@lonemountain wrote:
If you use a super low distortion [active] speaker system, it reveals more about everything upstream.
Agreed.
So my question: How is active taking choice away or reducing the [audiophile] hobby? There is far more to a system than amplifiers. To my ear, it increases choice, as these choices are suddenly far more obvious.. Example: the difference between cartridges is FAR greater than the difference between two good to excellent amps. Note I did not say you cannot hear a difference in amps, I said that other transducers in the system are more evident than amplifiers alone in a passive system.
Not to mention that an active approach can be taken with outboard amps and DSP/electronic XO, whereby the choice of these components exists to take the hobby element of active even further, not least with regard to setting filter values if a more radical DIY-path is chosen. Even though amps matter less imprinting-wise here there’s still a worthwhile process to be pursued in differentiating them, both in terms of quality and quantity of wattages, to their dedicated and respective driver segments.
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@lonemountain , I haven't used an ATC active but agree that my Paradigm Active 20 is far more revealing than the Paradigm Studio 20 which is the passive version.
I found my choice reduced when it came to speaker cables, which saved me money (yay), so I focused on upgrading the power. All of my speakers are internally biamped so that is a power hungry system when you have as many active speakers as I do. MCH music is sublime in my system, so much that I use it 90% of the time. If my speakers were less revealing MCH wouldn't be as satisfying.
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I have a question to "active in the hobby" audiophiles. Here's the background:
If you use a super low distortion [active] speaker system, it reveals more about everything upstream. I find that when I use an ATC active, what drives it ( preamp, CD player, streamer, turntable, etc) has a much greater impact on the resulting sound than the same exact speaker as a passive. Image is greatly affected by active vs passive. I can hear more "character" differences between these upstream devices, even cables become more obvious. For me, this increases the desire to play around with different things in the rig and see what the differences are.
So my question: How is active taking choice away or reducing the [audiophile] hobby? There is far more to a system than amplifiers. To my ear, it increases choice, as these choices are suddenly far more obvious.. Example: the difference between cartridges is FAR greater than the difference between two good to excellent amps. Note I did not say you cannot hear a difference in amps, I said that other transducers in the system are more evident than amplifiers alone in a passive system.
Brad
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Upper octave and lower octave room interactions seem quite different. One is a direct reflection that more or less preserves its waveform, so will be perceived as a smeared or reflected sound from the source (and not sure how you effectively dsp this because you're talking about reflections of detailed recognizable things.. vocals, instruments, etc), whereas with the latter the wave is often longer than the room, and are for the most part are truncated waveforms that manifest as unrecognizable resonances. These anomalies can be more imperceptibly fixed with dsp.
All that said.. even if you could effectively dsp upper octave room interactions.. who wants to listen in an anechoic chamber? That is a very dead.. boring listening space.
Dsp'ing transducers on the other hand makes some sense.. nullifying their unwanted resonances with the inside of the speaker cabinet and also leveling the direct output between drivers to give a flat output. Nonetheless, I am still suspicious of sticking sensitive DAC/DSP electronics into a noisy, vibrating space.. and also of speaker manufactures who also claim to be amp experts, and dsp experts. I don't think the company that makes the Holo DAC line wants to put their best work into a cauldron of strong magnetic fields.. a space that is literally shaking. I know it can be done, I'm just not sure if putting it inside, or attaching it to the speaker is a good idea.
I am still learning all this.. this is the way I understand it right now. I do own some small class AB active monitors designed by Simon Aston (Audiosmile/uk), btw. They serve a specific purpose, and I like them, but I don't nitpick their performance.
Some irony here is, the new (passive) speakers I chose (forgoing re-working my entire system and going the active route, but with separates) are designed by a music producer/studio engineer who primarily designs and manufacturers active speaker systems for his studios and clients.. this is how he makes his living. He's also designed very large line-array theatre installations for live performances. He's not a traditional audiophile speaker designer, however he still feels compelled to design and sell (albeit in very low volume) high-end passives. I'll have to ask him why next time. I still have this active digital crossover system in the back of my mind (but with separates), but just need some extra space to set up a second large system. I would like to see how good I can make it work.
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@jhw9 , all speakers have room interaction issues, need proper placement, and can often benefit from DSP. Many active speakers have controls in the back unlike passive speakers, similar to a subs controls only more appropriate for the type of speaker.
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Imo, subs are a different situation… 20-30ft LF wavelengths and room interaction.. so a sub needs dsp to deal with modal issues. A properly designed speaker has controlled dispersion above 80hz.
