What kind of active speakers?

Yeh I too thought that near field speakers were designed for dispersing sound in some narrow listening window, er other. Yes, I don't know the whole story either.
Have also read some about regular home audio speakers having to be listened to at like 6 feet back, minim requirement to sound right.
Would like to know myself how that works really.
If anyone finds some links on more indepth near field design, that would be nice if you could pass it up to us.

Bob,

Dr. Floyd Toole is an executive at Harmon (JBL) - I believe your speakers are designed using Toole's approach - wide even dispersion with useable signal up to 80 degrees. Most all nearfields are designed this way - and many have a waveguide so that tweeter matches the woofer in dispersion at the crossover. I'd bet your speakers are probably peerfectly flat up to at least 30 degress off axis.

So is the waveguide's effect solely around the crossover region?

As you go lower in frequency the driver radiates widely - by adding a waveguide it will narrow the radiation pattern and reduce off axis energy. The waveguide will increase the loading on the driver slightly and therefore you can cross it over slightly lower or you can get slightly more SPL out of it before compression. It won't affect the tweeter response much at high frequencies.

The advantage is to get slightly a lower crossover from a tweeter and then to match the dispersion to a 6 inch driver that is already starting to beam. This produces a smooth seamless transition in the off axis response. If it is done well you have absolutely no way to identify that there is a tweeter and separate woofer (from a reasonable listening distance). Also, one can achieve an even power response - this means the speaker has a flat frequency response at all angles - so it excites the room evenly at all frequencies with no imbalances from reflections. This is an example of what you get without a waveguide and a tweeter crossed over quite high. This is an example with a lower crossover ( a smoother off axis response). This is what you get with an even lower crossover at 2.4 Khz and a waveguide - absolutely beautiful!

See also Aeronet and Elliot Sound and Genelec Waveguides