speakers use 2 ,15-inch woofers per cabinet. I'm sure the Klipsch guys will chime-in and tell us all about Klipsch's 15-inch woofers used.
LONG LIVE THE BIG BOY WOOFERS!
Are some people now calling large two channel bass speaker drivers “subwoofers” 😳
6ft
Sexy thumbnail, Paul!!