Speaker size v. Tone: I don't hear any correlation

[Let It Fall]

Or the guy who thinks he can make smart a$$ comments about people he knows nothing about and their motivations behind their posting here.

Paul

post ignored

reason: Canadian




I keeed I keeed

 

[KJung]

This thread is finally starting to deliver

 

[Crabby]

I wanted to chime in just to add that 20 years ago or more, the choices available for bass players were so much more limited that certain speaker cabinets with certain size drivers in them became the "standard of the industry" and bass players came to associate many of these cabinet's inherent tone with their driver size. For instance, a Mesa 215 cab had a recognizable tone, or an Ampeg 810, or a Hartke 410 which was one of the first 410 cabs to become popular. There were nowhere as many choices in a particular speaker configuration so the most popular brand or model for each configuration became the standard.

If you line up Peavey 215, an Ampeg 810 and an Eden 212 cab, of course you are going to hear a difference and it would make sense to generalize the tone characteristics of each cab based on the size of drivers in them if you didn't factor in anything else. Of course you would be wrong as the differences in the cabinets themselves, tuning, porting, driver specs, etc are what set them apart from each other rather then what size speaker is installed. But back in the day these generalizations became ingrained into many a bass player's head and are obviously still alive and well today.

As mentioned repeatedly in this thread, there are modern 115 cabs that are tight and punchy and 410 cabs that are boomy and dark. There are so many choices for bass cabinets on the market that the last thing a buyer should be concerned with is the size of the driver(s) in the cabinets. Focus on the tone you want, the level of portability you require and your budget and speaker size will never be an issue!

 

[michaelgilleran]

Wait, so resonance has nothing to do with tone???

I find that really hard to believe. Not that I dont trust you, but as a classical wind player at heart, Its been beat into my head that resonance IS tone. So if someone could educate me...

 

[billfitzmaurice]

Wait, so resonance has nothing to do with tone???
.

In an instrument resonance has very much to do with tone. In a speaker it's a sign of a poor product.

 

[Munjibunga]

Cripe. I hate 15s for no reason.

 

[Munjibunga]

It does, and I kid you not. The material the cab is made of and the construction techniques used can give results just as divergent as a basswood body bolt-on with passive single coils versus a walnut body neck-through with active buckers.

Bill, Bill, Bill. The wood issue has been discussed incessantly here, and everyone knows the wood has nothing to do with the tone of a bass. Now you're telling us wood makes a difference in cabs?

 

[groooooove]

if you stand 20 feet away from your cab, you'll hear more of a correlation between sizes. IMO this is why 12" speakers are ideal.. i agree that 10" speakers have punch, but the sound disappears if you step outside of the cabinets immediate area. 12" speakers tend to have more throw, and 15" speakers (and larger) have even more throw, but can get too "slow" or bottom heavy, and 12" tends to have huge low end.

of course, with cheaper cabs these things are irrelevant since crappy 10" speaker vs crappy 15" speaker, its still a crappy sound, and all that sort of thing.

 

[rpsands]

if you stand 20 feet away from your cab, you'll hear more of a correlation between sizes. IMO this is why 12" speakers are ideal.. i agree that 10" speakers have punch, but the sound disappears if you step outside of the cabinets immediate area. 12" speakers tend to have more throw, and 15" speakers (and larger) have even more throw, but can get too "slow" or bottom heavy, and 12" tends to have huge low end.

Throw is a complete and utter myth. Decibels are decibels. They decrease with the square of distance. There is no shooting sound out into the room. Tis nonsense perpetrated by people not understanding phenomena, on par with believing Zeus causes hurricanes.

Near field sound is not a myth, but it's more that when you're standing right next to a box you don't notice dispersion patterns as much. So yeah different cabinets sound different depending on how far away you stand, but it's purely due to the vertical and horizontal dispersion patterns.

 

[ehque]

pretty much the more matching drivers the better , a 8x10 cabinet is just a line array of 10" speakers when you arrange a line of tightly grouped matching drivers. they all start to interact and produce a strong focused beam of sound. Since low frequencys are considered mono and non directional, the 8x10 in theory will not waste power filling the room with sound, but project it in a narrow beam towards your audience , instead of wasting power and shooting it all around. frequencys below 500hz are very non directional and eat up lots of power to go nowhere quickly. the line array will conserve power and shoot sound straight out into your audiences chest. same reason the marshall full stack is unchanged for 50 years its a line array of matching speakers . same reason large hanging line arrays are at every major concert event they don't waste power to fill the air, they shoot it straight towards the paying customers.

Yes indeed you are correct, but i never said anything about horizontal or vertical dispersion, i was just making the point that the idea is to conserve power and direct sound towards the listeners, and not the side walls or ceiling. yes indeed you can control the vertical or horizontal depending on how you lay the array. and the main point again just like the wiki said is to direct sound were its is important rather than waste power sending it to a wall or over the heads of the audience. It is very expensive to power a concert, and a promoter doesnt want to waste power or have spots were sound drops out. with older systems they discovered literally thousands of watts of sound pressure was just hitting the ceiling and people in the rear don't hear the concert as well. so in order to have the further seats hear they have to buy more power. same problem still it all gets lost to the ceiling.so the line array saved this problem and most line arrays are not stacked they hang and are assembled in a curve to shot sound straight out and downward. the curve will acheive multible angles to get the front of the audience all the way to the back of the audience. and no need to pay for racks of power hungry amps that nobody hears.

Dude, do you have any idea what you are talking about?

