From this it sounds like you already have more than one 2x10. If so, have you tried using them together in a vertical stack?
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Mixed cabs, double dog dare me
- Thread starter madjazzbass
- Start date
My bedroom cab is a barefaced one10. At these volume levels (turn it up until the glasses in the kitchen cupboard rattle, then turn down a notch) I could not ask for more, total sonic bliss.
The thing that is frowned upon here on talkbass is the classical 410/115 combination.
A maxed out 500W head would pump 62,5W in each 10" speaker while pumping the whole 250W into the 15".
The result often is a 15" speaker beyond its limit mixed with 10" speakers that barely are breaking a sweat.
Anyone claiming that the bigger speaker delivers the lows is invited to put those speakers side by side and connect only one, max out the bass and hear for himself.
There are lots of combinations that work great, as long as the mismatch between the power handling of the cabs and the difference in SPL is not too big. If you happen to have several cabs sitting around, feel free to experiment.
The safe route is to find a cab where you like the sound and then buy as many of this cab as you need to be loud enough.
The thing that is frowned upon here on talkbass is the classical 410/115 combination.
A maxed out 500W head would pump 62,5W in each 10" speaker while pumping the whole 250W into the 15".
The result often is a 15" speaker beyond its limit mixed with 10" speakers that barely are breaking a sweat.
Anyone claiming that the bigger speaker delivers the lows is invited to put those speakers side by side and connect only one, max out the bass and hear for himself.
There are lots of combinations that work great, as long as the mismatch between the power handling of the cabs and the difference in SPL is not too big. If you happen to have several cabs sitting around, feel free to experiment.
The safe route is to find a cab where you like the sound and then buy as many of this cab as you need to be loud enough.
If you had a 2 ohm stable amp you could do a 4 ohm 2x10 and an 8 ohm 15 and every speaker would get 4 ohms thus the same amount of power right?
If someone wants to add a second cab, the questions to ask are:
Do I want more output than my one cab is capable of delivering? or Do I want different tone than my one cab is capable of delivering?
Mixing cabs is a crapshoot. You can waste time and money chasing a moving target. If you want different tone, get a different cab. Then, if you feel you need more output, get another one of the same.
Do I want more output than my one cab is capable of delivering? or Do I want different tone than my one cab is capable of delivering?
Mixing cabs is a crapshoot. You can waste time and money chasing a moving target. If you want different tone, get a different cab. Then, if you feel you need more output, get another one of the same.
buldog5151bass
Kibble, milkbones, and P Basses. And redheads.
The best system I ever owned was a Trace Elliot rig with a 210 and 115. Of course, it weighed over 150 pounds.
Ah, the 1980s...
Ric5
Inactive
- Jan 29, 2008
- 29,772
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- I like 5, 8, 10, and 12 string basses
You can mix cabs sometimes ...
Both cabs should be about the same size and both should be 8 ohms
- Feb 12, 2006
- 60,970
- 5
- 220,701
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- Development Engineer-Mesa Boogie, Development Engineer-Genzler (pedals), Product Support-Genz Benz
All Subway cabinets, some of the PowerHouse cabinets.
- Feb 12, 2006
- 60,970
- 5
- 220,701
- Disclosures
- Development Engineer-Mesa Boogie, Development Engineer-Genzler (pedals), Product Support-Genz Benz
Why chase power distribution between mixed speakers, with out understanding how they pair up in the first place? Wrong thing to concentrate on when there are more important factors, namely how does the everything sound.
YMMV.
Listen to da man on this!
There are others, no doubt, but the Mesa Subway cabs are a good demonstration of that point. I've used a 12 cab with a 15, and tonight I'm gonna use a 2-10 with a 15. The Subway cabs play nice together, in any combination. That's one of many things I like about 'em.
That said there's good sense in the conventional advice to avoid mixing driver sizes. When that _crucial_ design work hasn't been done, it's a crapshoot whether any particular combination will sound good or sound poopie. And the odds (speaking of _crap_shoot), IME, tend to favor it sounding like poopie.
At one point I my "career" as a bass guitarist (very early 90's, IIRC), I had two 18 cabs and two 4 x 10 cabs, 1600 Watts of power (800 high/ 800low) with a crossover to put the deep stuff into the 18s, midbass on up through the 4 x 10s.
