The disappearance of the traditional amplifier

An active monitor that is worth its salt will require a balanced input, like the ATC.

OTOH, field coils are making a huge comeback right now. Active speakers are not likely to see innovations like that since they are closed systems. So you are limited by the limits of the internal amp, and the drivers themselves.

IMO they have their place, and some of them are excellent, but they are a long, long way off from describing state-of-the-art!

Kirkus, you and I have similar ideas about monitors in studios. I use the High Emotion Audio S7- clearly the most revealing and neutral monitor to come along in a long time.

Regarding field coils, while the prior art was indeed integrated into cabinetry to reduce the power supply costs, modern FC systems usually have a regulated supply of their own. There are high excursion units now, beryllium-dome compression drivers and the like that simply did not exist 60 years ago. My understanding was the industry abandoned the art for the less expensive (and lessor performing) permanent magnet systems.

The reason I brought this up is that field coils are a rising star in high end audio right now and are an example of how having a closed system of amp and speaker will limit the ability of the end user to upgrade the system. If you recall the old powered Acoustats, the issue is similar- if you want a speaker that can play louder, or one that is **actually** full range (plays bass), or so on and so on, you have to change both the amp and speaker at the same time to get there.

Integrated systems have their place, especially when space is limited, but by definition they will never be state-of-the-art.

Hi Paulfolbrecht, I for one believe the FC technology to be generally superior, but like all other things in this sport, a lot relies on execution. So its dangerous to make generalizations on that account.

FWIW though, you can't really 'tune' the parameters once the motor is designed- if you have that ability, it means that the gap isn't saturated, and if the gap isn't saturated, the motor will not be performing very well, field coil or no.

Kirkus, I'll see what I can do. The modern 15 FC woofers made by Classic Audio have some very large motors too.

I've also heard Duke's speakers at length, and they perform with some of the very best and IMO perform well outside their price points. He definitely did his homework.

FWIW in the old days, field coils and a lot of the other in-house coils were made in a very different economic environment. If we are talking about the 1920s, for example, the dollar now buys less than 1/10th of what it did back then. As the buying power of paper money declined, the industry looked for economic solutions- IOW permanent magnets are a **lot** cheaper to build.

I have an old RCA FC speaker from the 30s that is purported to have about 18,000 gauss once energized. The magnet structure on the thing is immense- so large that it is used for mounting the speaker, not the basket. IOW it puts a lot of Lowthers and the like to shame.

Kirkus, if you can, try out a set of High Emotion Audio S-7s for near-field. They will give you very reliable information about what is going on in the recording- and no lobing effects if you happen to be off-axis. They have the widest dispersion I've seen- there are no powered speakers that can compete.