2 way vs 3 way vs 4 way?

jlfernandes

what is the difference between a 2 way speaker and 3 way speaker. I was under the impression a 2 way speaker has a tweeter and woofer. and a 3 way has a tweeter, mid, and woofer. is this correct. if not please correct me.
--thanks--

jdhdiggs

My Maggies have a 3-way setup and it is labeled that way.

mldennison

that is the way i have always understood it:
2 different drivers - 2 way
3 different drivers - 3 way

McLoki

It is really a function of the crossover rather than the number of drivers in the speaker.

If the crossover breaks the signal into 2 parts, it is a 2 way speaker. If the crossover breaks the signal into 3 parts, it is a 3 way speaker.

In a three way design they could send the signal to a tweeter, 2 mid-woofers, and 3 woofers if they wanted to.

For example, the RTi12 is a 3 way speaker design with 6 actual speakers in it. (Tweeter gets highs, 2 mid-drivers get mids, 3 woofers get bass. - each speaker in the same group gets the same signal though)

Michael

Ricardo

JL, I guess your question comes from your other thread...

Many Polk speakers have a passive radiator that can be confused with a driver; they have a tweeter, a mid and a passive, but they are still 2 way; I don't know of any way to find out without pulling the big "driver" to see if there are any wires attached to it.

Edit: I saw the pics you posted in the other thread; thiose are 2 way with two mid drivers.

Edit 2: Here I go again....saw that those are not your pics :rolleyes: H9 explains below

heiney9

jlfernandes wrote:

what is the difference between a 2 way speaker and 3 way speaker. I was under the impression a 2 way speaker has a tweeter and woofer. and a 3 way has a tweeter, mid, and woofer. is this correct. if not please correct me.
--thanks--

The Monitor 7's you have are a two-way design because of the x-over, not the # of drivers. The bottom driver (woofer as you call it) is not an active driver. It's called a Passive Radiator (PR) and it's movement is coupled sympatheically to the mid-bass driver directly above it. A PR is tuned to a certain frequency by adding and subtracting mass to the radiating surface.

Here's a good analysis:

In speaker design a passive radiator is an element that is designed to move sympathetically with the energy in the cabinet. They generally resemble a low frequency driver or woofer, but have no voice coil or any element to actively generate sound. Often they are employed in speakers instead of a port to create a bass reflex type of design. The extra mass of the passive radiator actually lowers the resonant frequency thereby allowing smaller cabinets to reproduce lower frequencies than they would otherwise be capable of. However this extra mass also causes the radiator's movement to be hard to dampen, which in turn can lead to bass hangover and a more "boomy" sound.


I don't nec agree with the last sentence, but there is some truth to it. Running your Carvers, you won't have/notice this possible effect. Polk does very well with their PR designed speakers. I actually prefer their PR to a port.

There are some speakers that are considered 2 1/2 way because there maybe two exact drivers that are crossed over at slightly different frequencies, in addition to the tweeter.

H9

unc2701

mldennison wrote:

that is the way i have always understood it:
2 different drivers - 2 way
3 different drivers - 3 way

Not exactly- it has to do with the number of crossover points. For example, the klipsch RF35 has 3 drivers, but is only a 2 way design- both the woofers play the same thing.

Polk is a little weird- they have "cascading arrays"- Traditionally, each speaker plays a specific range, or you might have two speakers playing the same range, but with the cascading array, some speakers partially overlap (beyond what happens with the, say, 12db per octave rolloff created by the crossover).


edit: whoa. everybody post together now...

jlfernandes

Wow, thanks alot for the info!! :-)

zombie boy 2000

you know, it's funny...
i was all-over the internet yesterday afternoon trying to find info on this very same question... and returned with zilch, nada
(thanks for a big honkin' plateful of nothing Jeeves:D )
first and foremost, thanks jlfernandes for asking this question and providing many on this forum an opportunity to shed some light on this matter --
Welcome to the Forum chap:)
and thanks to all who replied with such informative responses-- for all the bitchin' and/or moanin' about flaming newbies, you'll see fernandes that more often than not, these guys will come through in the clutch

heiney9

I know it's funny how hard it can be to find things on the internet. I've done much research over the years and always bookmark site/articles, etc. It's not as easy as it seems getting really good reliable info. It takes work and time.

Here is a link I use a lot for terminology, etc. It works well because it's not too over-the-top for those unfamiliar and it's not too vague for those like me who know a bit about audio/electronics, etc. This is where I got the PR definition I posted. This is one of literally hundreds of sites I visit to get my learn on.

http://www.sweetwater.com/expert-center/glossary/

H9

zombie boy 2000

Thanks for the read H9!!
should be really informative

starchaser

Good question jlf!... and good answers.

Awesome link H9, thx. for helping us get our learn on.

t