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The market is flooded with knock-off/straight rebadged drivers or drivers stolen from other companies and taken to China where production costs are cheaper, which drives down the cost of products across the board in order to be competitive in the market. This makes any real innovation cost prohibitive as the end product will simply be too expensive compared to the knock-off/Chinese products in the market. The only realistic difference between subwoofers now and subwoofers in 5 years is that the market will continue to be dragged down towards cheaper and lower quality products. That was a long winded way of saying: Agreed. No idea who that is. The number of "internet companies" springing up is simply outrageous. It's actually sad to see that the "internet company" genre has gone from a provider of quality built, well performing and differentiated products priced below mass-market competition to any random kid (literally) with a user account on a popular internet forum and enough $$ (typically from mommy and daddy) to meet minimum order quantities from an overseas build house and buy ad space on the major forums. I've stopped trying to keep track of or care about any "internet company" started within the past 5 years. There's too many to keep track of, they go under far too quickly to remember who's still in business, and their products are such cheap overseas lack-luster carbon copies to even give a shit about them to begin with. It's unfortunately more about who can generate the most nuthuggers and who has the most friends modding forums to delete negative comments/reviews/issues rather than quality, performance and product differentiation. This isn't just subwoofers, but every car audio product from wiring to deadening to amplifiers and everything in between. That is another long winded way of saying: Agreed.

Funny thing about any OEM, and China is no exception here, quality and quality control are only as good as you're willing to pay for.Good drivers now are still going to be good drivers in a few years. As has been mentioned, the primary change in the market is going to be a continuation in the trend of more and more cheap drivers, more and more SPL drivers and fewer and fewer high fidelity drivers. High fidelity drivers will continue to command a premium price as well.

The youtube effect is only bringing down the industry in my opinion. More and more people are being exposed to more products, while at the same time, the market segment who is growing the fastest, is the youngest group. They are on average, the least experienced, who have not learned the real value of testing/research/specs/enclosure design etc. in terms of planing out a system that is best for their needs. Also, they have the least amount of money and patients, along with being much more swayed by 'show' and less by 'go'. Now, what does all this mean? Well looking at the aftermarket audio scene, there are far more vehicles with aftermarket stereos then 5 years ago greatly due to the explosion of the youngest group of customers. So why are the Brax's/Gensis' of the world in trouble or out of the market like Eclipse, and why are other high end brands like Zapco for example, vastly expanding entry products? In my firm opinion it is supremely effected by those who only care about (read: can only see) the cheapest price possible and 'if lighting stuck' simple marketing figures. In one way, this has really expanded the market, but at the same time, hurt the market. The race to the bottom is much faster then the race for superior quality and performance (race to the top). In other words, quality is losing badly to quantity. Something many can easily see and effect of this is the drastic reduction of individual designs or ground breaking new technology. In other words, the General Motors philosophy, let someone else do the engineering cheap off shore, and slap multiple different brand logo's on the same thing. This makes much of the game a lot more about marketing and a lot less about engineering. You can make the case for material and part costs going up, but that is not enough to counter act the way the market demand is shifting. This is my opinion, but I have been in the industry since the mid-90's and it has changed drastically and I strongly feel quality as gone down a noticeable amount, on average across the industry. Edit: In terms of JL, I like a number of their products, but let's take a moment to think about where they have shifted their efforts, especially in terms of money. JL has a very high capability in terms of engineering and design, much of this is due to how much they invested in their facilities here in the USA. Since then, JL has done mega amounts of marketing and outside of the small format class-D amps and maybe the shallow sub, they have not released too much that is earth shattering or marketing swinging in a while.

the air is not exactly dry air which is an issue... you would have to modify them so the air went through some form desiccant so it won't be blowing wet air over your equipment.

Here's my take...basically, other than better designs in cooling, stiffer suspensions and more excursion in drivers, there really won't be much change in drivers in five years, just like there hasn't been in the past. It's a trade off really. In the 90's, you had efficient drivers in sealed boxes that would perform best with 300-700 watts each....fast forward to now....there is more power handling, but efficiency has dropped. In comes more drivers specifically designed to work in ported boxes to make up for it. Neither is "better" really, but with amplifier power being so cheap these days compared to the old days it's necessary to make subs handle more now. As far as companies like JL, they seem to only come out with something different when it is REALLY different, IMO. The other thing with them, it seems they are just starting to move their focus more toward the high-end home theater crowd, which is probably a good move for them. I'm sure like everyone here, they see the race to the bottom and know they can't (or don't want to) compete with stuff built overseas. Anything they do with cars is going to be leaning toward the SQ crowd I think. As far as the internet companies, it's going to be all about customer service, performance, and reliability that helps make one stand out over another. Companies like Sundown, SSA, DC and the like have built up a fan base that helps keep them relevant. I just hope most of them keep their lower lines at a good price point but still quality, rather than just looking at price. In the long run, that is what will help keep companies going, rather than just the $500-700 subs I believe.

