Here is what SVS says in their
FAQ
(The FAQ is huge--this is just the piece on my question.) Please speak up if you agree or disagree with what they have to say.
4) What's best for me? Cylinder or Box SVS?
Like so many things in life... it depends. Some folks like the cutting-edge, unique and understated elegance of our Cylinder Subwoofers, others value the more traditional but likewise slick simplicity of our newer box designs. In fact, aesthetics ... how you want your sub to look ... is probably the most significant consideration in your decision here. Still, there are some other "pro's and con's" to consider, and even the question of "looks" isn't as straightforward as it might seem at first. How you weigh these issues is clearly a personal call. A note for some who consider it important, all our enclosures, cylinder and box, are made in the USA exclusively for SVS. When so many accept the fallacy that "Made in America" can't be done affordably, we're pretty proud of that.
Executive summary?? In short, cylinders tend to cost less, are noticeably taller, but at the same time lighter and easier to move. Boxes tend to have considerably more "heft" (requiring more "grunt" to place them), have nice flat tops you can put things on, yet cost a bit more than the closest performing cylinder equivalent. Want further discussion on this eternal question??? Read on.
Cylinder Subwoofers: The original SVS designs were all cylinder-based for some very good reasons. First and foremost it's a very efficient audio enclosure from a number of perspectives. The internal pressures of an SVS can be intense! Ever wonder why cylinders are used to contain compressed gasses?? They can't stretch easily, and tend to resist forms of wall distortion that boxes must combat. In short a box wall must be many times thicker and heavier to equal the strength of a simple cylinder. This affects several things in turn...
Weight: For a equal level of performance and enclosure space (the key to getting deep and powerfully clean bass) a cylinder will be lighter, and that means easier to move around your room, or from house to house as you go through life. One example. Our PB1-ISD weighs in around 78 pounds. The 25-31PCi is virtually identical in performance, but weighs in a relatively svelte 55 pounds. Now, 23 pounds might not sound like much, until you haul one up to the top floor of a dorm room, or nudge one into a tight spot in a basement. Most our cylinders you can sling on your shoulder, most our box subs are decidedly "two-person lift" entities. Now we know that for some customers weight is good, it connotes quality and value. If you fall into this camp, then the relative light weight of a PCi isn't an advantage. In practical terms most folks will find 55 pounds quite enough!
Floor space: Because our cylinders go "up, not out" they can contain prodigious amounts of internal volume that would make for a huge box "foot-print". While a round cylinder base-plate can't snug into the very corner of a room like a box can, our cylinder subs still tend to take up less floor space than a box equivalent.
Finish/looks: Except for our hand-crafted SS subwoofers, all our cylinder subs are finished in a tough knit velvet like black fabric we sourced from a high-end Architectural supply company. Its light scattering properties means even our tallest Cylinder Subs practically disappear in a dark home theater corner. We've had reports of spouses that didn't even notice a surreptitious SVS upgrade until it was pointed out to them. We've sold countless thousands of them and know that most folks love their look.
Some don't. They prefer the harder, more conventional edges of a box and the hard pebble finish of our box sub's poly-finish. While the boxes are a similar shade of black, the fact they are not fabric covered enclosures is a plus, and we're not one's to argue. We developed high-performance SVS box subs precisely because folks asked for a more traditional design as an option.
Cost: Because the cylinder design is so efficient and relatively easy to manufacture, an equivalent box subwoofer will tend to cost more. Not much, but for some folks every audio budget dollar counts. To use the PB1-ISD as an example, it performs virtually the same as a 25-31PCi subwoofer (with the optional, no-cost 22Hz tune we offer). The PCi is $549, the PB1-ISD costs $599. Now, you might light Cuban cigars with $50 bills, but if per chance you don't, at least you understand that a box design can cost a bit more up front. Shipping naturally adds costs too, and depending on where you live you can expect a 25-31PCi to cost roughly $15-$25 less to ship than its PB1-ISD cousin. Our larger box subs will also cost more to ship (though all will be quickly calculated based on your location before you place an order so you can check). Our UPS shipping rates are still amazingly low no matter how price sensitive you are.
