Why not active?

Phelonious Ponk · Jul 2, 2010

Sean - you are one of the few who are in a really good position to answer this question, so here goes: Why have active speaker systems failed to catch on in consumer audio?

I'm personally a big fan, to the point where I believe it is very difficult for passive systems to equal good active ones in anything close to a fair comparison. Sure, a big pair of passive floor standers can move more air, and produce a greater scale, perhaps, than a good pair of active monitors and a well-integrated sub, but the advantages of the elimination of passive crossovers and the perfect match of individual amplifiers to the loads of individual drivers can offer advantages, not only in control and clarity, but in price/performance, that are obvious and very audible. Make it a pair of subs and the advantages of the big floor-standers vanish.

Why do you suppose they've failed to make it into the home market in any significant numbers?

P

JackD201 · Jul 2, 2010

I can say as a consumer why I haven't taken a shine to actives but sadly I am in no position to do so for anybody else.

Factor 1 AC Power. Placement becomes difficult because each speaker needs an outlet. This makes satisfying the significant other more difficult. Speaker cables are bad enough, add power cords to the mix and the "Speaker of the House" will go nuts.

Factor 2 I like mixing and matching amps and loudspeakers. I simply can't do this with an active.

Phelonious Ponk · Jul 2, 2010

JackD201 said:
I can say as a consumer why I haven't taken a shine to actives but sadly I am in no position to do so for anybody else.

Factor 1 AC Power. Placement becomes difficult because each speaker needs an outlet. This makes satisfying the significant other more difficult. Speaker cables are bad enough, add power cords to the mix and the "Speaker of the House" will go nuts.

Factor 2 I like mixing and matching amps and loudspeakers. I simply can't do this with an active.

My cable count is WAY down with the active system (stereo only). I can understand the fun in tweaking and synergizing, it's just that after a few experiences I've had to admit that the engineers who design the better active systems are much better at it than I am.

P

Gregadd · Jul 2, 2010

Powered subs are ubiquitous. High frequencies are much more subjective. Hence the tube/ solid state debate. I think manufactures are loathe to make that choice for you. With that said Meridian offers an excellent wireless active speaker system that has won an award.
Also Sanderssound offers a dedicated amp but its optional.

cjfrbw · Jul 2, 2010

JackD201 said:
I can say as a consumer why I haven't taken a shine to actives but sadly I am in no position to do so for anybody else.

Factor 1 AC Power. Placement becomes difficult because each speaker needs an outlet. This makes satisfying the significant other more difficult. Speaker cables are bad enough, add power cords to the mix and the "Speaker of the House" will go nuts.

Factor 2 I like mixing and matching amps and loudspeakers. I simply can't do this with an active.

Well, it is "easier" to use a single external crossover, but not necessarily better for the response. I don't really believe in the power cord kool aid, so that is not a a problem for me. Also, using the best possible amplifier for each driver, whether or not it is the "same" amplifier, is one of the advantages of an active crossover, not a problem. I think aural discontinuities in this situation tend to be more imagined than real.
What could be worse than torturing your amplifier with a big glop of huge caps and coils that create complex impedance behaviors? Speakers and amplifiers will respond better as a rule with direct hookup between, and you will get a faster, more direct rendition from both amp and speaker.
That being said, passive crossovers do seem to give a sense of uniformity to the sound field, possibly because the elements of the crossover itself have become the arbiter of the sound rather than speakers and amplifiers.
Remember, the compromise of passive crossovers was an efficiency move, not a sound quality move, in the original speakers where high fidelity sources required using speakers with narrower frequency response range. Passive crossovers are a compromised design characteristic increasingly well implemented over time with better speakers and sources. It simply allows placing all the speakers and elements into a single box to use with a single amp, it wasn't for maximum sound quality, it was for convenience and packaging.

tonmeister2008 · Jul 2, 2010

Phelonious Ponk said:
Sean - you are one of the few who are in a really good position to answer this question, so here goes: Why have active speaker systems failed to catch on in consumer audio?

I'm personally a big fan, to the point where I believe it is very difficult for passive systems to equal good active ones in anything close to a fair comparison. Sure, a big pair of passive floor standers can move more air, and produce a greater scale, perhaps, than a good pair of active monitors and a well-integrated sub, but the advantages of the elimination of passive crossovers and the perfect match of individual amplifiers to the loads of individual drivers can offer advantages, not only in control and clarity, but in price/performance, that are obvious and very audible. Make it a pair of subs and the advantages of the big floor-standers vanish.

Why do you suppose they've failed to make it into the home market in any significant numbers?

P

For me, active speakers have so many advantages (price, performance, usability, configurability, portability) that they will have to eventually replace passive speakers.