And sure.. you can have a sub as separates if you want. The company that made my sub actually does this in their standard home theatre installations.. everything is separate, but this is far above my pay grade.
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@celtic66 , that is exactly the same thing, the benefits of an active sub apply to active speakers.
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Just to tickle the dragon, believing this subject somewhat beaten to death, not only in this post but others, but are not nearly everyone's subwoofers active? I like many here have owned a plethora of everything, but I've never done the passive subwoofer with a dedicated separate amp. Would that not be the same argument?
I'm just wondering respectfully how that plays out with the zealot passive transducer crowd. Confident that confirmation bias will rage in and have a declaration of "that's not the same thing!" It makes me smile.
I know what works for me and do not wish to proselytize to others.
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Not to beat a dead horse after my lengthy post, but read this active speaker review and you’ll have an idea if you want to go this route. This is a highly regarded all-in-one ’easy’ solution for going active. No doubt there are people who will want this, and the audio world is a better place for it, but it’s a different process. (Stereophile’s review of the also highly regarded Dutch & Dutch 8c is another you might want to read). Both are probably excellent choices for clean sounding minimalist systems.. but if you’re a traditional audiophile, in these cases you may very well start to wonder what other hardware is inside that box. Do you immediately trust someone when you meet them? Well, then you're a good soul.. and these speakers will be all you'll ever need. No right or wrong answer.. only choices.
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I went through a few months of soul searching on going active after a midrange driver’s ferrofluid on an old beloved 25yo speaker turned to gooey molasses and started to seize. After running out of driver replacements (had a stock-pile being these were very delicate things) but these drivers were no longer replaceable or repairable, so time to reevaluate everything. I was fully committed (with cost efficient solutions) to the extra amplifiers, cables, and an electronic crossover - Danville Signal dspNexus (and requisite software to make it work), along w/ Orchard Audio BOSC/Starkrimson mono’s and Newform Research’s flagship Last Dance speaker.. which is just the perfect candidate for this given it can be spec’d with an external crossover and has a fundamentally great driver design, but needs electronic time alignment as the line source sits proud of the phalanx of Purifi mid-woofers by a good couple inches.. ie not physically time-aligned, quite the opposite.
Anyways.. only $13k for everything. You could spend far more by staying passive and not have the near the same power or potential.
No doubt, on paper.. active is more efficient, and theoretically you can be more surgical in creating an editable phase linear crossover. Non-destructive R&D. The softwares and devices to create these software networks has become good enough that with a long weekend, most audiophiles with some computer savvy can figure out how to go about it.. but the reality is, it may not sound good to your ears for weeks, months... or longer, if you want better than that. There is so much more to making a good sounding speaker (system actually) than just getting the math right. Our ears (& brain.. ear-interface) are far more sensitive to input than can be evaluated by looking at a plot on a computer screen.. as right as it may appear according to whatever audio-cookbook you may be reading . Our brains are so good at perceiving harmonic falsehoods (odd order distortions and clocking errors) that things which engineers decide are truths get thwarted by reviewers and potential buyers all the time. I’ve heard enough active systems over the years at shows, which sound dynamic.. wide bandwidth.. low distortion, etc, but they are almost always just missing a certain magic you don’t get from a well component-matched system.
I’m an all digital guy.. my entire library is 1’s and 0’s.. don’t own a turntable, but honestly I’ve yet to hear a DAC that sounds as good as a high end vinyl playback system when it comes to becoming emotional involved with the music. Its close in some cases.. but not yet.
It also occurred to me.. what if I had this digital Swiss Army knife? Theoretically I could create any house sound signature with these digital tools and prodigiously powerful array of GaNFET amplification ..driving epically-wide-bandwidth transducers. There wouldn’t be much a point to change any hardware for a long while.. my job description as a system builder/home audio alchemist would now be re-rewritten as ’crossover programmer.’ To some this might seem fun, and no doubt my ears would always be challenged to decipher the nodal changes made to a crossover diagram, however I already stare at a computer screen long enough for my day job, and also I’d be restraining myself from the joy of selecting, unboxing.. just the tactile satisfaction of configuring real objects into a real working collection of symphonic devices to produce a result.. an expectation, whether failed or achieved.. would be lost. The gamble is lost.. and there is no winning. Yes, I suppose you can win at the math.. at object-oriented-programming on a computer screen, but is this the same hobby?
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I don't know the size of your room but those RBH towers seem huge. If I were shopping at that size and price range I would compare with the JBL M2's and the Bryston Active Model T. I am sure all three measure and perform exemplary.
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Ahha I did not realize that. Thank you for that tidbit.
