I Was Considering Active, Then I Watched This ...


high-amp

Showing 5 responses by tobes

Hmm.....If you go onto YouTube and search 'Guttenberg active speakers'. You'll find he's made three almost identical video rants against active speakers in the past 2 years.
Maybe he's sponsored by the amp and speaker companies? - gotta maintain that status quo.
A lot of mis-information in that Guttenberg article.
Almost none of his generalisations are true of ATC.
- All amplification made in house and has been for decades
- No DSP, all analog active crossovers with class A/B output 
- exemplary reliability as required by around the clock studio use
- Service/replacement of active amps available for models that are decades old
Not sure if Steve is just ignorant or has gone soft in the head?


dave_b2,710 posts12-13-2020 2:41pm
So it’s a pissing match...and why?  Buy what you want and enjoy.  But passive is more fun!  Active is deterministic.
Indeed - I'm sure I could live happily with your JBL monitors.
Enough said. 

12-13-2020 dctom86 posts
Thanks douglas_schroeder
HiFi Critic, a respected UK mag, did a comparison between the standard passive ATC 50 and the standard active 50 version.
Worth noting that Martin Colloms appears to have done this 'comparison' based on memory/notes of the previously tested passive version - where he used amplifier/cables that doubled the cost of the active setup.
 
In Neil Gader's TAS review of the ATC SCM50aslt he substitutes the ATC passive crossover + ATC stereo amp for the active tri-amp pack and comments on the differences.
Neil preferred the active version (and bought it).
https://www.theabsolutesound.com/articles/atc-scm50-aslt-loudspeaker/
Anecdotally, I can't recall reading in any forum where an actual consumer compared the ATC active and passive models and preferred the latter, but I guess there must be some(?).

This is of course not to say that a particular passive setup can't outperform some other active one, or be preferred for some personal reason - that would be a ridiculous claim. 
However in an apples to apples comparison active speakers offer many real world performance advantages that make it difficult for  a passive counterpart to compete. 

musicaddict19 posts12-19-2020 4:30am
 to me it seems that active speakers with DSP have to be the wave of the future for many people for great reasons.
I think you are right.
If I was starting again active speakers with DSP like the Dutch & Dutch 8C and Kii 3 would be top of my list.