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2-way vs. 3-way speakers


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I would go with a 2-way woofer/horn cab. There's probably a good reason why 2-way mid/high cabs outnumber 3-ways 20 to 1. If 3-ways were more desirable even in a small number of situations, one would think that there would be a lot more 3-way products available.

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Originally posted by J.

I would go with a 2-way woofer/horn cab. There's probably a good reason why 2-way mid/high cabs outnumber 3-ways 20 to 1. If 3-ways were more desirable even in a small number of situations, one would think that there would be a lot more 3-way products available.

 

 

say what?!?!

 

Probably the biggest reason two-way cabs out number three-way cabs is that good three-way designs are more epensive (and generally larger in size) than a two-way design. 99% of the people I know involved in the sound industry would choose a good three-way design over a good two-way design any day of the week.

 

The main benefits of a three-way design are:

-Generally lower midrange distortion due to the added midrange driver

-Potentially increased maximum SPL

 

With that said, I would highly recommend the Yorkville Unity 15 cabinets. They are one of the best sounding designs out there at that price point.

 

Jeff

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Exactly what I was going to say. It's easy to throw in a midrange driver and call it a 3 way. Harder to make a proper design that actually works well. Plus the boxes are usually bigger and heavier.

 

BTW - Sound guy is switching to the QRX 153 for mains. They will be over a pair of EV X line subs. Anyone have any experience with these?

 

We were formerly using Yorkville 508's over 808 or 1208 subs, depending on the venue size. Now the "Big rig" will be the EV based one and the small rig Yorkville NX550P's over Yorkville LS700 subs. Basically a carable PA that is easy to set up and doesn't require the 6-8 MPG pickup and trailer!

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I have designed commercial versions of both, and there's advantages and disadvantages to both.

 

First of all, not everybody prefers a 3 way to a 2 way. There are many very desireable 2 way boxes out there... Meyer UPA 1 and UPA 2 come to mind. Compact, articulate and... expensive.

 

A 2 way can be a smaller box and may have some advantages where size matters over SPL or low frequency response. For good directionality, a decently large horn and 1.5 or 2" driver can be used to allow lower x-ove point for the directional element.

 

A 3 way box can be either a good box made with good components and... well... expensive. Or, it can be a mediocre box, made with cheap componets and... cheap. It's easier to sell a cheap 3 way box than an expensive 2 way box to the average entry level sound dude or band. That's why they exist!

 

I prefer the sound of a really good 3 way box, but often the directionality will suffer as the horn is crossed over higher and the mid is less directional. This can be good or bad depending on application. That said, my working box is a 2 way line array box, and I achieve needed directionality by other means.

 

3 way boxes work best (generally) with 24dB/octave active crossovers... my preference is BW filter type to minimize the effects of "stuff" around the more narrow bandwidth of each passband.

 

All of the above considers subs as an additional part of the system.

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