Full Range Drivers

For anyone who is desirous of that coherence thing, I can recommend the horns I use. They are, of course, very efficient and they are utterly seamless throughout a very broad operating range. They are quite directional with only a 40 degree dispersion pattern, you need a woofer, and you need to sit back 12 feet or more. Because they are very directional, room treatments are less necessary. My room is 15 by 22 and they work well but I always have a sense that they would be even better in a larger space. Oh, and did I mention, they are extremely dynamic and effortless sounding?

Magfan. I read that article (head ache). That was enlightening to say the least. I was particularly interested in the comments about the Fostex FF225K driver, which is the driver Eric Alexander from Tekton Design chose to use in his Kat's Meow speaker. In the aricle, Nelson Pass said it reminds him of the JBL LE8 and if implimented with a tweeter above 5k you'll really have something. It's funny because that's what Eric Alexander found worked out best with the Kat's Meow and added a Fostex bullet tweeter in a separate enclosure on top.

I agree with Darkmoebius that I should find some to listen to.

Tannoy does not use a full range driver. And performance for full ranges is as varable as any other transducer type.

Donjr, almost any true fullrange "single driver" system is going to need a supertweeter and subwoofer(s), making it a 3-way system, in reality.

But, some have done a great job to moving the crossover between highs and lows way beyond the entire midrange frequencies.

A great starter system for a real taste of true fullrange glory is the $650 Hammer Dynamics Super-12 kit. It uses a professional 12" widerange driver to cover everything up to ~8-10kHz where it crosses over to a coaxially-mounted supertweeter.

This speaker does bass in a BIG way, along with all the benefits of other single drivers. A 12" driver has it's own benefits compared to smaller ones. There are a ton of upgrades that can be done to the speaker, like a better tweeter and crossover mods.

The kit is easily built by anyone with a table saw or circular saw and a few other simple tools. It can be made in a few hours from three or four 4'x8' pieces of plywood/mdf, if you are the least bit handy.

There are a few magazine reviews of the Super-12 on their website.

Darkmoebius, I would be able to handle the wood working skills no problem. My father gave me a beautiful Jet table saw with a Biesemeyer fence, an amazing plunge router with a more amazing router table that I can't remember the make of. It's all a matter of getting my a$$ out of the listening chair. I didn't want to go this route out of pure laziness, but a 12" driver holds my interest like a beach in Brazil. I'll look into the Hammer kit. If I lose a digit or two along the way, I can always press the shuffle button with my nose.