I've owned a couple of good 10's these last few years but I just recently bought a Pioneer 12" W3002D2 to run on my 1000 watt mono block amp and it blew. As you can imagine this kind of ruined my impression on 12" subwoofers. Granted, this subwoofer had the LOWEST, most bowl loosening sounds I have ever heard from ANYTHING.
I wanted to know if there was a 10" subwoofer out there that could compete with the low bass extension put out by a 12". I've been looking at the Pioneer TS W260D4 and the Alpine SWS-10D4 but I'm open to other options. In addition, do these subwoofers i'm looking at have really great low bass response? Loud and clear down to 20-30hz?
If anyone wants to go the extra mile, would someone post their experiences with 10" subwoofers with an emphasis on the low bass output?
Be as long winded as you please because I love learning about this and thank you for your time.
Answers & Comments
Verified answer
As long winded as I please? I can do that...
But like previously said, how low you can play is not determined by the size of the woofer, a 10" can play just as low as an 18" woofer. The dependent factors are the specs of the woofer and what it has been optimized for, and MOSTLY the tuning frequency of a ported box. Pre-fabricated enclosures are usually terrible. They are way too small for the woofer(s), have very small port area (causes audible port noise), and are often tuned fairly high. So in prefab boxes your lows will likely be very lacking. Larger woofers are great, more cone area and often more xmax means more displacement! The more air it moves the louder it will be. Size of a sub also does not affect punchiness or tightness. This is more a result of box design. (Look up "subwoofer group delay" to find out more about this). Many people underestimate the importance of box design and wonder why their system doesn't perform like they want it to. To get loud and clear in the 20 to 30 hertz range is not easy. You will have to tune low, very low, probably around 24-28 hertz would work good. This will lessen your high end output greatly by tuning low. If you have ever seen a frequency response curve, you can usually see a peak at the tuning frequency (unless it was designed to give a flat response). Tuning high will get you more SPL (louder), especially at the tuning frequency, your subsonic filter must be set 2 or 3 hertz below your tuning frequency because below tuning your subs output not only drops greatly, but the cone excursion greatly increases and it will bottom out and the coil will hit the motor. Subs also have airspace requirements. For example in ported boxes airspace needed per sub is:
1 cubic foot (10")
2 cubic feet (12")
4 cubic feet (15")
6 to 8 cubic feet (18")
Things to look for in a subwoofer: High power handling (watts rms, ignore all peak or max ratings), sensitivity (higher sensitivity means it gets louder on less power, not too important but can make a difference), high xmax (how far the cone can move one way while remaining linear (rated at 70% Bl)), impedance of course, and more cone area is good although the largest I would go is 18". Two 10" have more cone area than one 12".
Personally I don't like using 8" or 10" as subs. Especially lower end or even mid level ones. They just don't put out nearly enough bass for me and when you step up to the 12" version the motor is often a bit beefier and more powerful, also along with more xmax and power handling (although not always). However when you get to higher end brands, 10" subs can most definitely get loud. For example a DC XLm2 10" or a Sundown Z v.3 10". Just one of either of these subs will be much louder than two common 12" kicker subs. You should go for whatever subwoofers you have space for. Less/smaller subs in the proper box will be louder and sound so much better than if you jam in as many woofers as you can fit.
As for subwoofer recommendations within your budget... You know I prefer 12" and up, so an Audioque (they changed their name to soundqubed) SDC2.0 12" would be great, but you can look at the 10" model too if you are limited on space or stuck on 10". I would go with audioque before alpine, pioneer, kicker, etc... AQ underrates their power handling by a bit, and even these woofers that are their lower end models have over 22mm of one way cone travel. You aren't going to find that in an alpine.
http://www.soundqubed.com/NEW-Street-Duty-SDC20-12...
Anything else you want to know or have questions on?
How low a sub plays is determined by the box and a subs FS