It’s hard for me to believe that 130 dB is possible from some loudspeaker designs.
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Want to use this image for something else? Great! Click it for the link to a high-res or resolution-independent version.When a manufacturer claims that a loudspeaker system (say, a two-way arrangement in a single, vented enclosure) can create a 130 dB SPL peak at 1 meter with a 1000 watt peak power input, I’m a skeptic. Or rather, I should say that I’m a skeptic about how useful that 130 dB actually is.
What I’m getting at is this: A 1000 watt input is 30 dB above the 1 watt input level. Getting a direct-radiating cone driver to give you 100+ dB SPL of sensitivity in a consistent way is challenging (thought I will not say it’s impossible). There are, of course, plenty of drivers available that will get you over that mark of 100 dB @ 1 watt/ 1 meter, BUT, only with the caveat that the 100+ dB sensitivity zone is confined to a “smallish” peak around 2 kHz. The nice, smooth part of the response that doesn’t need to be tamed is probably between 95 – 97 dB. If you’re lucky, that zone might be just south of 100 dB.
When it comes to useful output, what really matters is what a driver can do with minimal variation across the bandpass it’s meant to reproduce. Peaks in different frequency ranges aren’t helpful for real work – although they do let you claim a higher peak-output number.
My disbelief, then, is rooted in the idea that any “affordable by mortals” loudspeaker model is probably not using an ultra-high performance, super-custom-built cone driver for the low-frequency bandpass. Sure, it might not be a driver that you can get off the shelf, but it’s tough for me to have faith that the very upper edge of loudspeaker performance is being tickled by whatever got bolted into the enclosure.
Now…I could be very wrong about this. In fact, I would prefer to be wrong, because I will always desire an affordable speaker that takes up no space, has no weight, and is infinitely loud from 20 Hz to 20,000 Hz. Anything that gets closer to that impossible goal is a box I can welcome. At the same time, I prefer (and encourage) pessimism when reading manufacturer ratings. Sure, they say the box can make 130 dB peaks, but under what circumstances? Only at 2 kHz? Only when combined with room reflections?
If the numbers you claim are difficult to achieve, I’m going to need more than your word to accept them.