Agreed, more info is needed to suggest something. Why a single twelve? Can you fit a fifteen? Thats what she said

If you specify the acceptable reject rate in the OEM contract, it quickly becomes in their financial best interest to provide an increased level of quality and QC. They had some real growing pains in this regard originally, but the established OEMs that work with the bigger western companies have it figured out at this point. The smaller manufacturers over there still haven't quite got it right, but the cheapskates over here will keep them in business regardless.

Reflections are bad and nearly impossible to control. Any "famous sq guy" who would say that is truly an idiot. I will agree with him on some points though. Hair tricks are dumb and most of the time, sub woofers aren't needed, neither is a lot of power for that matter.

By the way by strong I didn't mean by proof. Heck I really didn't mean strong most likely. I meant something with a distinct and unique flavor, which I associate with "stronger" bourbons and whiskey. I love whiskey. I drink a ton of it. There are so many distinctive flavors it is hard to say what one may like. If you really want a complex, full bodied whiskey I suggest an Irish. On the cheap (but good) I like Jameson at ~$35. If you want to step it up, Redbrest is very complex and smooth, and roughly $50. It is one of my favorite everyday Irish whiskeys. Now, my favorite Irish is Jameson Limited Reserve 18 Year Single Pot Still. It is a very smooth, very tasty Irish at ~$100. But in all honesty I have been drinking a Kentucky Burboun quite a bit lately. WHile I am generally not a huge fan of the oaky Kentuckys I was turned on to Woodford Reserve about 5 months ago by a friend. It is fucking beautiful. At $35 it is absolutely georgeous. I went ahead for a goof and tried the Woodford Reserve Double Oaked at $50, and I have not turned back. I drink a couple fifths of this a week. I love this drink. Very, very smooth. Complex but not cloying. Slightly caky aftertaste. Very nice. I drop 2 cubes in a glass and sip on it all night. will post up a double oaked tonight. I don't mix. Drink with either a splash of water or a couple cubes to crack the spirit as you are supposed to. I drink whiskey to enjoy it.

We did offer a while back for you to send it back to us and we'd ship you out a new one but it wasn't that much of a concern at the time as ccnncc was using it more than anyone else and was fine with it. Inaccuracy isn't normal and therefore is warrantied.

Got plenty of em. J

As do I..

That's a lot of power for how much you are willing to spend on subs. GCONs would be great if you wired them to two ohms. If you can up your budget a bit ICONs are awesome subs.

2 words for you Pro Audio

Check to make sure the subs are wired to 1ohm. It sounds to me like the amp is seeing too low of an impedance.

Buffalo Trace is amazing if you can find it, it sells rather quickly.

Following your logic I suppose that you are running Audiobahn subs too. Judging a product by using it is worse than using scientific logic to understand what it will do. Your comments are indicative of everything that is wrong with the mobile audio industry.

Same as effing a biatch while partying up in that club, or screaming about how much life sucks. Every genre has shity music, and that is the stuff that I don't listen to. If it is catchy and I can relate to it I'll listen to it. That is all.

Agreed, more info is needed to suggest something. Why a single twelve? Can you fit a fifteen?

just one 12?

Well, good luck. I know the guys at FI know what they are doing when they design these drivers. Performance is usually pretty well optimized... I am also very skeptical of anyone's personal opinions of driver performance in relation to car audio without proper measurements. And I don't mean a Termlab... Everything sounds great 99% of the time to people...

I remember you calling me along the lines of a liar for saying I don't drop below 12v on the very same batteries.. The Diehards are not to be messed with.

The number of spiders are worthless unless you know the deflection of each of them. For example 5 spiders with a deflection of 1mm at 100 grams each will not be as stiff as two spiders with a deflection of 1mm at 385 grams each.