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@kac32
I have not heard them but keep in mind RBH is a sponsor of Audioholics.
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Has anyone listened to the RBH active SVTR-active towers? They get glowing reviews at Audioholics. I am considering them myself at this time but I can't seem to find others that have heard them.
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The synergy is built into the loudspeaker and the audiophile doesn’t have to search for some magical pairing of loudspeaker and amplifier. Active loudspeakers definitely have the potential for better sound compared to passive designs.
Whose synergy? The designers?
The reason audiophiles use separates is to create their personal synergy that works best with their tastes and the sound of their particular room. Audiophiles generally do not want Genelecs or Kii 3, despite their brilliant measured nearfield response in an anechoic chamber.
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@johnk wrote:
Those fearing passive networks and driver integration issues seem to be a logical choice for a full-range driver system. Since it's active. 1 amp selected to best match transducers 1 driver no network. Maybe that's where you active lovers need to be in the end.
A wideband driver sans cross-over of any kind is a "pure" approach, also with regard to maintaining a single point source per channel, but driver integration actively is really the preferred route to go vs. passive, so it's the latter "camp" that would seek to benefit the most with a pair of full-range drivers, irrespective of the challenges (and limitations) such a solution brings with it. Calling a full-range driver sans cross-over an "active" approach btw. doesn't seem strictly correct, as by definition active involves an electronic/DSP XO prior to amplification to be named such.
And keep in mind many actives still use a passive part to keep drivers from blowing during amp turn-on or amp damage. And is the cabinet really the best place for an amp and an active crossover to reside?
Safety measures with active can be part of the amplifier section as well instead of necessitating of passive component, and even so a single capacitor as a safety means isn't what constitutes a load scenario comparable to that of typical passive cross-over with coils and all.
As I have outlined at numerous occasions active can be configured as a separate (/outward) solution as well, and so "component care" would apply as it pertains to any typical passive setup. Among the many bundled active speakers that are, incl. not least pro sector products, reliability seems pretty solid. Poster @lonemountain mentioned active ATC speakers being extremely reliable even following many years of extensive pro usage, while sounding great, not to mention cables being less of a variable here. Except..
I have to fix so so many subwoofers that have an amp and active all-in-one box they don't have longevity. Is your costly active just a short-term friend that gets binned in a few years when amps fail?
And this is the one exception - with actively configured, bundled subs - where amp durability can be rather dubious and many a (bad) capacitor in particular has blown up fairly early in its life cycle. Plate amps found in many subs may be high power, but component quality is often so-so to pretty shitty.
Again, this is where I would direct the attention towards the fact that an actively configured sub can be such with an outwardly positioned amp (of much better quality). This is what I do myself with my pair of tapped horn subs being driven by a Crown K2 - actively; the digital XO precedes the amp, and the rest of them for the remaining frequency span above sans any passive XO parts, which is to say fully actively.
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@johnk , my Paradigm active spekaers have an LED light that makes the logo glow green. When you max it out they turn red so you know to turn it down.
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@ricevs , that is an interesting direction to go, DIY. I know GR Research and Crites have kits for speakers. Do you think you could take an off the shelf $ amp and and $ speaker, do a little DIY and make it sound $$$?
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Those fearing passive networks and driver integration issues seem to be a logical choice for a full-range driver system. Since it's active. 1 amp selected to best match transducers 1 driver no network. Maybe that's where you active lovers need to be in the end. And keep in mind many actives still use a passive part to keep drivers from blowing during amp turn-on or amp damage. And is the cabinet really the best place for an amp and an active crossover to reside? I have to fix so so many subwoofers that have an amp and active all-in-one box they don't have longevity. Is your costly active just a short-term friend that gets binned in a few years when amps fail?
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Fully active digital xover triamped/biamped speakers using pure digital input amps would simply kill any speaker alive.....he he......that statement will get you going.
The Peachtree GaN 1 is a 200 watt a channel stereo amp that has coax input only. It converts PCM directly to PWM.....there are no linear amplifier stages or feedback......this is the same as Tact, Lyndorf and Technics.....but according to the guy that makes these inexpensive modules.....he thinks they sound better than Technics.......check out the thread on the amp here on Audiogon.
