Are active speakers still worthwhile?

[phoenixdogfan]

Let's look at it this way. For smaller monitor level speakers, many if not most of us, starting from scratch, would probably prefer something like the Genelecs, Neumann's, or possibly the Kii's or the D & D's. But, what is you have a big living room and want something that's both stylish and great sounding. Perhaps then a passive is what you're looking for. Toole and Amir have Studio 2's and Kal Rubinson has Blade II's, if that tells you anything.

As for Asci, I've already invested in a state of the art amp (Purifi Eval 1 Eigentact), a state of the art DAC (Octo Dac 8 Pro), and state of the art DSP (Dirac DLBC), along with 2 subs that can play at 100 db in my room (SVS SB-2000's), so for me the buying decision seems simple: Just get the best passive bookshelf I can afford. That's looking more and more like an ASCI A6B than anything else.

Active or passive is a function of the use case, and what equipment you already have. I think most audiophiles who have already invested literally thousands of dollars in their electronics are going to be very loathe to go to actives, especially if they have to sell their amps and dacs at steep losses, and who can rightly blame them when there are so many outstanding passive designs on the market?

 

[Bruce Morgen]

Let's look at it this way. For smaller monitor level speakers, many if not most of us, starting from scratch, would probably prefer something like the Genelecs, Neumann's, or possibly the Kii's or the D & D's. But, what is you have a big living room and want something that's both stylish and great sounding. Perhaps then a passive is what you're looking for. Toole and Amir have Studio 2's and Kal Rubinson has Blade II's, if that tell you anything.

As for Asci, I've already invested in a state of the art amp (Purifi Eval 1 Eigentact), a state of the art DAC (Octo Dac 8 Pro), and state of the art DSP (Dirac DLBC), along with 2 subs that can play at 100 db in my room (SVS SB-2000's), so for me the buying decision seems simple: Just get the best passive bookshelf I can afford. That's looking more and more like an ASCI A6B to me than anything else.

Active or passive is a function of the use case, and what equipment you already have. I think most audiophiles who have already invested literally thousands of dollars in their electronics are going to be very loathe to go to actives, especially if they have to sell their amps and dacs at steep losses, and who can rightly blame them when there are so many outstanding passive designs on the market?

I could definitely endure a pair Kii Threes in my living room 24/7/365. IMO speakers don't have to look like furniture to be stylish AF, so I guess I'm just a "form follows function" sort of guy.

 

[Salt]

With modern design tools like vcad, you can pretty much get yourself within the ballpark of only needing to modify a few caps and resistors which should only be a few dollars. Once you get it, the speaker filter is set for life.


I had a very nice, albeit complicated active setup where the filtering was done in my computer. It sounded great, but my was a pain to manage. Good DSP units were just out of my budget. Sometimes a cat would walk by and knock a volume knob out of place and then I'd have to whip out the measurement mic and get everything back into place. Of course this only a DIY active problem.

My life demanded a bit of simplicity so I converted everything to passive filtering. Didn't care for the initial leap of faith buying xover components but the extensive measurement and design process resulted in a great speaker.

Not bad for first passive speaker ever if I do say so myself.

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Looks very good at first glance, congratulations.
Coming from that passive side with all that impedance, resistance and whatever caveats, it's a lot easier to create xovers on the fly with DSP and each transducer at it's own amp, but success is not guaranteed.
At the moment I'm working on the ESS AMT and it's a real beast ... would have given up without DSP, though measurements looked fine but listening could not fulfil the high level of expectation.

 

[Vacceo]

Absolutely nothing, but it is the reason I do not use active speakers, as I explained in my first post on the matter.

The point I was, obviously badly, making back then was that for me the undoubted benefits of available active speakers are not great enough for me to change because they are not great enough, IME, to compensate for the lack of the rotary volume control on the remote control of my amp and my passive speakers which I still like.

What I was trying to say is after a certain point ergonomics trumps pure performance for me be it hifi or cars or anything else.
I have 6 active speakers in this room but only use 4 of them in the 5.1 lash up for films the other 2 I should sell.

The Kii´s have a nice knob in their hub. That said, we have, again ,the issue of multichannel that your Marantz currently acomplishes.

 

[Cbdb2]

I think everything that is metal is forbidden.
The cables inside the tubes* are single so a cable like Romex should not be allowed in a fixed and certified system.
Obviously I am referring to the electric current.
A signal cable, telephone, Ethernet, etc. as long as it goes through its tube alone is exactly the cable we see every day.

*
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In Canada and I believe many states romex is used in houses and small apartment buildings but its not code for any other spaces. Everywhere else you have to run power cable in metal conduit (grounded) or use armoured cable (flexible metal shield).

 

[alankila]

However, with modern science-based speaker designs, we can see even affordable speakers like the C6B providing very linear frequency performance. I'm wondering how active speakers will differentiate and overcome some of their inherent challenges, namely: 1. Serviceability if the amplifier inside goes bad; 2. Hassle of powering two speakers; 3. Keeping software updated to keep them running.