It was a pretty darn good setup, especially against to guitarist with 100 Watt Mesa and Marshall 4 x 12 rigs!
And that was just for playing clubs with out any FOH (and even a few that did)!
Goodness, were we really THAT loud back then?
Now, I'm just happy with my 810, although the single 15 cab (or pair maybe) for a second channel is very appealing!
As I've always said, whatever works/sounds good to you, IS good!
It was a pretty darn good setup, especially against to guitarist with 100 Watt Mesa and Marshall 4 x 12 rigs!
And that was just for playing clubs with out any FOH (and even a few that did)!
Goodness, were we really THAT loud back then?
Now, I'm just happy with my 810, although the single 15 cab (or pair maybe) for a second channel is very appealing!
As I've always said, whatever works/sounds good to you, IS good!
- Feb 12, 2006
- 60,970
- 5
- 220,701
- Disclosures
- Development Engineer-Mesa Boogie, Development Engineer-Genzler (pedals), Product Support-Genz Benz
Right, how does it sound?
In properly designed speaker families, sensitivity, power distribution, phase response, voicing and polar patterns have all been taken into account.
When done properly, it opens up additional possibilities that bay not be practically possible with a single driver model.
buldog5151bass
Kibble, milkbones, and P Basses. And redheads.
Try the search engine. This is explained ad nauseum. No one is saying it CANNOT work, what is said is that the best chance of getting a good outcome is to use two matching cabinets.
You've been sold a bill of goods that all 15" speakers are good for bass and all 10" speakers are good for mids.
Playing in a room.
That's what I do all the time.
I have two 1x12 cabs. I almost never use the second cab because it doesn't add anything tonally except volume. Often using two will mess up the tone I got with one.
I alternately play four basses in that room. And they are all tonally different and it can't be fixed with fingers.
I was thinking of getting or adding a 15" to get better lows and tone. Until I realized it's not the amp/cabs...it's the room acoustics and the strings I use and the type of bass as well as several other factors.
!2's should be able to cover the sound spectrum. Personally I wouldn't use a single 10 but having never tried a 4x10 cab I can't comment on that.
Which is why I bought an Empress Para EQ a while back. Fantastic little EQ. You can pinpoint and take out undesirable tones or add/boost ones you like. It is way ahead of a slider generic EQ like the Boss GBE-7 which I also have.
This combined with a ton of time moving the single 12 around to different places in the room plus trying different elevations of the cab (and believe me the placement and certain elevation makes a huge difference) until I found sonically what I was looking for.
For me I don't like a ton of volume in a smaller room space. I prefer quality over quantity.
Just automatically adding a 15 to your 2x10's might not necessarily get you where you want to go. There's way more to it than that.
That's what I do all the time.
I have two 1x12 cabs. I almost never use the second cab because it doesn't add anything tonally except volume. Often using two will mess up the tone I got with one.
I alternately play four basses in that room. And they are all tonally different and it can't be fixed with fingers.
I was thinking of getting or adding a 15" to get better lows and tone. Until I realized it's not the amp/cabs...it's the room acoustics and the strings I use and the type of bass as well as several other factors.
!2's should be able to cover the sound spectrum. Personally I wouldn't use a single 10 but having never tried a 4x10 cab I can't comment on that.
Which is why I bought an Empress Para EQ a while back. Fantastic little EQ. You can pinpoint and take out undesirable tones or add/boost ones you like. It is way ahead of a slider generic EQ like the Boss GBE-7 which I also have.
This combined with a ton of time moving the single 12 around to different places in the room plus trying different elevations of the cab (and believe me the placement and certain elevation makes a huge difference) until I found sonically what I was looking for.
For me I don't like a ton of volume in a smaller room space. I prefer quality over quantity.
Just automatically adding a 15 to your 2x10's might not necessarily get you where you want to go. There's way more to it than that.
Sounds like you are having a lot of fun. My bedroom/practice amp is an old (USA) HARTKE kickback 10. I gig with a 300 watts and a single 15. I went through a period of using multi size drivers and cabs. I use to bi-amp a QSC-USA 800 and Alembic F1-X into a Hartke 115XL on the bottom and a 4.5Xl (4x10) on the top. I thought it sounded great and it looked killer until one day I bridged the poweramp and ran it full range into the 4.5XL. It sounded better and only 1/2 as much hassle to move around and setup.
Finally, an explanation ^ that makes sense.