The module in the GaN 1 is a 4 channel amp (50 watts each) that combines two pairs in differential mode to make 200 watts. If you bought two of these $2000 amps and rewired each one so you had a three channel amp.....two 50 watters and one 200 watter per channel......you could then tri-amp using a minidsp digital xover or other pure digital xover. You could then hardwire the outputs of the amps directly to the voice coil wire of drivers mounted on a super damped and braced open baffle....or box....if you like box sound. Now you have a triamped speaker that uses no DAC, no preamp, no linear amps, no passive xover. By using software in the digital domain you can time align the drivers, make the frequency flat as a board at your listening position and set the xover at any slope and frequency you want. This would simply blow your frickin mind. The volume would be controlled in the digital domain in the server/streamer using lossless digital volume control. What I suggest has never been done before but is available now. You could do it yourself......but most here are not DIYers. I am sure there are manufacturers of speakers that will be implementing exactly what I suggest inside a loudspeaker......The output board weighs less than 2 lbs......the revolution is now!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
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@lonemountain , that would be awesome, you run in some high profile circles and I would appreciate checking it out. There is a "Virtual Systems" area here, you just go to the page and their is a link to Create System to start your system, you can list components, add comments and add pics. If you are able to upload measurements that would be a plus.
I notice you use 7 channel bed layer, have you tried adding wide channels at 60 degrees before for 9 channels? I find it much better for music in immersive audio.
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Hey Kota1
Nice post on your system. Yes Galaxy has been one of the top players in "good sounding" studios in the EU for a long time. Check out the latest from MIraval, the revival of an old room. Also British Grove in the UK is spectacular.
Reference level, I'm not sure what that boils down to for you in SPL, but I know Dolby likes systems to have reference ATMOS rooms somewhere around 118dB capability. Not easy without distortion but we have several rooms that function at that level: Blackbird in Nashville and Ben Walfisch's Mix Lab room in Santa Monica. I cannot listen to anything that loud, it hurts!
We have quite a number of guys using our stuff in film composing/scoring world, such as Alan Meyerson at Remote Control for Hans Zimmer, or Shawn Murphy. They are both A level players in that community.
All the gear used by these guys is all active, typically ATC SCM100A for scoring or SCM150A or SC 300 A for Atmos mixing.
I wouldn't mind at all posting what I have at home, but i have not tried to figure out how to do that on Audiogon. To be fair, my system changes all the time as I bring samples home from my office or take samples back to sell off. I have a ATMOS rig at home and at work, both similar, based around ATC HTS 40s, and HTS 11 for sides (7.2.4) and HTS 7 for overheads. I use two ATC C1s for subs at work and 2 Subwoofer Pros 12s at home.
Brad
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@lonemountain
Some people want it to sound like it’s supposed to, the way Fleetwood Mac decided or Tom Petty or Lenny Kravitz. ATC enables you to get that, and you cannot get that with passives.
I set up my home theater with the intention of replicating to the degree that is practical what the mixing engineer of a movie or album heard on the soundstage. I exchanged emails with the owner of the Dub Stage and Galaxy Studios. Both were very helpful in advising me on how to treat my room. Wilfred Van Balen from Galaxy Studios and founder of Auro 3D emphasized treating the ceiling and suggested bass traps. I am using a combo of absorption panels and Geofusers from Auralex which are diffusors that can be backfilled with rockwool or polyfil to double as bass traps. Both studios use active monitors and while I am sure they sound much better than my home theater, active speakers gave me the ability to bi-amp each speaker AND have that power go to the driver, not just excess heat. With 13 speakers that is roughly 26 channels of amplification. Even if I had that many amplifiers in a biamp configuration it still wouldn’t be as efficient. If you listen to acoustic music at low to medium levels, no worries. If you listen to concerts and action movies at reference level like I do, totally different animal. Look at these specs:
http://www.cain.cainslair.com/Paradigm%20Reference%20Active%20Series%20Specifications.htm
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@lonemountain I could tell you were not a typical customer, now I get it. I checked your profile and you don't have a system posted. Would you mine sharing? Do you know how the virtual system page works? Thanks
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ATC speakers do not even provide frequency response measurements on their website. You'd think they would give you plenty of measurements to look at given that they brag about how accurate their speakers are. The are just overpriced overrated speakers that have achieved success based on rave reviews by so called industry professionals that know nothing about speaker design.
ATC are a driver manufacturer that have no expertise in speaker design. You would think a high end speaker would be far more advanced than just a wooden box with drivers in 'em but thats exactly what ATC are.
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kota1, I missed your comment about my post asking if I was a designer or engineer? Forgive my oversight. I am neither, I am the ATC importer to the USA for the last 20+ years. Before that I worked at JBL as in charge of theater and installed sound. In both roles, there was/is a lot of interaction with the engineering department about "why" they do things a certain way.
