Hello members,

I just had an experience that I thought to share. Most all of the seasoned veterans will probably not gleen anything from this, but for the up and coming speaker guys, it will reinforce something that you might not realize.

First off, I am just beginning to explore the ins and outs of crossover design. It is complicated in a lot of ways because there is SO much to consider. Here is something that I just found out that has firmly pointed me in the right direction-for good.

I have a dedicated two channel system for my music and a pretty good Home Theater for movies. I bartered and traded, bought and sold, to get what are the top of the line suite. I don't like plugging another company too much, but I'll say that they are from England. I've noticed that the $550.00 center channels (one front and one rear) have a less than appealing mid/HF output. You all know that the Center channel handles most of the dialogue (speech) and it's frequency response and timbre, is critical to a realistic experience.

Not being satisfied, I decided to investigate the crossover and speakers. I took the connector cup/crossover out ,and to my disbelief, in my $1100.00 worth of center channels ,were but a single capacitor (first order or 6db) and the LF was running full range!!!. Now, don't get me wrong, if the design team did that and achieved a good result, who am I to mess with success?. Here comes the big BUT!.---But they didn't and it was clear to me why. Being one to tinker, I looked up the crossover points and then went to my spare parts box and found a pair of JBL L19 crossovers. The specs were within 200hz, the impedence is the same, blah, blah,blah. I took my time and figured out how to make them fit by ungluing some of the JBL components from the board and arranging them a bit closer. After a short while, the moment of truth. I fired them up and WOW, what a complete difference. SWEET voicing!. I even have a HF level control now.

That brings me to my point. If I didn't already know what a huge difference a crossover can/could make, I certainly do now. I just wanted anyone new to the game, to know how important and critical, the crossover is. I've been at this for a long time and never gave this as much attention as I now firmly believe it deserves. Maybe this will help someone out there. Steve G