Speaker design myths revealed

I'm not an expert on speaker design, but I can assure you of one thing - several of these questions and answers would certainly disinterest me in this man's designs.

For the life of me I can't even imagine an infinitely large baffle - for a home system thats comparable to saying a wall mount speaker is ideal. The next two questions are as interesting - which wall is the rear wall - in my experience the rear wall is the wall behind the listener. A couple of feet from the front wall is going to make a materiel difference in minimizing the time delay etc - where in a phone booth?

And, lastly, he can't see any reason why his speaker placed next to a wall would ruin a stereo image - his site has dynamic drivers, do the have no off axis dispersion - perhaps only a narrow beam of sound and there is no first reflections to degrade the signal?

But as I said I know nothing about speaker design so YMMV.

I also know very little, but:

1. I think he's making the argument that sound can diffract off the edges of baffles. Some manufacturers address this issue by rounding the edges of the baffles or the shapes of the cabinets in various ways. Jordan seems to recommend using a larger baffle instead to decrease such diffraction, but it really does come across as though he's advocating in-wall speakers. The flip side, of course, is that many folks seem to report better results (less "boxy" sound) with narrower baffles.

2. It's a bit ambiguous, but I believe that "rear wall" refers to the wall behind the speakers, as he refers the advantages of larger baffles. In essence, I think he's saying that backing the speakers up against the wall makes the wall behind the speakers act almost as a large extension of the speakers' baffle, especially because at least one of his designs is very shallow.

3. As this question follows the previous one, I believe that he's saying that having the speakers backed up against the (what would be front to us) wall isn't detrimental to stereo imaging, not having the side of the speaker against the side wall.

Young-Ho

Thanks for providing a link ; )

1) Larger baffles increase bass response, which is what he's after with this specific design. There are trade-off's associated with increased baffle dimensions though, but he's obviously willing to take them in order to get what he's after for use with that driver.

2) Placing the speaker cabinet closer to the wall increases bass response, which is what he's after. Like the above response, there are trade-off's involved, but he's willing to deal with them in order to get what he's after for use with that driver.

3) Placing the speaker cabinet nearer a side wall will increase bass response, which is what he's after. Like the above two responses, there are trade-off's involved, but he's willing to deal with them in order to get what he's after for use with that driver.

Have you noticed any specific similarities? Figure it out. It is a small driver that he's trying to use full range. As such, it is going to be deficient in bass response. On top of that, due to the size of the driver, it will become beamier as frequency rises. As such, the problem with sidewall reflections will be somewhat reduced as compared to designs using a tweeter or smaller midrange drivers.

With all of that in mind, I read that Nelson Pass really liked the Jordan drivers. This tells me that it obviously has some very alluring qualities to it. Whether or not it is truly suitable as a full range driver with no auxillary support above or below the midband is up to the end user. Sean
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Now Listening to: Jazz At the Pawnshop 2 / Redbook CD

While the Jordan driver is not high-sensitivity like many single-driver systems, it has many of the pros and cons of these kinds of systems.

The Jordan driver was awarded best sound in at least one national "DIY speaker" competition, and has gotten some follwers for its sound quality.

Cdc, I am currently in the process of putting together an "open baffle" design. If you are interested, I will let you know my impressions when the drivers are broken in.