Glossary of Terms
Pure balanced synthetic silk soft Accutec-Dome™ tweeters create brilliant highs and smooth midranges in an effective diffusion pattern ideal for flat wall/ceiling installations.
Lightweight and stiff Apolymer-Cone™ deliver excellent damping and bass response. In polymer chemistry, polymerization is a process of reacting monomer molecules.
This material will give you very robust sound qualities in both the tweeter and woofer cones. Aluminum has been used in high-end components for years with great success. These are excellent for both music and theater applications. Aluminum is a great cone material because of it’s lightweight, thin and strong properties. The cones can move fast with minimal flexing, making for superior bass response. Premium material.
Crossover:
A crossover is kind of a traffic cop for sounds. It is composed of a combination of capacitors and coils of thin wire. The outputs of a crossover are directed toward the individual drivers of the speaker assembly (woofers, midranges and tweeters). Each of these sub components specialize in the type of sound they are good at producing. A woofer creates the lower sounds, a tweeter creates the higher frequencies, a midrange creates the stuff in-between. So the crossover sends lows to the woofer, the mids to the midrange, and the highs to the tweeter. There are different types of crossovers with differing types of components used. Crossovers use different ‘slopes’ to roll off the sounds out of the speaker’s usable range. They come in four basic configurations: 6db, 12db, 18db and 24db. What those numbers mean is how many decibels/per octave of sound the sounds ‘roll off’ . A couple of graphics will explain a lot below.
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The graphs read low frequencies (left) to high frequencies (right). The line starting on the left would be a reading from the woofer and the line on the right would be a reading for a tweeter. So a woofer can play only low frequencies and the crossover sends only the sounds on the graph to the woofer to reproduce. Same thing for the tweeter, they can only play highs, so the crossover only sends highs to the tweeter.
The ‘slope’ is the steepness that the crossover adjusts these sounds at the point of ‘crossover’. A better pairing of speakers can handle a steeper slope. So the woofer can play at a higher range and the tweeter is good enough to play down a little lower. So inherently when you see crossovers that are of a steeper slope you can assume that the drivers being used are of better quality.
IMG- Injected Molded Graphite:
Usually a woofer material. When “molded”, they make a shape of a horn (think trumpet) instead of a straight walled speaker. By just making this shape, the structure adds strength. The strength is important to a fast moving cone. As the cone makes it’s initial movement outward this shape resists flexing and will be less likely to cause distortion. Some people will refer to this as a “hybrid-polypropylene” speaker. The polypropylene will be injected with graphite and molded in the final shape. These will sound fast and responsive.
Kevlar:
Kevlar is an amazing fibrous material developed by two DuPont research scientists in 1965. The technology developed by Stephanie Kwolek and Herbert Blades proved to be stronger, more durable and lighter than any other material available. Kevlar is 5 times stronger than steel of the same weight. These unique properties lend Kevlar to a wide variety of applications. As you may know, one of first and most well known applications is for bullet-resistant vests used by law enforcement as well as the military because of the superior bullet stopping power it provides without adding weight and restricting movement. Products made with DuPont’s Kevlar from loudspeaker cones and protective apparel to automotive parts and ropes used on the Mars Pathfinder do more, go farther, last longer, and do the impossible. When you listen to Kevlar you’ll hear a more sturdy type sound in the bottom end of the frequencies. If you like to listen to your music at full tilt, you’ll like this material. Rock music is especially good with Kevlar materials.
Mylar:
This is can be used in many forms in speaker design. The most common are tweeters and capacitors (crossover components…or in other words, the stuff on the circuit boards). In tweeters they are used in the value brand of speakers. Very basic in sound reproduction. Good for low levels. Not extremely high frequency response that is accurate. Some will describe the sound of mylar as “limited” or “clouded” with music.
Polypropylene:
This is the most common of all materials made for basic speakers. Very economical and readily available. Poly will provide a good structure for you music but you won’t be able to go as loud as some of the other types of materials. At lower volumes for the most basic of background music, this material will do just fine. Very appropriate for medical offices or commercial background music applications. If you just listen to the news or oldies music at home, these will work fine also.
Provlar™:
Custom engineered Provlar™ Woofers (InwallTech’s new improved version of Kevlar) made especially to create a controlled excursion with amazing damping properties for unequaled bass response.
Wafer-thin Rarefied-Grille™, a magnetically-secured grille that protrudes only 4mm from its surroundings. Rarefied-Grilles™ have nearly transparent, ultra-small perfs, and are acoustically inert, for dynamic, unimpeded sound and more uniform coverage, even in larger rooms.
Sensitivity:
Generally describes how efficient a speaker is at transferring an electrical current into an audible sound. Low numbers, for home audio sake, are below 88 decibels and higher numbers are above 92 decibels. Pro Audio gear, like used in night clubs and concerts regularly put out numbers above 100 decibels. For a more in depth article see this Stereophile writing.
Titanium:
Typically used in tweeters. This material is the strongest man-made material ever developed. It can be made in very thin layers, yet can still be very strong. This is especially important in high frequencies as tweeters have to move back and forth up to 20,000 times a SECOND! So when you have a titanium tweeter, you can expect very extended high frequencies. Some people will describe this type of tweeter as sounding “bright” or “up-front”.
Tweeter:
The smallest speaker in a speaker array. Produces the high sounds you hear from a speaker generally above 3000 Hz. Sometimes called the treble speaker.
Woofer:
The largest speaker in a speaker array. Produces the lowest sound you hear from a speaker generally below 3000 Hz. This is where you will “feel” your music. Drums and bass guitar is reproduced in this range.
Zelenium™
Tweeters featuring Zelenium-Dome™ (Enhanced Titanium) technology co-developed with InwallTech’s Chinese engineers bring next generation Titanium to be less “shrill” than current offerings from mass market speaker driver producers.