Subwoofer Craze

[Skotty]

The other day I was looking around to see what kind of home stereo speakers there are. Oddly, I couldn't find any speaker sets that had large woofers (most had nothing over 6.5" tops). Some of them (maybe all, I don't remember) you could get separate subwoofers for.

So then I was thinking maybe I would just build my own when the time comes. A set of nice tweeters, midranges, and a couple of 8", 10", or 12" woofers, with some nice crossovers. I looked around at Crutchfield and what did I find? No woofers to be found. Only subwoofers. Where are the woofers?

Now originally, a subwoofer was a separate speaker for hitting the really low bass notes, and they were dual voice coil. Did they just rename regular woofers "subwoofers" because the name was popular? If not, where did all the woofers go?

 

[Safeway]

Subs! I don't think I was around when there weren't subwoofers. Do you know what you're talking about?

 

[NanoStuff]

I don't know what you mean. Woofers are very standard in just about every decent home sound system, but woofers alone aren't always enough.

 

[skace]

The accessibility of subwoofers allowed them to shrink the size of regular speakers? Just a guess, I don't really know. I want to know how my answer compares to people who actually know what they are talking about say.

 

[vi edit]

You can blame the home theater craze for that. A compact, high performing set of bookshelfs coupled with a quality sub will provide more than adequate range for most listeners. When you are setting up home theatres, sometimes you don't have room (or a spouse acceptance factor) to have a giant set of front speakers.

Just stick a small of bookshelves up front and tuck the subwoofer in the corner and blast away.

 

[Boonesmi]

Originally posted by: NanoStuff
I don't know what you mean. Woofers are very standard in just about every decent home sound system, but woofers alone aren't always enough.

lol, imo (or at least for me!!) woofers are ALWAYS more then enough

 

[Hyperlite]

uh....i'm pretty sure the term has always been subwoofer. 'subs' or 'woofer' were short terms. i would classify anything from 1/2" to 1-1/2" as a tweeter, 3" to 7" as a mid, and anything 8" and above as a woofer, or sub. That said, there are some very high end floorstanding applications that use 8" and larger woofers, along with several mids and tweeter(s).

 

[ebaycj]

http://www.sonystyle.com/is-bin/INTERSH...tegoryName=hav_HiFiComponents_Speakers

These have 8" woofers and actually sound very very nice for $100 (for the pair).

 

[Raduque]

Yes, you can still buy non-subwoofer woofers. I bought a pair of tower speakers at circuit city that have 8" woofers in them. What you were probably looking at was "HTiB" speaker sets. Those are usually designed for both space and aesthetic concerns, not audio concerns.

You're not going to be able to buy bare woofers through crutchfield, though. You'll have to go with a different store, like partsexpress. As far as I know, through CF you can only buy complete "speakers" through them.

Originally posted by: Hyperlite
uh....i'm pretty sure the term has always been subwoofer. 'subs' or 'woofer' were short terms. i would classify anything from 1/2" to 1-1/2" as a tweeter, 3" to 7" as a mid, and anything 8" and above as a woofer, or sub.

Woofers generally refer to drivers that play frequencies down to 60hz or so, "sub"woofers play frequencies below that.

 

[Skotty]

Originally posted by: NanoStuff
I don't know what you mean. Woofers are very standard in just about every decent home sound system, but woofers alone aren't always enough.

Go look at Crutchfield. They used to be the major source for stereo equipment (maybe they still are, I don't know). If you look at floor standing home entertainment speakers systems, they are all the thin and tall variety, with very small woofers. Then, if you look at car stereo to see what kind of stand-alone speakers there are, there is no category for woofers. Just subwoofers, and a generic speaker category that only has mid-range stuff and some 6x9s. That's what I'm taking about.

Car speakers usually use a different impedance than home stereo, but used to be you could buy pretty much any impedance speaker from the car speaker area of Crutchfield.

Are there other companies out there like Crutchfield that I should be looking at these days?

 

[Imported]

Originally posted by: Skotty

Originally posted by: NanoStuff
I don't know what you mean. Woofers are very standard in just about every decent home sound system, but woofers alone aren't always enough.

Go look at Crutchfield. They used to be the major source for stereo equipment (maybe they still are, I don't know). If you look at floor standing home entertainment speakers systems, they are all the thin and tall variety, with very small woofers. Then, if you look at car stereo to see what kind of stand-alone speakers there are, there is no category for woofers. Just subwoofers, and a generic speaker category that only has mid-range stuff and some 6x9s. That's what I'm taking about.

Car speakers usually use a different impedance than home stereo, but used to be you could buy pretty much any impedance speaker from the car speaker area of Crutchfield.

Are there other companies out there like Crutchfield that I should be looking at these days?

http://www.partsexpress.com/

 

[Adul]

http://www.partsexpress.com/

http://madisound.com/

http://www.e-speakers.com/


Try here perhaps

There are some woofers listed there
such ass this one
http://www.e-speakers.com/catalog/woofer_tiw_300_8_ohm_4700986.htm

 

[BD2003]

Originally posted by: ebaycj
http://www.sonystyle.com/is-bin/INTERSH...tegoryName=hav_HiFiComponents_Speakers

These have 8" woofers and actually sound very very nice for $100 (for the pair).

