whats the deference between 2 way/3way /4 way speakers?

Answer 1

javin was right. but i like 2way and 3way depending on the speaker. anything over 3way is pointless. they just add a bunch of "supertweeters" that dont really make any difference

Answer 2

The goal of a speaker designer is to reproduce the widest possible range of frequencies (from low to high) in the most "linear" way possible. "Linear" means that the bass doesn't sound louder than the treble, or the midrange sound more prominent than the bass; they're trying for the most balanced overall sound.

The problem is that there's no one single speaker "driver" that can reproduce the entire frequency range that humans can hear. The answer is to combine two or more drivers together in one speaker system, so that you might have a "woofer" to reproduce the lower frequencies and a "tweeter" to reproduce the high frequencies. It's important that the different drivers aren't trying to reproduce the same frequency range, or their sounds will combine in ways that might not work well for the overall output. To solve this problem, a device called a "crossover" is included. A crossover is an electronic component that filters certain frequencies out of the audio signal, so that the the individual drivers are only playing the frequency range they're meant to play, and the driver outputs combine to create a wide, balanced range of sound.

It's the CROSSOVER, not the number of drivers, that determines whether a speaker is a 2-way, 3-way, or 4-way design. A 3-way speaker has a crossover that sends low frequencies to one driver, middle-range frequencies to another and high frequencies to a third driver. A 2-way speaker uses a 2-way crossover that just sends the bass to one speaker and the treble to another.

In most car audio speakers, you can count the number of drivers and tell whether you're looking at a 2-way or 3-way speaker; if there's a woofer, a midrange, and a tweeter, then it's probably a 3-way. But this isn't foolproof: http://www.rockfordfosgate.com/products/photos/P162S_4_l.jpg The speakers mounted in the door in this picture have three drivers, but they're actually a 2-way design. The 2-way crossover included with the system sends the same frequencies to the two tweeters, so they're playing the same fequency range.

Answer 3

2ways (coaxials) have the woofer and a tweeter.
3ways (triaxials) have the woofer, a midrange driver, and a tweeter.
4ways (quadraxials) have the woofer, a midrange, a tweeter, and a supertweeter.

A good set of coaxials (2ways) is really all you need. The others don't reproduce any freq. a coaxial can't, therefore are a waste of money, IMO.

Good Luck!

Answer 4

Whether you want to be a clone in a crowd of clones and go with the loud "buzz-fuzzy" boom-boom-boom overrated bass sound......

.....or if you're a true audio-phile, an elite crowd of people who master the art of getting high sound volume and audio clarity with MINIMAL (and some people are wizards at this hat-trick) DISTORTION.

Audio-philes are an elite group because most everyone who tries for loud clear resonant sound with virtually NO distortion fail.

But PART of the secret is in which speakers to get....and here's a hint: one would have to break away from the 'bling-bling' crowd.