Is Bi - amping worth the trouble?

That speaker is not that large, and may not need tons of current for very satisfying listening levels.. The advantage of bi-amp is too balance out a top heavy speaker for the most part, loaning an entire channel to take on the bass drivers to relieve that saturation to the highs and mids.. It will be very dependent on the amps, and speakers reaction to it whether it will be worth it.

Honestly its tuff to find Biamping always better, but in some situation it could sound better. It would not probably hurt at all if using 4 exact same channels, however might not have enough advance for you to keep the investment into it. However definatley ACTIVE bi-amping, which will be at least removing your passive Crossovers from the Woofer section can be a whole different thing, and yes if you active the whole speaker you can juice more out of the finer points of discrete channels.

However again the cost and the needed equipment, Tuning, and Time can outweigh the the "Is it worth it factor". Try it first with 2 identicle amps simply hooked thru the passive crossovers. see if you wish to proceed, its the only way, you have to hear the investment or forget it.

Maineiac, your confusing something, those are Active Sub systems in the DB99.. Not really a biamp, its basically a seperate electronic crossed over system. Yes Active bi-amping can be effective like the db99, however we are talking about a passive standard 3 way type crossover with 2 amps hooked up. Different application in the end.

If you can run Solid state on the bottom with LEVEL controls, which many do not unless running a pro audio amp than you will have difficulty matching up gain with a tube amp on top.. YES there are still benefits of running 2 of the same amps in a verticle bi-amp config, this is because you will still have dedicated Current running to just the bass drivers not sharing it with the upper end. However it can be as explained here to some more accurate degree very little advance, unless it is just the right amp speaker combo it could be substantial even in a passive crossover system. The VK 500 you have in question is a Dual mono with dedicated power supplys to each channel I believe, so Having 4 Dedicated transformers, with Hi current and Higher Capacitance per channel can be better even with the same 2 amps... Also, I totally agree that DO NOT bridge and expect better results, the Verticle bi-amping with 4 channels should prove to sound better anyway, but you could experiment both ways if you have the amps that can bridge in the first place.

Blindjim, you want a plug and play? Cheapest possible? Here you go, simply run your BAT on the Mid / High section.. Remove the jumpers of course on the speakers, and By a CROWN K series digital Pro power amp, it has about 1k watts per channel so you will have no problem with bass slam and transparency, and they can be found cheap on ebay and things(around 600 plus used).. Also it is digital so it runs dead quiet, No heat, tons of power for Live concerts because that is what they are used for, many people use these for subwoofer setups in real hiend theaters and 2 channel.

Now it also has Level knobs built right into it so you can adjust the gain on the amp to match up to the bass output you want without effecting the output of the Bat or anything at all for that matter.. However you will need to run a balanced cable cause they only have XLR and maybe 1/4" connectors on them. It is possible however unless your preamp has 4 volt output which it could very well be if using balanced XLR outputs on it, than you might not get full gain output of a PRO amplifier, cause most consumer products could be only 2 volt output which is half and I believe the crown will be looking for a 4 volt signal for 100% gain from it.

This is as plug and play as it gets, you just need another outlet open on the wall to plug the new amp in, and another pair of balanced cheap XLR cables, and another pair of copper 10 gauge lamp cord speaker cables... It will be damn powerfull that much is guaranteed.

Well, in all honesty you might just be best off finding a more liquid sounding Preamp instead of neutral dark and punchy.. The bats are very good, but most of the stuff I listened to them with were on the more Damped sounding speakers like Dynaudio which mixed very well with the BAT tube sound... with the liver sounding speaker you have The VK 500 I don't think is your problem, maybe try a conrad johnson or Cary preamp with some tubey type tubes.. Mullards, Telefunken or something and see what happens. Then worry if bi-amping is a real need.

The Vac will be louder cause you eliminated all that loss in crossover on the lows, and the fact you are not driving lows with it now at all, but the crossover itself was probably soaking up 50% plus of the power in the amps power supply, so its got a lot more headroom in reserve. Yeah biamping if done right with good speakers and amps can definatly have advantage's.