Brad
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I think ATC has the right idea in reducing complexity while they increase performance. At least it works for someone who wants high end performance but doesn't have the time or desire to DIY. That being said, I would not expect that type of buyer to be plentiful on Audiogon forums.
Brad
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Bryston uses the same type of approach, active speakers with the crossover and amps external giving you some flexibility:
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Phusis is right, you can build your own active. This would make sense if you want to DIY. If you have the ability to adjust crossover point, slope, output level and driver phase, you have it all. JBLs M2 was an attempt to build a system that could be "tuned" on site for best performance. Its a good idea, except fiddling by different users renders many of these expensive systems far from target without some regular checking. There are many examples of good M2 demos and spectacular M2 "that's awful" misses. Its also a very difficult system to calibrate and set up, and is beyond the ability of many dealers to put together on site. When Peter (from JBL) sets it up or someone like Nate Kunkel, and the system is left alone, it can be spectacular.
Brad
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Erik
I agree with you I wish more people understood what they were buying.
At ATC, we build both active and passive of nearly every model from 2 way to big high power three ways. Understanding the advantages of an active system is not well understood out there in the market but should be. Reasons to NOT like it are usually baseless, such as "you can't service the amps if they are installed inside a speaker" (silly as ATC amp packs bolt on and off and are can be sent to us for service without the entire speaker coming along- its usually easier to send us a amp pack then a standard 3-5Ru rack mount amp). Or other reasons like "plate amps don't last that long" which is also completely untrue, I have so many active ATC speakers on for 15- 20 years for 18 hours a day its crazy. If they all broke I would be buried in service. Reliability doesn't really enter into it as I think most well built gear lasts a lifetime now. Unless you are talking about cheap active, thrown together low cost contract speakers with amps inside that are built for price. That's a different story but it has nothing to do with being active.
Again, being in the studio business as well as home audio in active and passive I see both. Studios have issues with passives and outboard amps more often than issues with actives because of the constant connections and unconnecting and the additional part and pieces that need adjusting. Connectors are a huge issue in reliability. Users at home have issues with outboard amps ( of various brands) than active set ups (of various brands) from my direct experience
I think its marketing that has convinced everyone they need to buy amplifiers and if they don't all hell will break loose. Somehow something is being taken away or somehow something is lost when its really the reverse. Wire and caps and inductors are added between amp and speakers that doesn't need to be there. I think what's taken away with passives is imaging and a significant amount of your money.
When I see someone saying they like the ability to change the sound of their system, that's totally fair and okay. That IS the single best reason to stay passive, not performance or reliability.
Some people want it to sound like it's supposed to, the way Fleetwood Mac decided or Tom Petty or Lenny Kravitz. ATC enables you to get that, and you cannot get that with passives. You can get close, but not "there". Realism is what drives Billy Woodman- or should I say "low distortion", the doorway to realism.
Brad
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Invalid
Most recording engineers don't listen to music "at home" period- not when they are listening for work 15 hours a day. Plus during the pandemic many built studios in their houses so they could keep working despite commercial rooms being shuttered.
Brad
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I can't comment on active vs passive speakers, except to say I would hope that the speaker designer would test many amp configurations to find the best "bar none".
It has always seemed sort of self defeating to have the output signal from an amp to have to power a crossover network. I have always thought (forty years or more) that the way to go is electronically separate the frequencies PRIOR to them being amplified and then feed them to the appropriate driver. Yes the amps should have the same power factors and damping factors. Staying in the same family of amps can mostly negate this problem. And hopefully phase shift is not an issue. I say this without the aid of measurement on my part, just listening.
My system uses four amps and a Marchand 3 way electronic XO. Two mono blocks to drive the woofers, a stereo amp to drive the midrange and a stereo amp to drive the tweeters.
In this configuration when the bass is really heavy none of the other amps have a clue what the two bass amps are doing and they just keep playing sweetly.
Just my take on the myriad possibilities to set up a satisfactory system. I love the way my system sounds...it is somewhat complicated in the wiring aspect but that is just one and done if you get it right.
YMMV.
Regards,
barts
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@phusis Wrote:
Most active speakers are configured as bundled packages, but it (i.e.: bundled) is not what defines an actively configured speaker (see my post above).
I agree!
Mike
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@rajugsw wrote:
My problem with active speaker designs is that they are not user serviceable after the warranty runs out. You cannot adapt the sound of the Speakers to your own taste either.
[...]
The JBL M2’s pictured above are actively configured speakers, yet the accompanying Crown amps with built-in DSP are outward to the speakers as amps would be with typical passively configured speakers. Most active speakers are configured as bundled packages, but it (i.e.: bundled) is not what defines an actively configured speaker (see my post above).
