Go Active Crossover or Upgrade existing XOs?

It was recently suggested to me that rather than doing a crossover upgrade

I look into an active crossover for my Tannoy FSMs. Anyone experienced enough

to guide me? What advantages does active provide?

gadios12-09-2019 6:19am

Showing 4 responses by pragmasi

pragmasi Details Discussions Posts This discussion Message User 212 posts 12-09-2019 at 11:38am Copy Comment URL Report Comment Edit Delete An active crossover is implemented before the power amplifier so you need to have an amplifier for each driver. For this reason it is also referred to as Bi-Amping, Tri-Amping etc. A speaker with a passive crossover can present a complex and difficult load to the amplifier, taking into account the impedances of the drivers along with the inductance and capacitance in the crossover network. In most cases active will be a significant improvement. There's a good article here that describes in much more detail. Another advantage of active is that you don't need the enormous (and expensive) components required for passive. I'd suggest seeing if someone has already designed an active crossover for your speakers. Just to be clear I'm talking about active analogue crossovers (using op-amps), not DSP based.
pragmasi Details Discussions Posts This discussion Message User 212 posts 12-09-2019 at 09:15pm Copy Comment URL Report Comment Edit Delete Yep... difficult to design but not that difficult to copy.
pragmasi Details Discussions Posts This discussion Message User 212 posts 12-09-2019 at 06:26pm Copy Comment URL Report Comment Edit Delete I don't know why active loudspeakers haven't caught on in the consumer market, but there are many examples in recording studios. I have some active Genelec monitors which sound great as nearfields although they won't be to everyone's taste. Technically the benefits are compelling, but I understand why people might be sceptical given the enormous amount of BS in the audiophile world. Siegfried Linkwitz' LXmini speakers can be paired with Nelson Pass designed active crossovers... admittedly not that mainstream but I'm yet to read a bad review - and they're designed by two people with some 'audiophile' kudos. I agree with @erik_squires that active crossover design isn't that intuitive but it really isn't much more difficult than passive as long as you don't try to iron the frequency response completely flat with endless filters. If you're starting from scratch then it would probably be best to reverse engineer the existing crossover (or get someone to do that for you) and model it in DSP to use as a starting point. You can then make adjustments in software before re-creating the filters using analogue components (or getting someone to do that).
pragmasi Details Discussions Posts This discussion Message User 212 posts 12-10-2019 at 11:19am Copy Comment URL Report Comment Edit Delete Depending on the number of drivers you have (remember you'll need an amplifier channel for each one) you could look at one of the MiniDSP solutions. If you have three way speakers and are on a budget you could start by replacing the Mid / Bass crossover and leaving the Mid / High intact which would require a DSP with four outputs and four channels of amplification.

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