Practical advantages of three way vs. two way

Hmm...
(Should I divulge Tales of my Youth?)

Chris

Took me a minute to even figure out that this could be a monitors thing.

I'm [sadly] only able to offer first hand advice on the monitor speaker side of this conversation. Each time I changed monitors it was after several year of working with something an knowing what they do, how the help me, and eventually, how they hinder me. I had been thinking a bit about monitors and there were also threads running here that really got me to thinking about a three-way system. Then one day I was at a friend's listening to his Focal Shape 2 ways and he turned on his Avantones, at the same times and that's when it relly hit me. This wasn't even a 'proper' way of doing things, but once they were in, the picture became fuller and with a TON more information.

Then I was at a friend's celebration of life, and I was helping prepare gear for the even and spending a bunch of time with the guy who took his room over. We say one night listening to a bunch of music on his 3 way Pelonis monitors. And again it was that "there is so much more clear information" when I listened.

When I got home I messaged my speaker building buddy and asked if he'd ever done a 3-way nearfield type monitor (he normally builds lager speakers). He had me come over and we listened to a set of 3 ways that were the rears of his 5.1 system. I really liked what I heard and a month or so later he had the prototype of what I now have in my room.

That added driver (in this case an 8" ribbon) has made some many things easier to do, and improved everything I do.

I'm basically kicking myself in the ass for not having 3-way monitors sooner.

In theory each individual driver will do a better job over a range that it was designed for:
The contradictions, the crossover just got expensive.
If a 2way design and a 3 way are of similar price, you are taking your driver budget and splitting it 3 ways vs 2 ways so less $$ per driver.

Like almost everything in speaker design there is no right answer, it’s all about priorities and in the end execution.

If your still running the sub in a purely technical sense your monitors are 2 way but your system is 3 way.

One of the best examples of the difference was to compare Quested 2108s to 3208’s same tweeter the only differences were 2 vs 1 of the exact same 8 in the same cabinet and the addition of the mid.

I am hesitant to say midrange clarity is an inherent advantage, way too many examples of a designer throwing a sub in a box with a 2 way and calling it a 3 way😁

A big advantage in a well designed 3 way is that you move the crossover points out of the vocal range.

The power and authority of my TAD’s will have you wondering why anyone needs more than 2 drivers. Of course we could go the Audiophile Set 1 way route no highs no lows but no pesky crossovers.

It can seem like hyperbole and it's hard to describe until you've tried either Coax or a proper 3-way but besides absolute clarity there's a lot of phantom imagaging. Like on the Dyn's the mid signal sounds like it's directly in front of you but there's no speaker there, then let's say in an LCR panning configuration there's quite a gap between the middle left and right. Now, having really high levels of seperation is great for analytical corrections although sometimes you have to "fill in the gaps" in terms of cohesion.

A really good set of headphones gets you somewhere in the right zone but the effect is a lot more pronounced on the likes of ATC, Gethain or the Core 59's IME. After I got rid of the ADAM S3's many years ago to recoup some $$$'s I searched through a lot of sub $2K 2-ways and none of them had the same effect. I finally stumbled on the Equator D5's (Coaxial) and the imaging on them was amazing, nothing quite compared until I finally got to the LYD 48's. Although the advantages of 2-ways for me are equivalence as in they seem to match pretty well when you're aiming towards car stereo's, home hi-fi systems or 2.1's, laptop speakers etc. they are also easier to position IME and far less fussy about listening distances. Get too close to a 3 way and they start to decouple. Coax's aren't all that fussy but unfortunately today they're thin on the ground and either cost a fortune or come with some serious compromises.

Personally I find it much harder to spot issues in general on a 2-way but I've not tried the best of the best 2-ways systems out there like PSI, ATC, Quested etc. As soon as I got back on track with a decent 3-way or Coax I never looked at anything else.