If you’re a bit of DIY’er (or can see yourself as such) you can assemble an actively configured setup with separate, outward components through and through like you would with a passive system, and get to learn setting the filter values by yourself. This way you’ll have the most elaborate set of "tone controls" at your disposal, yet as an integral part of the electronic or digital cross-over they’re without the detrimental effects found in the simplistic and sonically degrading tone controls that’re imposed over an existing passive setup.
As such, and with a bit of diligence, you can have your cake and eat it too.
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I don't understand why either design, active or passive, should be inherently better than the other (w.r.t. sound quality.) .My floor-standers are offered in both passive and active designs. I chose passive. I did not want almost all the system eggs in one big, heavy, expensive basket. If anything went wrong (probably more likely with the electronics) shipping them out for service would have been a real pain.
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@rajugsw , I understand your point about the benefits of external amps. You can adapt the sound of a lot of active speakers with built in controls on the plate amp (volume, treble, bass, crossover point, etc). For example, look at the back of this speaker in the pics on the website, you won't get that on a passive speaker:
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@esarhaddon , as for the value of going active here is what Soundstage said about the speakers I eventually bought when compared to a much more expensive speaker (without including the additional cost of the amp and speaker cables. YMMV):
And when you compare a much more expensive speaker, such as JMlab’s $7000 Mini Utopia, you’ll find that it has a much more luxurious appeal with a nicer finish (and given the price difference, this is to be expected). But when it comes to comparing the sound, again it is more about differences than one being better (although the Active/40s do have much better bass extension). The Mini Utopia is a bit more incisive, visceral and lively in the midrange and up top. The Active/40s, on the other hand, don’t jump out at you quite as much, and they are not quite as precise, but what they do well is play music superbly across the board with top-to-bottom coherency and balance.
https://www.soundstagenetwork.com/revequip/paradigm_active40.htm
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My problem with active speaker designs is that they are not user serviceable after the warranty runs out. You cannot adapt the sound of the Speakers to your own taste either.
Plate Amplifiers won't last twenty years without dying to my knowledge. Just look at all the great Subwoofers form 20 to 25 years ago. The plate Amps are dead and a swap in from Parts Express doesn't work or fit all the time. Will the manufacturer even support repairs should it fail ?
Stick with separates unless you are on a tight budget or with a manufacturer who'll support an out of warranty dead Amplifier after many years of service.
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I can see some benefit in isolated situations, but don't see a mainstream use for them.. You are actually expecting a $1,000 active speaker to have the sound quality seen from a $20,000 Amp-speaker Combo. Oh ya, you don' thave to pay $555 for a special speaker cable, But Oh ya, you still do. Unless you are opting for a wireless speaker then all you have to worry about is someone hacking you home for the sidewalk or the HAM operator next door totally overwhelming your Bluetooth signal.
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Just putting my thought out: aren’t passive capacitors and coils (C an L), and maybe even resistors causing a PHASE shift on passive crossovers, and NOT so using active crossovers?
This happens with active and passive crossovers. it is the natural outcome of using analog circuits to create high and low pass circuits as well as any equalizers. It is not distortion. The concern in either case is that the combined (electrical + acoustical) amplitude and phase match seamlessly across the crossover band.
In terms of design, crossover designers are creating to systems, drivers and circuits, which sum to a final result. Changes in amplitude go hand in hand with phase shifts. The one area where things get easier is in the active crossover we can ignore driver impedance as part of the equation. We pay attention strictly to driver amplitude and phase.
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Over many decades, I have listened and owned many, many speakers, trying to replicate the kind of live sound I was hearing in the mixing room of a friend's recording studio. My hunch is that crossovers are very damaging devices. After all, their goal is to kill music. I think they introduce some form of distortion that I don't like. Phase ? I don't know, but electrostatics sound clean to me, as well as the Dali Callisto 6C active I had. Last year I listented to ove half a milllion $ of speakers for my new home. In the end I chose Borrenses's Raidho X3. In this 2.5 speaker, there are two pairs of mid bass drivers. The designer MB explains that at the crossover points, there are distortions which attract the attention of the ears. Thus he did two things: make sure that at that point the measured SPL response is reduced, and that the volume of the other pair of drivers is louder than the pair which are crossing over . So to me these speakers sound clean, like if they were electrostatics, but with the focus and punch of dynamic drivers.
Active speakers, bi-amping and biwire are ways to avoind crossover distortion. Active speakers can be considerably more economical than their equivalent in separates for a given SQ.