You could buy much better sounding speakers for $100 a pair...I had those, and thought they were crrrrrap.

 

[Skotty]

Thanks for the extra sites to look at. I'll check them out. Been awhile since I've done anything with audio.

 

[TheTony]

The subwoofer has become so popular because they are integral in most surround setups (5.1 or more).

 

[Adul]

speaking of subs anyone have a chance to listen to the new JL Audio subs? The Fathom F112 and F113? They are some incredible subs, need to save up for it

 

[Hyperlite]

Originally posted by: Raduque
Yes, you can still buy non-subwoofer woofers. I bought a pair of tower speakers at circuit city that have 8" woofers in them. What you were probably looking at was "HTiB" speaker sets. Those are usually designed for both space and aesthetic concerns, not audio concerns.

You're not going to be able to buy bare woofers through crutchfield, though. You'll have to go with a different store, like partsexpress. As far as I know, through CF you can only buy complete "speakers" through them.

Originally posted by: Hyperlite
uh....i'm pretty sure the term has always been subwoofer. 'subs' or 'woofer' were short terms. i would classify anything from 1/2" to 1-1/2" as a tweeter, 3" to 7" as a mid, and anything 8" and above as a woofer, or sub.

Woofers generally refer to drivers that play frequencies down to 60hz or so, "sub"woofers play frequencies below that.

ah, i see. forgive my relative adolescence.

 

[jdoggg12]

A subwoofer is a type of driver dedicated to the reproduction of bass frequencies, typically from about 20 Hz to perhaps 200 Hz in cone speakers, and in the case of a rotary woofer, all the way down to below 1 Hz. It is difficult for small loudspeakers in typical enclosures to reproduce frequencies below about 40-50 Hz, especially at high output levels (say, above 100 dB), as their cones must move farther than any practical driver construction can manage, and so it is often advantageous to use a loudspeaker specifically designed for handling low frequencies at high power levels.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Subwoofer

Subs provide a very specific range of sound, most use of the word subwoofer is incorrect. A woofer can provide frequencies down to the 20s Anything the provides ranges significanly higher than ~200hz is a woofer than can handle low frequencies like a sub.

No matter what their marketing team tells you, that 6" speaker is not a sub, and in 80% of circumstances that 8" speaker isn't either.

 

[Jinny]

Originally posted by: Adul
speaking of subs anyone have a chance to listen to the new JL Audio subs? The Fathom F112 and F113? They are some incredible subs, need to save up for it

they are like 2-3k each. $$$
I wonder if anyone tried to duplicate one yet.

JL 13" w7 (i realize they aren't exactly the same as the car sub version)
Massive Amp
Velodyne SMS for the room correction
and a sturdy sealed box.

 

[ElFenix]

i miss my old 2 speaker setup with 12" woofers in the cabinets. a proper woofer, a mid range, and a tweeter. awesome.

the term 'subwoofer' usually is applied to what is more properly called a 'bass module.' which is a home theatre item that allows for smaller floorstanding or bookshelf speakers. those smaller speakers are necessary for spouse approval.

i'm guessing they use the word 'subwoofer' because often the main speakers will have a mid-range 6" driver that is called a 'woofer.'

 

[Excelsior]

Originally posted by: Jinny

Originally posted by: Adul
speaking of subs anyone have a chance to listen to the new JL Audio subs? The Fathom F112 and F113? They are some incredible subs, need to save up for it

they are like 2-3k each. $$$
I wonder if anyone tried to duplicate one yet.

JL 13" w7 (i realize they aren't exactly the same as the car sub version)
Massive Amp
Velodyne SMS for the room correction
and a sturdy sealed box.

Yes.

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=818705

There are a couple other examples as well.

Fact is, while the Fathom's represent a high quality commercial product (especially compared with the other commercial subs that aren't worth a fraction of their MSRP) it is still overpriced.

Folks need to see the light, and start building. No need to spend so much when you can get equal performance for much less, or much more performance for the same $$$.

 

[theprodigalrebel]

I like how powered subwoofers can put out a great amount of bass even at lower volumes (for night-time listening). Now I have very limited experience with quality home audio setups but with most full-range speakers (with large drivers) I've heard, the bass doesn't seem to kick in until you really pump up the volume.

 

[Nutdotnet]

Nowadays I think the term "woofer" has really gone by the way side.

Typically speakers are coming in three varieties. The tweeter, the mid, and the subwoofer.

As long as you purchase quality components that give you the frequency range that you're after then I think you'll be in business.

Would you go with sealed enclosures for your home application? I see accomplishing this in one of two ways. One, you build some floor-standing enclosures that include all three drivers, or two, you build two bookshelf speakers and one separate subwoofer enclosure.

Which one are you leaning towards, the floor-standing setup?

 

[Excelsior]

Thats really incorrect. In the driver world there is still very much a tweeter, midrange, mid-woofer, woofer, subwoofer. Each has their place...

 

[dennilfloss]

Check the chart below.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Woofer