1. You can repair devices, provided it isn't welded shut. A generic electrician is likely able to figure out if a cap has busted, transistor shortcircuited, or a chip broken down. This line of thinking seems to contain the assumption that you would not repair the amp, but rather would buy a new one. I'm not sure if this is genuinely an issue that warrants the concern it seems to have. I guess active speakers do lose on this metric because you can't just power the thing with a different amp that you might have laying around, so I'll concede this one.

2. Multiple cables are annoying, yes. Power and signal wires don't necessarily all go to the same destination, so depending on situation this can mean having to route double the cables. I think, however, that in most case speakers area always near outher equipment like TVs, monitors and computers, so it's all plugged into same power strips that are already there. Maybe other people have different setups, I don't know.

3. Software updates usually aren't needed to keep something running. Maybe if it was connected to network and presents an internet-of-things type attack surface, then it is a bigger concern. I do update my active speakers if new firmwares are provided, but I think they generally speaking play exactly the same as before especially if the firmware update hasn't been applied?

Edit: scratch that reply to #3. I've generally found updates to be useful. They are a means for manufacturer to fix defects, e.g. update DSP, provide new capabilities post-purchase, and add new features. All these things have happened to me with multiple manufacturers, like Genelec, Wiim and Adam. I think updates are generally a good thing.

 

[Bruce Morgen]

I think, however, that in most case speakers area always near outher equipment like TVs, monitors and computers

One is exception is rear surround speakers -- much easier to manage with passives for that job IMO.

 

[Frank Dernie]

Don't the Phantom's come with a sort of rotary volume control?

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It is an optional extra I was quite excited about but it didn't work anywhere as well as I hoped when I tried it. Maybe it is better now but mine are hardware incompatible with the latest firmware and maybe this too. It would be just the thing if it worked for me

 

[fbirch]

Do any active speaker manufacturers offer wireless connectivity for the signal path? I realize there would be latency, but if it's the same for both speakers (or all N speakers in a multichannel setup), it shouldn't matter. That would at least eliminate one set of cables that need to be run to each speaker.

 

[Ktacos]

Do any active speaker manufacturers offer wireless connectivity for the signal path?

Yeah plenty of them do. Kef has a few, Dynaudio as well.

 

[Salt]

Do any active speaker manufacturers offer wireless connectivity for the signal path? I realize there would be latency, but if it's the same for both speakers (or all N speakers in a multichannel setup), it shouldn't matter. That would at least eliminate one set of cables that need to be run to each speaker.

KEF, Electrocompaniet, Teufel, Sonos .... just search the web.

 

[TimW]

Do any active speaker manufacturers offer wireless connectivity for the signal path? I realize there would be latency, but if it's the same for both speakers (or all N speakers in a multichannel setup), it shouldn't matter. That would at least eliminate one set of cables that need to be run to each speaker.

Check out WiSa

 

[Vacceo]

Check out WiSa

8 channels in the age of Atmos is still quite low. Hopefully they´ll push it to 15-16 (to include subwoofers, that is).

 

[Esprit]

It is an optional extra I was quite excited about but it didn't work anywhere as well as I hoped when I tried it

 

[Kal Rubinson]

8 channels in the age of Atmos is still quite low. Hopefully they´ll push it to 15-16 (to include subwoofers, that is).

In the works, I've heard.

 

[Esprit]

Check out WiSa

But what about latency? It might be irrelevant for listening to music, but what about videos?

 

[Waxx]

The best is active but with the amps outside the speaker i think. That is how i run my main setup now and it got all the advantages of active, but with flexibility of amp choice and maintenance of passive speakers. But then you got more devices off course. But with modern amps that can be small it can be smaller than most old ampliferss in total space it takes. My amps are smaller Ncore amps (in size and wattage) and a MiniDSP flex as preamp/dsp/dac.

And well done passive can be better than most active. The passive JBL 4367's of my girlfriend (amped with a NAD Purify amp with DIRAC) is better than most active i know, and those Ascilabs look also like that. But it needs to be done right, and that is very often the problem. Passive crossovers are the most difficult part of speaker design (at least to do it right), and many, even big brands with a good reputation, don't do it right. Active doing it right is a lot easier.

 

[Frank Dernie]

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I am familiar with a small number of wired product specific volume knobs, specifically Genelec and Kii - both of which I would consider - but I am happy with the performance of what I have and any improvement in SQ I might get from going active is not worth it for the price/longevity balance or ergonomics of any bar Genelec and Kii.

 

[Bjorn]

The answer is a big yes. Due to time alignment (very important), better dynamics, a better crossover, lower bass extension, and it opens up the door to designs that isn't possible with passive and which can improve the speaker substantially.

However, personally I think active with external electronics is the very best option.

 

[Behrelec 37]

I have had active speakers of different brands non-stop since at least the early 2000s. Before that, there were passive speakers and the last one I think was a passive three-way tower speaker with an 8 inch bass/8 ohm. 30-210w continuous power.

As I recall, Yamaha was driving them with a 250w amplifier.That was back in 1995 when the bass was always booming and the speakers were running out of power and distortion started to constantly come through them when playing music. Those passive speakers were terrible shit. After my friend bought active speakers, there has been no going back, not even in the slightest consideration, to the stone age of passive speakers.