But still it is possible and fun to tweak the sound with separates and wires of all kinds. My wires alone (Transparent Ultra with The Q concept 500 and Luna Red with Raidhos X3) are worth much more than the actve Dalis and Triangles I had.
The members of this Forum are probably inclined to follow this latter route. But in some applications, active speakers are certainly a good solution.
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Just putting my thought out: aren't passive capacitors and coils (C an L), and maybe even resistors causing a PHASE shift on passive crossovers, and NOT so using active crossovers?
In my mind, the question is active vs passive CROSSOVER.
40 years ago, we built our own active crossovers (and tri amped our Electro Voice (I think it was called a Sentry 3?) and made it sound great even on classic music). I know bought (still in box) a miniDSP 4x2HD with hopes it can provide a 2 or 3 way active crossover (to drive my Infinity Quantum 2 with seperate amps for the Watkin bass, mide cone and dome tweeter/EMIT tweeter (maybe tube amp?).
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The fun fact is that most studio monitors, i.e. the speakers the producers and sound engineers listen to while the music is being made, are active (near field) speakers.
Most of them don't use monitors to listen to music at home.
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[...] I asked him if he plans an active speaker.
His answer was a definitive and immediate "No". He said separates sound better.
Not knowing the rest of Mr. Borresen’s explanation on why he clearly favors passive over actively configured speakers, I’d say the above is a peculiar answer of his, and one that would seem not to take into account what ’active’ really entails. Because active can be "separates" as well, and coming down to it whether it’s a bundled or separate component solution of active is not what defines its overall merits and defined status as active; it’s that the cross-over (analogue electronic or digital/DSP) is situated prior to amplification as a signal I/O, and not as a passive cross-over on the output side of the amp between that and the drives.
@lonemountain wrote:
The additional wire and type of wire should NOT be passed over, there are many measurements to indicate the issues there. Dampening factor losses, power losses, capacitance added with length, etc are the simple issues. There are more complex ones as well. There is a long list of differences detailed by so many in cables, how can these differences suddenly not matter when discussing active vs passive?
Wiring is a factor, yes, and going by the active-as-separates solution that more or less mimics the component configuration of a passive setup (sans of course the addition of an active XO and extra amp channels, while not least subtracting the passive XO), wiring is still a consideration to factor in here. It would say though that the freedom it lends working with an active setup this way, while maintaining the traits that comes from filtering prior to amplification and the amp-to-driver-direct connection it offers, has so many things going for it that wiring is really the least of it. And yet it offers the individual from the passive "camp" who’s used to (and possibly enjoys) working with cables and their means as a tweaking device to retain this element into an active-as-separates setup, in which case the divide going from passive to active would come down to the essentials of filter settings - unless they’d been preset from a manufacturer to a given pair of speakers.
Ad 1). +1
Ad 2). +1
Ad 3). +1
Ad 4). It’s certainly about the importance of the location of circuitry in this case and what replacing it with another means. Subtracting circuitry from being situated between the amp and drivers and taking the whole of amplifier power is the essential aspect, while its addition on signal level prior to amplification is the least interfering part to place it while accommodating the superior amp to driver control without a passive XO interfering here.
Ad 5). True. That being said amp matching with drivers in an actively configured setup is a lot easier given the much more appropriate working conditions an amp is presented with here. With passive speakers it’s more or less all about finding an amp that is impervious to load, much more so with complex an wattage draining passive filters in many "high-end" speakers, and how the more pragmatic scenario of not finding an amp that is exactly that very much affects the overall presentation of sound coming from the speakers. It also feeds the market for expensive amps with sturdy PSU’s, progressively so with complex/heavily filtered high-end segment speakers. This is not to say amp matching in an actively configured scenario doesn’t matter, in fact this is where it can really be taken to another level, but the outset of working with amps here is much more favorable so that a fitting combination is more easily found. Many don’t take this into consideration.
However, an active speaker + amp manufacturer in many if not most cases is also confronted with the need to cut corners, and while fortunately they have the better outset working on amps in an active context and the specific tailoring that can be brought about here, it is also rare to see such a manufacturer use a pure class A amp feeding the MF/HF section for example, or otherwise going an extra mile with their amps that might add that smidgen of refinement some are looking for. In an active-as-separates configuration this is what you can do and have the freedom to pursue.
@erik_squires wrote:
A shout out to many audiophile tinkerers who enjoy configuring drivers and horns and multiple types of amplifiers and are constantly switching out to try something new. There is nothing wrong with that at all and you should enjoy it.
