10" vs 12"

[saad]

Guys

As part of the whole downsize, Im thinking of shifting to a JL W3 10" instead of my 12".

Will I miss my 12"? I usually have the sub volume less than half way on the head unit, so Im not too worried about SPL, and I dont listen to much hip hop, but a lot of house, prog, some RnB, and some classical and jazz too.

Thoughts?

saad

 

[zcspec]

IMHO, the 10" sub would statisfy your taste of music best. 12"s tend to be very boomy, great for hip hop, rap, etc where you dont really care about SQ. RNB, classical, jazz, etc tends to have more clarity in the use of bass. You'll also notice that a 10" will hit "cleaner" with more detail.

 

[james.bigouette]

exactly what he said.

 

[MisdemeanorMatt]

IMHO, the 10" sub would statisfy your taste of music best. 12"s tend to be very boomy, great for hip hop, rap, etc where you dont really care about SQ. RNB, classical, jazz, etc tends to have more clarity in the use of bass. You'll also notice that a 10" will hit "cleaner" with more detail.

Errrrr, Please try again.

The box the sub is in determines it's "boomy" ness as you describe it.
The main question is what kind of box are you running right now? Sealed, ported, bandpass? What do you plan on doing with the 10?

 

[lounginfreak247]

I have a 10w3 in a side-mounted enclosure made by Wicked C.A.S. (Google them) I'm feeding it with 300w and have my hu set for 3 (out of 10) on the subwoofer controls.

I listen to a mix of rock, hip hop, rap, and electronic and the sub executes them all well. Nice tight, clean hits for rock and electronic. Real low, smooth tones for rap and hip hop. Bottom line is I couldn't be happier.

Hope this helps!

 

[saad]

Running a sealed box.

I think I may go the 10" then! Lets try and find one for a good price locally

 

[saad]

another question - 10w3 or 10w6?

 

[lounginfreak247]

another question - 10w3 or 10w6?

Depends on your system. The w3 is more than enough for me and I have Rainbow 3-ways in the front running 100w per side. I'm only running it at 300w. It is rated to 500w rms.

 

[MKV King]

For your style music, a 10W3 would work great. I've got two 10W6 with the JL HD750 in a JL 10W6-specific ported enclosure, and I love it. Sometimes I miss the lows that you get with 12's, but as aformentioned, 10's hit much cleaner. And even with the W3, the SQ is going to be great. I say go for it.

 

[MisdemeanorMatt]

Sometimes I miss the lows that you get with 12's, but as aformentioned, 10's hit much cleaner.

I give up on helping people, the amount of ignorance about audio on this forum baffles me. It's like trying to explain color to someone born blind.
Good luck OP.

 

[saad]

Yeah ive heard 10s hitting cleaner is a miss - its all to do with box dynamics yeah?

A small box will give less SPL but a tighter sound is that correct? Clean hits are just boosted upper bass frequencies no?

Is there a SQ diff between the W3 and W6? I have a 12W3, and even though it was only getting 250rms, it was more than loud enough for normal (ie not showing off) listening

 

[MisdemeanorMatt]

Yeah ive heard 10s hitting cleaner is a miss - its all to do with box dynamics yeah?

Correct, hell you can make a 12 sound like a 6 if you'd want to, just choke the hell out of it in a super small sealed box.

You can make a larger sub perform like a smaller, but not the other way around. (only applies to SQ, SPL is another story)

A small box will give less SPL but a tighter sound is that correct? Clean hits are just boosted upper bass frequencies no?

Now your getting into tuning, generally a sub box will have a certain frequency that it is tuned for 30-50 hz. This is all preference. Whether your tuning for quality of spl, it's all about matching your sub/box/car interior acoustics.
This is why I bang my head on the table every time someone asks how a certain setup is going to sound....way too many variables in the equation.

Clean hits are described as the ability to reproduce the input as correctly as possible. SQ cars will have multiple subs tuned at different frequencies along with awesome active crossovers with insane amounts of -dB drop off at certain frequencies.

Is there a SQ diff between the W3 and W6? I have a 12W3, and even though it was only getting 250rms, it was more than loud enough for normal (ie not showing off) listening

I couldn't tell you, I gave up on JL years ago. I feel they went the way of Bose home stereo, being they have their heads so far up their asses with how superior they used to be, they can jack the price up, all while milking the market all they can for a name that used to be good.

There are so many companies in the audio game doing it better and much cheaper. Don't be afraid to wander brand wise.

 

[saad]

Thanks Matt. I'm gonna go the JL Amp because I can get it wholesale, (same with sub), because my mate works at the JL Dealer here, and because I want a compact 5 channel one, and all the reiews suggest nothing else - even the PDX 5 isn't as good. Plus the HD series of amps have good SQ too.

Matt, what would you suggest then as a good woofer, around 500rms other than the JL. The amp can handle 2-4 ohms, and puts out 500wrms regardless of load.

Cheers

 

[saad]

And how do you tune a sealed box? Is it just the capacity? And what will going larger or smaller than recommened do to the sound?

 

[motorhoney]

And how do you tune a sealed box? Is it just the capacity? And what will going larger or smaller than recommened do to the sound?

x2. I guess, the only thing I could think of would be to add more material (screw blocks of wood) to the inside to reduce the volume of the box... but how do you know what volume to use for what application?