 

[Jazzdogg]

My wife has this same phenomenon but with low frequencies. Makes me laugh that she married a bass player

You probably like stuff loud enough that the fletcher-munson curves don't make the bass too quiet

Right you are!

I need enough midrange to hear the details clearly, but if there's too much HF, I feel physical pain; I can't listen to slapping or other percussive bass with a lot of treble content, or stand too close to the drummer - and "sizzler" cymbals make me lightheaded if I stand too close! Guess I'm an Odd duck.

 

[Jazzdogg]

this thread was good until people who haven't read a thing in it started commenting. not that i'm against any of the cabs they're talking about, but geez, read the freaking thread, people!

You know how it is, Jimmy; the only exercise some folks get is from jumping to conclusions.

 

[Jazzdogg]

I wanted to chime in just to add that 20 years ago or more, the choices available for bass players were so much more limited that certain speaker cabinets with certain size drivers in them became the "standard of the industry" and bass players came to associate many of these cabinet's inherent tone with their driver size. For instance, a Mesa 215 cab had a recognizable tone, or an Ampeg 810, or a Hartke 410 which was one of the first 410 cabs to become popular. There were nowhere as many choices in a particular speaker configuration so the most popular brand or model for each configuration became the standard.

If you line up Peavey 215, an Ampeg 810 and an Eden 212 cab, of course you are going to hear a difference and it would make sense to generalize the tone characteristics of each cab based on the size of drivers in them if you didn't factor in anything else. Of course you would be wrong as the differences in the cabinets themselves, tuning, porting, driver specs, etc are what set them apart from each other rather then what size speaker is installed. But back in the day these generalizations became ingrained into many a bass player's head and are obviously still alive and well today.

As mentioned repeatedly in this thread, there are modern 115 cabs that are tight and punchy and 410 cabs that are boomy and dark. There are so many choices for bass cabinets on the market that the last thing a buyer should be concerned with is the size of the driver(s) in the cabinets. Focus on the tone you want, the level of portability you require and your budget and speaker size will never be an issue!

Great post!

Too bad there have been so many posts by folks who formed impressions without benefit of facts. Why expend the effort necessary to obtain an education when unsubstantiated opinions are as close as the tip of the tongue?

 

[Jazzdogg]

Throw is a complete and utter myth. Decibels are decibels. They decrease with the square of distance. There is no shooting sound out into the room. Tis nonsense perpetrated by people not understanding phenomena, on par with believing Zeus causes hurricanes.

Near field sound is not a myth, but it's more that when you're standing right next to a box you don't notice dispersion patterns as much. So yeah different cabinets sound different depending on how far away you stand, but it's purely due to the vertical and horizontal dispersion patterns.

Preach it, my brother!

 

[klaus486]

I believe you have to hear any given cab in context. If you are a bedroom wanker buy what sounds best in that environment. If you gig get some long cables or a wireless. Get out in the room & hear your band. I remember my SWR Sm-400 with 2 Eden d210t cabs stacked vertically being totally schooled by a friends Peavy Combo 300 & 1x15 cab set one to each side of the drummer when I played a party & we used their gear. As in I could actually hear & feel my Modulus Q5 for the first time! In that room on that day with that particular alignment of the astrological signs & that particular.....


PLEAS PLEASE PLEASE!!!! Don't get me started about the time my amp blew & I had to play through the PA + monitors...... = best gig tone ever! So......... total absence of a speaker cab is the best sounding cab!

 

[Brad Johnson]

That might hinge on how good the PA is.

 

[R Baer]

From what I've gathered there are lots of reasons for the "speaker size tone myth."...

IMO, a lot of these myths came about many years back when speaker technology was nowhere near what it is today. Back in the 70's, big 15" and 18" drivers were usually placed in big cabinets and gained the reputation of sounding "Deep, low and slow". Smaller speakers tended to be placed in smaller cabinets and sounded punchier with less low end, which everyone attributed to the smaller speakers being "quicker".

Todays drivers and cabinet designs have left all that far behind.

 

[rpsands]

IMO, a lot of these myths came about many years back when speaker technology was nowhere near what it is today. Back in the 70's big drivers were usually in big cabinets and gained the reputation of sounding "Deep, low and slow". Smaller speakers tended to be in smaller cabinets and sounded punchier with less low end, which everyone attributed to the smaller speakers being "quicker".

Todays drivers and cabinet designs have left all that far behind.

I think the #1 reason behind the "15's are slow" myth is people putting 15" woofers in boxes that are way too small. A lot of those old 15's needed 6 cubic feet to be happy and got closer to 2-3 feet.

 

[billfitzmaurice]

Dude, do you have any idea what you are talking about?

He does, but brevity is not an attribute shown in his posts.

Bill, Bill, Bill. The wood issue has been discussed incessantly here, and everyone knows the wood has nothing to do with the tone of a bass.

That must be in the instrument section, where I never venture. But anyone who believes that wood has nothing to do with tone probably also believes that the driver size does.

I think the #1 reason behind the "15's are slow" myth is people putting 15" woofers in boxes that are way too small.

IMO the #1 reason is not having the slightest idea how speakers work. For the layman that's understandable. For the professional who uses speakers to earn his living it's unfathomable. But the sad fact is that when it comes to understanding how the tools of their trade actually work most players haven't a clue.

 

[dvh]

But the sad fact is that when it comes to understanding how the tools of their trade actually work most players haven't a clue.

I use Photoshop to pursue my other sometimes paying avocation... It does what I need and want it to. I don't need to understand how it works...