Thank you, Ivan. Great points you've made in this thread, by the way...
@inna "Though every element and the interaction of them is important, my
understanding is that drivers are the single most important element. I
don't want to pay thousands for nice finish, give me great drivers
first, nice finish can be optional for those...whatever you want to call
them."
You have a most reasonable position. Few people think about crossovers, and that actually drove my point.
In fact, these elements divide and feed the signal to the drivers. Not that it's my rallying cry, but it's a bit like the source is the most important element in the chain. The drivers can only produce what gets fed to them. The crossover determines that. Because these components live inside the box, and don't have the visual impact of the cabinetry / aesthetics or the drivers, we presume the builder has that part of the loudspeaker equation nailed down. Seeing more familiar, high-quality, or exotic components (wire, resistors, capacitors, coils) further puts our minds at ease.
In reality, high-level parts quality actually provides little indication the designer has any handle on crossover theory. It's really something few people understand, and that's why I suggested folks take just half the time spent on their cabinets and learn it.
Anecdote: A friend builds a line loudspeakers that always sounded "distinct" to me. Initially, I wondered if that reflected the midrange driver. After building my own speakers with that part, and hearing other products that used this driver through its growing popularity, that characteristic at all. Over the years, the iterations of his speakers piled up. One day, for whatever reason, he showed me the schematic of a crossover. I felt happy to see it featured a simple design, but my eye immediately fell to a part that looked off by a factor of 10. I began to discuss it with him, and despite his background as an engineer, instantly saw his discomfort with the subject. He told me he had no idea about the different topologies. A mutual friend (a technician, not an engineer) gave him those values way back, he'd employed them in every speaker he built, and would never mess with them. Even as I let him know somehow the decimal point must have got moved over one place, and that he should simply (how much effort and cost would it cost him?) listen to a pair with my suggested value, he wanted no parts of it. But in fact, that perfectly explained the signature sound of his products.
Unfortunately, most of the folks who build loudspeakers I've met have nothing close to his acumen with mathematics, engineering, and the like. That's not to say people don't exist who can explain the what, why, and how of their crossover. But as the hobby has shifted to a more mom and pop type of business, a quick conversation with most people makes it clear cabinets and drivers get the lion's share of attention
