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What is with the small speakers?

post #1 of 9
1/4/07 at 2:17am
Thread Starter 
I don't know much about speakers, but in speaker recommendation threads, and paging through my Audioadviser magazine, I seem to get the impression that a common size for speakers is 1 or 2 7" or less drivers and a tweeter, in some kind of skinny cabinet.



That doesn't strike me as a design that could possibly have any impact or bass...the cones are just so small. I can't imagine that it could reproduce bass drum effectively or anything. It seems that impact is half the point of using speakers...why not some real 8"+ drivers? Is it just expected that you are going to need a subwoofer with such speakers?

I don't have much experience with Hifi speakers but I know that the common little cube speakers that people use in Home Theatre are simply not up to the task of giving any impression of volume; whereas the pro sound speakers I used to work with, it was like the sound was going through you, real, room filling sound, even at relatively low volumes...
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post #2 of 9
1/4/07 at 2:45am
Speakers with big woofers used to be popular, but the trend in the last 10 years has been toward slimmer cabinets for aesthetic and WAF reasons. Match that with the parallel trend towards home theatre systems (in HT a subwoofer is considered a "must") and you can see why the overall trend is toward smaller main speakers.

There are some positives. Smaller cabinets are more rigid for a given thickness of MDF and a given amount of bracing. Smaller baffles tend to have better imaging due to less diffraction and secondary radiation.

In terms of music, a 6.5 inch or 7 inch woofer is a good size for decent bass reproduction with no subwoofer, *provided* there is adequate baffle step compensation. The trouble is many commercial vendors (e.g. PSB), for cost reasons, don't include full baffle step compensation in their lower cost speakers. This leads to people being dissatisfied, even though a well designed speaker with the same woofer size may have satisfied them. Incidentally, you can't fully fix a speaker with inadequate baffle step compensation by adding a subwoofer.

A speaker with a 5.5 inch midwoofer may be adequate for some people given adequate BSC, but in most cases I think 6.5-7 inch is the sweet spot.

There are still some commercial speakers with 8 inch woofers if you hunt around, e.g. the Paradigm Monitor 9. If I remember right, the last generation Monitor series had some of the cheaper models with 8 inch woofers, e.g. the old Monitor 5.
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post #3 of 9
1/4/07 at 2:50am
By the way, bass "impact" happens in the 60-85 Hz range. That's the frequency range where you get a thump in your chest. Many people think you need low bass for impact. That's just not true. 60 Hz and below is just rumble. You can prove this to yourself by experimenting with EQ. Most professional sound installations (dance clubs, performances, etc.) have a peak in this region, hence the thump. A lot of large pro audio drivers don't actually go very low. This is why a decently designed 7 inch woofer can provide bass impact with music.
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post #4 of 9
1/4/07 at 5:57am
Thanks for that Wodgy, I really learned something there. Cheers!
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post #5 of 9
1/4/07 at 10:20am
Driver technology has changed a lot over the years. My Paradigm Reference Active 20's can reach a real world 38 Hz with a 6 1/2" woofer. Of coarse they are much less taxed crossed over to a nice sub.
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post #6 of 9
1/4/07 at 12:59pm
A floorstanding speaker with only a single woofer and tweeter would probably be no better than a similarly-constructed bookshelf speaker. Most floorstanders have more than one woofer, and though it has gone out of fashion (since the late '90s), the lower halves of floorstanders were often used for subwoofers.
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post #7 of 9
1/4/07 at 1:50pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by Wodgy View Post
By the way, bass "impact" happens in the 60-85 Hz range. That's the frequency range where you get a thump in your chest. Many people think you need low bass for impact. That's just not true. 60 Hz and below is just rumble. You can prove this to yourself by experimenting with EQ. Most professional sound installations (dance clubs, performances, etc.) have a peak in this region, hence the thump. A lot of large pro audio drivers don't actually go very low. This is why a decently designed 7 inch woofer can provide bass impact with music.
40 hz is the punch in the stumock frequency
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post #8 of 9
1/4/07 at 5:15pm
The size of the woofer only matter's to an extent. A bigger woofer will generally beat out a smaller one, becuase it can move more air. But I have seen 8" woofers that blow away 10's and 12's.

Honestly, I have 3-way bookshelfs. Two 7" and one tweeter, each, and those pump out so much bass by themselves.
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post #9 of 9
1/4/07 at 11:04pm
I would rather have old style floorstanding full range cabinet speakers with good drivers and a well designed crossover than to have to deal with EQing the inevitable gaps and bulges in response between tiny mains and a sub.

If you ask at good stereo stores, they still have full range box speakers. They just don't have them out in the open because they don't look as sexy as those outer space pylons.

See ya
Steve
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