That’s very much me, sans the "constantly switching out to try something new" line. But thank you, I certainly enjoy the outcome of working with an active setup this way, i.e.: configuring drivers and horns with multiple types of amplifiers. Of course, some element of joy taking on this approach is necessitated, and I very much "subscribe" to that.
The reason though for my replying here is to stress the fact that even though this is how I am going about it (and I’m sure many others in a similar situation as well), it isn’t necessarily to say that a "constantly trying something new" aspect is what follows; actually, it’s not in the least the primary or even secondary motivation to embark on something like this. What is however is sonic outcome, and an active-as-separates solution is one to lend a degree of freedom and uninhibitedness to this endeavor that’s very rewarding to me. A bundled approach would be very stifling and limiting to me, although I can understand why manufacturers are heading this way (while I would encourage others to go the separates route).
"Tinkering" here is what comes from the necessity of working with an active-as-separates solution where finding amps, electronic/DSP XO, the proper speakers/driver/horn elements and not least setting filter values are of primary concern. This approach naturally calls for that, but at the end of the day it all comes from the desire to achieve great sound - uninhibitedly, unapologetically, and as something I don’t have to revisit all too frequently with regard to the setting up process. A small component change in the chain however can necessitate minute filter adjustments, and that’s not because of the need to change just for the sake of change, but because with a setup like this it’s what I can do to ameliorate an ever so slight sonic imbalance to bring back the overall presentation to where I find it’s supposed to be.
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The fun fact is that most studio monitors, i.e. the speakers the producers and sound engineers listen to while the music is being made, are active (near field) speakers.
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ATC makes nice actives and passives. I’ve only heard them at shows but preferred the actives.
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Speaker engineers, unlike audiophiles, are in no position to discount the advantages of active speakers. Andrew Jones tells us that in actives:
Each amplifier is matched to the driver, and only has to operate over a limited frequency range. It’s operating into a simpler impedance, so it’s not going to have high-current demands. Also, the temporal characteristics of music change with frequency. High frequencies require very little average power, but have a lot of peaks. Bass requires much higher average power, but has far fewer peaks. You can match the amplifier to those characteristics as well.
As a gesture to the audiophile penchant for experimentation, Jones’s ARB-5s forgo digital signal processing (DSP). He nevertheless acknowledges its advantages:
DSP is very versatile as a development tool. If I want to make a change to an analog crossover, I have to solder in new components. With DSP, I can push a few buttons, load in a new crossover profile, and a minute later, I can listen to it. In production, there are no tolerance issues with DSP the way there are with the parts in an analog crossover. With DSP, the crossover shape will be identical on every unit. I can provide a lot more equalization with a DSP, with very little degradation. With analog, every time I want to add another filter section, the signal has to go through another op-amp stage.
Plus DSP can adjust to a room’s particular acoustics; here both Kii and Dutch & Dutch are in the vanguard. And in all active speakers the specific frequencies for each specific driver “crossover” before amplification, yet another enhancement of audio design.
Other engineers echo these same points. Listen to Paul McGowan from PS Audio at 03:00, or Dynaudio’s Roland Hoffman at 03:20 and 13:06, or Meridian’s Bob Stuart. They all work for companies that sell passive speakers or equipment for them, but they all clearly favor the design opportunities found in actives.
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@dynamiclinearity, I agree, active speakers properly done is superior AND less expensive than a speaker/amp/speaker wire traditional route. Did you ever wonder that back in the day dealers found they could make more $$$ selling a sperate amp/speaker package so active speaker weren't given the time of day (except by the pros who used them in the studio)?
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It depends on how much $$ you have and how good or crappy your amp is. For a TV signal cheap actives are an upgrade to the TV speakers. On the other hand if you have a decent receiver and not much $$ passives may work for you. If you have tons of $$; like a lot of those on this site a really good receiver and great passive speakers are hard to beat ( w/ a good powered subwoofer). FYI comments by NOT an AUDIOPHILE!!
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Speakers are a reactive load meaning a combination of resistance, capacitance and inductance. Amplifiers don't like reactance. They want just resistance, alas. The less reactive the load the more the amp acts like its specs. An amplifier only needs to drive the reactance of the voice coil in an active speaker, a much easier load than a passive crossover with capacitors, resistors and inductors. Which load will the amps be happier with. It's obvious. Add in each amp doesn't have to drive the full audio bandwidth and a few other advantages, all things being equal it's no contest. An active speaker properly done is superior. The biggest problem is audiophiles think they can choose a passive speaker and amp combo better than a good designer can do a speaker combo. So active speakers are a hard sell. |
