Stupid Question..
50 Watt CAFz'r
Joined: Jul 2003
Posts: 346
to cross over frequencies to the dark side of course. just kidding. they are a way to allow frequencies that you want to be played, to be played without having the not so wanted frequencies to not be played. kinda confusing. you can have a low pass xover, that eliminates highs, or you can have a high pass xover which eliminates lows. that way you can have your tweets play highs(and no lows) but let you subs play low(without having highs). there is one last one, a bandpass xover(this allows frequency in a desired range) and eliminates everything out side that . so you can play you 5.25's or 6's without having tweets highs come thru them and eliminate sub lows from killing it. all of these come in passive(non adjustable) or active (adjustable) hope this clears up a few things. remember i only gave it to you in layman terms. it's actually more complex but you should be able to get the jist of it. good luck
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Further to that, there are two types of xovers:
Passive xover: this xover takes a full range signal from your amplifier and divides it to multiple speakers. Any multi driver home speaker has a passive xover of some sort in it. Component sets will geenrally come with a passive xover of varying complexity. They can be hand made but you need to understand what you are doing and the parts add up fast. Also, they are generally tough to design with variable frequency and sensitivity controls. Should you be interested: http://www.passivecrossovers.com is an okay site and great parts can be found at www.solen.ca
Active xover: This xover still divides frequencies up into different bands but it does it BEFORE the amplifier(s). With this type of xover you will need an amplifier for each range of music. For example if you have a subwoofer and a pair of coaxial speakers then you may choose an active xover to feed your subwoofer amplifier low frequency signals and your 'highs' amp the higher frequencies (incidentally the coaxials will have some form of passive xover on them even if it is just a cap for the tweeter) This style of crossover lends itself to being very flexible for frequency selection and sensitivity adjustments. The trade off is the extra costs for amplifiers.
Most systems are like the example above in that they employ both types of xovers: generally a sub amp and a 'highs' amp. The high range amp then feeds a coaxial or component speaker set that divides the range to the high frequency speakers passively. This allows people to choose more power for their subwoofers as most people are happier with 2-10x the power on the subs than the highs.
Passive xover: this xover takes a full range signal from your amplifier and divides it to multiple speakers. Any multi driver home speaker has a passive xover of some sort in it. Component sets will geenrally come with a passive xover of varying complexity. They can be hand made but you need to understand what you are doing and the parts add up fast. Also, they are generally tough to design with variable frequency and sensitivity controls. Should you be interested: http://www.passivecrossovers.com is an okay site and great parts can be found at www.solen.ca
Active xover: This xover still divides frequencies up into different bands but it does it BEFORE the amplifier(s). With this type of xover you will need an amplifier for each range of music. For example if you have a subwoofer and a pair of coaxial speakers then you may choose an active xover to feed your subwoofer amplifier low frequency signals and your 'highs' amp the higher frequencies (incidentally the coaxials will have some form of passive xover on them even if it is just a cap for the tweeter) This style of crossover lends itself to being very flexible for frequency selection and sensitivity adjustments. The trade off is the extra costs for amplifiers.
Most systems are like the example above in that they employ both types of xovers: generally a sub amp and a 'highs' amp. The high range amp then feeds a coaxial or component speaker set that divides the range to the high frequency speakers passively. This allows people to choose more power for their subwoofers as most people are happier with 2-10x the power on the subs than the highs.
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