Box Subwoofers: So cylinders have it "all over" boxes, right? Not hardly. Even though we engineer audio solutions for demanding buyers, there is nothing quite perfect (to our way of thinking). Cylinders have their advantages, and so too do their box brethren.
Size: While their designs are similar in nature (using common woofers, amps, ports etc) SVS box subs tend to strike some folks as less visually obtrusive. All while taking up more floor space. Why?? Box subs tend to be able to tuck tightly into a corner (you still need a few inches for the rear firing ports to breathe) and are naturally much shorter to boot. A PB1-ISD is a mere 20" tall including its integral base-plate, while even our shortest cylinder sub is a little over 35" tall.
Performance: If enclosure volume in about the same, there are no significant disadvantages, in terms of raw performance, due to a box shape versus a cylinder. But (there has to be a "but" right??)... boxes do lend themselves to multi-driver configurations that are simply not practical in a cylinder design. The PB1-ISD has single woofer so as you might expect, it's virtually identical to a 22Hz tuned version of our 25-31PCi subwoofer (especially since it shares all the same parts as the PCi subs). If you are with us so far then, you already know that when we release a PB1-Plus later this year (Powered Box, with one "Plus" woofer and three way porting) you can expect it to perform much like a 25-31PC-Plus.
More performance considerations. You need look no further than our killer B4-Plus to understand that SVS is already pushing the limits of box design to a new level too. FOUR of our Plus woofers in a massive "box" cabinet means performance that would take several of our best cylinder subs to match. Just keep in mind this is a custom-built, 26" high x 32" wide x 25" deep 190 pound bruiser that costs $2,495, not including an amp. Keep in mind too that even one of our CS-Ultra cylinders can leave some other $3,000 18" woofer box subs in the dust. So a sense of perspective is important.
Another example?? What about a "PB2-Plus"?? This is our Powered Box, two driver subwoofer set to debut in the first quarter of 2003. It'll include a massive amp that would simply be too much for nearly any single woofer, even the vaunted TV-12 "Ultra" driver. Will the PB2-Plus also be big and heavy?? You bet; but in terms of sheer power it'll outperform any other single powered sub in the SVS line up (if not the world), simply by virtue of its dual woofer configuration and sufficiently robust built-in power. Box subs allow multiple woofer designs more easily but weight, cost and size go up accordingly. Two 16" cylinder SVS's can often fit in a room where one large box SVS like the forthcoming PB2-Plus might not.
Cost: Any single woofer box sub from SVS we'll offer will tend to cost about 10% more than its closest performing cylinder equivalent due to more costly enclosure construction. Yet considering even the lowest cost SVS box subs, like the PB1-ISD already outperforms most subs costing from $200 to $1,500 more than ours, we don't think that's much of a premium.
Finish: Some folks like boxes, others hate them due to their relative commonality in the speaker world. Regardless of how you feel about that, the tough cured-poly finish of most the SVS box subs is simple, tough and attractive. Some might lament the lack of a "piano gloss" finish in our offerings, but in our experience what looks good in a magazine ad is typically a pain-in-the-butt to live with in the practical world of finger prints, scratches, dust, and "drink rings". You'll suffer none of that with our black finished subs (more care should be given to those offerings available in natural wood veneer like the B4-Plus, of course). Vacuum of your house-dust on occasion and you are done.
Practicality: There is not much more practical than a simple box. You can put it in a corner, put a plant on it, put a lamp on it, put Granny's picture on it (as long as you understand Granny might be moving around a bit during the pod-race scene in Star Wars: The Phantom Menace). A sub like our PB1-ISD will be impervious to your kids' peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, it'll be immune to the most vicious house cat (though to be fair, we've not had one owner report any defeating our tough cylinder subwoofer fabric either). Plants, your best friend's bottle of beer, and that 50 lb. bust of Beethoven are all very bad things to put on top of our cylinder subs by comparison. Their tops must be un-obstructed as their top-firing ports are protected by a relatively light-weight mesh grill. If this matters to you, the box SVS's gain another point in their favor.
