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Re: Wizzer cone question

I think the problem is that "shout" is not a precise term.

Whizzers have several effects, and it's unclear which of them - or which combination of them - is called "shout". Here are the ones I am aware of:

1) high frequency emphasis. Increasing the treble energy is the point of a whizzer, of course, but in many cases it provides excessive high frequency energy. IIRC, Lowthers do this in the 2kHz to 10kHz range, often averaging 10dB emphasis on axis. Beaming mitigates this, depending on the room - one reason (IMHO of course) some of the more complex Lowther cabinets have some drivers pointing away from the listener. A large horn will boost the lower frequencies to bring the spectrtum into better balance. Also, see intem 3).

2) ragged frequency response. The whizzer is unterminated, so its resonances are not as well damped as the main cone. The perceived effect depends on the music, and on the distortions in the rest of the chain - there is a lot of mutual masking going on, IMHO. The best of the non-whizzer fullranges avoid this problem, but still suffer the others.

3) beaming. Any large driver will beam, and the whizzers are often 3"-4" diameter. To me, this gives an unnatural sensation - bright and dull at the same time. The treble emphasis on-axis is balanced against the weakness in the reverberant field, but to me it never sounds quite "right".

4) distortion. Any time you use a fullrange driver, the bass excursion nonlinearities will intermodulate with the high treble. High efficiency drivers with small excursion capability make it worse.

Any of these, or any combination of them, might be called "shout" by someone. All of them have solutions that can at least mitigate the problem. Sorry to say, it is never going to be as simple as "whizzers shout, so I'll use something else". All the alternatives have their own problems and their own, more or less partial, solutions.


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  • Re: Wizzer cone question - Paul Joppa 23:58:16 03/12/07 (0)


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