View Poll Results: which do you prefer?
active
42
85.71%
passive
7
14.29%
Voters: 49. You may not vote on this poll
active vs. passive
02-01-2009, 03:45 PM
#5
Passive sounds a little warmer...could be from the distortion...kind of like tube amps, it's cheaper usually, a no brainer in terms of set up, and can still sound as good or better (depends on your taste) than an active set up.
Active is cleaner, more accurate, and can be tweaked until you find a sound you like. It's usually more expensive as it requires extra amps, electronics (cross overs), and tuning/set up can be much harder to get right and requires more time and effort. The real advantage is in the flexibility of tuning for those that love to tweak....like me!
Active is cleaner, more accurate, and can be tweaked until you find a sound you like. It's usually more expensive as it requires extra amps, electronics (cross overs), and tuning/set up can be much harder to get right and requires more time and effort. The real advantage is in the flexibility of tuning for those that love to tweak....like me!
02-01-2009, 09:16 PM
#9
1000 Watt CAFz'r
Join Date: Oct 2003
Posts: 1,783
Without getting too technical, the 2 options make an amplifier behave differently. Think of wire and components as a sponge that sits between the amplifier and the speaker. The more components/wire, the less direct control the amplifier has over the diaphram movement. This affects how the combo sounds, but in many cases the effect is more desirable than the un-filtered response.
Probably the most prominent advocate of eliminating "crap" from between the amplifier and speaker is Meridian. They build home speakers that are a fed a digital signal direct from a controller, which is is then decoded and amplified by electronics mounted right next to each driver.
Personally I like well done active amplification, but you will have to spend a mint to surpass the sound quality of a well done passive setup with 1 quality amp. (Define amp quality however you may, I will term it here as having lots of power) I've used a few active crossovers that did more harm to the signal quality than a good passive setup. All of the active setups I've played with could play louder, and with seemingly greater dynamic range than a similiarily powered passive setup.
If you like cost effective SQ - Passive
If you like loud - Active
Unlimited budget with best SQ - High quality Active
Sure there a TON of incredible systems that use passive X..Os...but the question in my mind is: Could they be better with active control?
Probably the most prominent advocate of eliminating "crap" from between the amplifier and speaker is Meridian. They build home speakers that are a fed a digital signal direct from a controller, which is is then decoded and amplified by electronics mounted right next to each driver.
Personally I like well done active amplification, but you will have to spend a mint to surpass the sound quality of a well done passive setup with 1 quality amp. (Define amp quality however you may, I will term it here as having lots of power) I've used a few active crossovers that did more harm to the signal quality than a good passive setup. All of the active setups I've played with could play louder, and with seemingly greater dynamic range than a similiarily powered passive setup.
If you like cost effective SQ - Passive
If you like loud - Active
Unlimited budget with best SQ - High quality Active
Sure there a TON of incredible systems that use passive X..Os...but the question in my mind is: Could they be better with active control?
