2-way speaker with best bass

The problem of bass is that it requires a large driver and a large box. The
problem with midrange is that you need a small driver to produce this
properly - that is without "beaming". You can get prodigious bass
by adding ports to a small woofer but it won't be musical - mostly one note
bass. To get decent bass you need critical damping. To get decent mids you
need proper dispersion (not beaming) and a dome tweeter would be good for
dispersion but it can't handle the excursion necessary to crossover low
enough to a big woofer.

This is all physics.

Given the constraints - there are several ways to go about it.

1) A large driver with a whizzer cone - the draw back is distortion and a
bumpy frequency response in the mids.
2) A small but very powerful woofer (6 inch) in a sealed box with a large
phase plug or dome to control dispersion better in the mids. (You still won't
get much bass but mids will be better and what bass you get will at least be
accurate)
3) A large driver for bass and with a single horn for mid and tweeter. This
allows you to
crossover low down so you can avoid beaming from a big woofer. You get
good bass and great mids with a gentle roll off in the highs. All round pretty
good except you now have your crossover in a rather critical range (700 to
900 Hz)

Thats pretty much all folks - only so many ways to skin a cat. You can play
with TL and bass extended ported designs until the cows come home but
IMHO you will never get the "best" bass response that way.
Although to many people "best" may simply mean "prodigious" - in which
case anything is possible.

Eldartford - good point - reasonable SPLs in the bass means large woofers -
large woofers are ill suited to producing midrange - this is why a two way
system ends up as a near-field or life style type trade off. They are the most
common speaker on the planet because they are the "minimum"
necessary to get 60 to 12 Khz in a flat response. Since the 80's two ways
have been delivering ever more prodigious bass but this is at the expense of
quality bass and a quality midrange - it has all become boom boom tizz,
IMHO. And, as a consequence, no wonder some people are enamored by the
midrange magic of single driver speakers!

If one is to ignore home lifestyle and other domestic considerations and go all
out for just quality sound then one is forced to consider three way or four
way (three way + sub) designs, IMHO. However, there is no doubt that a two-
way seems likely to remain the most popular speaker on the planet - so the
question on this thread is an interesting one!

Those who suggest that simply adding a sub will fix the bass issues of a two
way are forgetting that this is NOT true for the majority of ported bass
extended two way designs - if you go this route then you ideally want a
sealed box two way speaker that rolls off at 80 HZ and has its design goal on
the midrange quality rather than shock and awe ( a design that is NOT bass
extended with all the inherent phase & distortion issues and the typical mid
bass bump up to give "impression" of deep bass).

Tobias,

Agreed. Firstly let me say this is an awesome speaker. You are talking prodigious bass in a two way. Extremely impressive. However, do you not notice the "hole" in the midrange - especially around 1 to 3 Khz? For sure this kicks butt in the bass but I am sure you'll agree there has been a trade off to achieve this (mostly unavoidable due to physics).

Pubul57,

Yes I was. I must admit that when it comes to the Merlin VSM though and I
did take a look today - they are exceptionally good - great example of
getting everything right in a two-way - you and Tobias picked out a real
winner there! About as good as can be physically achieved in a two way
design - probably the only limitation will be how loud they can play (you can't
have it all but I am sure these are more than enough for most domestic
environments)

So what is the trick - smallish woofer (less beaming) and I think the key is
the tweeter - he gets it down to 2.2 Khz with the crossover - that is hard
work for a tweeter - this probably requires something out of the ordinary
with the tweet. This means you get about as beautiful an off axis response as
you ever see (I looked up the the Stereophile review of the VSM Millenium). A
keeper for sure. Actually the Meadowlark is good too - both designs are
pushing the envelope of what two-ways can achieve.

This article may be relevant(I actually posted it on a subwoofer thread too) - it is all about trade-offs and what do you call "better" - is "better" more accuracy (good transients) or is it just copious bass (wow that thing makes lots of bass at LF).

"There thus evolved two camps of woofer design: those with strong magnets, having better transient accuracy but worse LF response, and those with weaker magnets having good LF response but poor transient response. However, the poor transient response of a sealed box with a woofer having a weak magnet pales into insignificance alongside the
wholesale demolition of the waveform that takes place
in reflex, bandpass and transmission line speakers."

If you'd like to hear for yourself how Pat McGinty managed his tradeoff in the Shearwater design, you're welcome. Drop me a line if you come to Montreal.

Thanks! I'm not heading that way anytime soon but I appreciate the offer.