Ported, Sealed or Transmission Line

The Question that every audiophile probably has an opinion about. My feeling is that a well designed speaker is just that. Most designs these days tend to be tuned ports, for what reason I'm not sure, but any sealed speakers I have owned have needed a large amount of power to bring out there best. As I understand a sealed box needs to be quite a bit larger than a vented design to achieve the same bass extention. Larger boxes in general equal poorer sound stage and imaging.
The reason, as I understand it, for the proac speakers having straws stuffed into the port was not to increase bass responce but to increase friction in the port at higher volumes so that the woofer didn't break-up, and yes in much the same way that stuffing a transmition line's horn/port with insulating material.

Too many variables to sum up all of the different design attributes in even several very detailed posts. As such, you really do need to dig into the subject in order to have a better understanding of what is really going on. Take a look at this book about loudspeaker design if you're really interested. Not only is this the most thorough and "relatively easy to understand" book on the subject that i know of, this is the best price that i've found.

I will only say that Pepler's comments above are loaded with misconceptions based on the aforementioned design variables. This is not to single out Pepler as i'm sure that he's only trying to share what he knows. Problem is that it is the same rhetoric that has been preached to audiophiles and it is basically wrong and / or a phenomenally small portion of what is a very big picture.

Turbulence or friction in a port is not ideal and that is not why they are doing that. They could have achieved similar results by redesigning the port, but that wouldn't look "special" or give them a gimmick to hype. Reading the aforementioned book will allow one to cut through the hype due to becoming an educated consumer. This pretty much allows one to dismiss inferior designs right off the bat without even having to listen to them. Looking at a speaker and picking out the visible design flaws becomes second nature once you understand how they work. Only problem is, once you've attained this knowledge, you'll come to realize that "snake oil" is as much a part of the speaker industry as it is of the cable industry. Sean
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Sealed speakers are intrinsically faster in transients response so im my opinion are better.Period.

Sealed speakers beat ported speakers in the areas of transient response. Because of this, you don't get the port resonances and noise that blurs the sound. And, because of their slower rolloff, produce more deep bass. They are also the easiest, and least costly to design and implement. There aren't really too many drawbacks to a sealed box.

Ported speakers are supposed to be up to 3 dB more sensitive than sealed speakers. In reality, it is not the case. They have a bump in the midbass which many people seem to like, and give the impression of having more bass than they do. While it is difficult to correctly implement a ported speaker correctly, it seems the public does not really care.

Transmission lines have excellent bass response. They have relatively loud deep bass, and can pack a real wallop. They combine the sharpness of attack and decay of a sealed speaker, with the impact of a ported speaker. In my experience they do not have less sensitivity than other designs.

Although I am not sure Sean meant to suggest that the straw trick for reducing port turbulence or "chuffing" is pure snake oil, I quite agree with him that you need to do some reading. There is much more to this question than you will conceivably get here, and you need a balanced view of your own.

That said, I am just as willing as anyone else to display my ignorance in public.

Any speaker design can result in a pleasing sound or not, depending on how it is implemented. Every design is built around tradeoffs--you win on the roundabouts and you lose on the swings, as the British say. Sealed enclosures have a relatively low resonant 'Q' but the actual resonant frequency will be higher than that of an equal-sized, properly ported box. Sealed box designs need more amplifier power, on the whole, because the cones have to work against the very stiff spring of the air trapped inside the box.

Knew that ? Great stuff. There's more. My supposedly humble opinion is that until you appreciate the tradeoffs involved in any audio design, you don't really appreciate the design.