Add to that a speaker that is wireless (e.g. the new IEEE AVB protocol handles both wired and wireless HD multichannel audio + video over Ethernet) you simply plug it into the wall, and it automatically configures and calibrates itself to the system as a main theater speaker or as part of zone ( kitchen/bedroom/outdoor speaker) --whatever you want it to be. Every audio component in your house intelligently communicates with each other via TCP/IP so that you can control your music and the system's parameters (volume, surround mode, etc) at your computer or a remote like an iPhone or iPad. Imagine a speaker consisting of an array of powered speakers with DSP where the directivity/beam of the speakers can be adapted and optimized to the setup conditions (loudspeaker/listener placement, room acoustics,etc). Something like Wave Field Synthesis requires many small powered loudspeakers to recreate or approximate the sound field of the original acoustic event in your room.

These types of scenario are hard to realize with a "dumb" passive speaker that has no amplifier/DSP or the ability to calibrate itself and communicate with the rest of the system.

I'm not sure why active speakers have not caught on in consumer audio, when they are so popular in pro applications. Of course, active speakers are the standard for computer/multimedia/mobile audio products. Within the high-end audiophile community, I'm sure many customers want to be able to tweak/swap out their amplifiers and have that added flexibility. High-end amplifier companies certainly don't want to encourage active speakers unless they get in that business too. I also don't think the performance benefits of active speakers have been well explained or marketed to consumers.

For the other 90-95% of the audio market, today the driving purchase factors are price,ease of use and setup and form factor, which active speakers can potentially deliver in spades. The fact that there are potential performance improvements to be realized will be icing on the cake. For some market segments, these performance improvements will be very important factors in their purchase decisions.

audioguy · Jul 2, 2010

JackD201 said:
I can say as a consumer why I haven't taken a shine to actives but sadly I am in no position to do so for anybody else.

Factor 1 AC Power. Placement becomes difficult because each speaker needs an outlet. This makes satisfying the significant other more difficult. Speaker cables are bad enough, add power cords to the mix and the "Speaker of the House" will go nuts.

Factor 2 I like mixing and matching amps and loudspeakers. I simply can't do this with an active.

With a dedicated room that was wired (power and interconnects) for speakers everywhere, that is not an issue for me. And in fact, just went the active route.

I played the mix and match game for 40 years. Some results were better than others but it costs a lot of money, time and frustration (in addition to the excitement of getting new toys). Quite frankly, I now just want to listen to music and not screw around with the hardware that produces it. I have found active speakers that do everything I need and am not looking back.

Mark Seaton · Jul 2, 2010

Phelonious Ponk said:
Sean - you are one of the few who are in a really good position to answer this question, so here goes: Why have active speaker systems failed to catch on in consumer audio?

I'm personally a big fan, to the point where I believe it is very difficult for passive systems to equal good active ones in anything close to a fair comparison. Sure, a big pair of passive floor standers can move more air, and produce a greater scale, perhaps, than a good pair of active monitors and a well-integrated sub, but the advantages of the elimination of passive crossovers and the perfect match of individual amplifiers to the loads of individual drivers can offer advantages, not only in control and clarity, but in price/performance, that are obvious and very audible. Make it a pair of subs and the advantages of the big floor-standers vanish.

Why do you suppose they've failed to make it into the home market in any significant numbers?

P

To add to Sean's comments as another maker of active loudspeakers, there are many hurdles which have been created by the huge marketing efforts over the years. One simple aspect is that suddenly you see the price of your amplification in the speaker total. When sold as separate boxes, it is easier for many to digest/rationalize. Where pricing is less significant a determinant, the percieved flexibility or lack-there-of is something that makes many audiophiles uneasy. Many audiophiles are also still hardware addicts, and that's one less box they get to buy, show off, or select.

As we start to see some of the potential flexibility that Sean describes become easier to control by mere mortals, I expect we might finally see a larger shift as the gear can be replaced with function and adjustments. I'm a tiny player in the grand scheme, but my choice to offer powered speakers came about from not just the active/passive advantages, but equally so the frustration in delivering to customers the full capability of a design. With a subwoofer we can close the loop pretty well to consider and plan for most variables. As my primary target was large dedicated theaters, I decided I would eliminate the situation of a customer spending significant money on a very capable speaker which could easily put 500-2000W of amplification to use only to have them scratching their head when they connect it to some fancy 100-150W/ch amplifier. The final deciding factor was the ability to speed development where crossover changes happen by a few mouse clicks vs. ordering passive parts, soldering, and comparing between incremental values. There is a lot of peace of mind had in knowing that each customer has the full capability of the speaker on tap at the turn of a dial.

If only that peace of mind wasn't so disturbed by grounding and shielding nightmares!

Bruce B · Jul 2, 2010

We have 2 rooms in the studio. One room has powered speakers (Focal 5.1) and the other room has Evo A. MM3. Both rooms have the best acoustics available. Thinking about it, the Evo's have powered bottom ends. Before that, we had WATT/Puppys. We moved the Focals in the other room and got great results. The jury is out here. We could go either way. The only caveat is that a lot of designers skimp in the power supply/amp section. I know there are a lot of good Class D amps out there. Just think if a manuf. partnered their powered speakers with some Great Class A or Tube amps... one can only dream!

amirm · Jul 2, 2010

JackD201 said:
Factor 1 AC Power. Placement becomes difficult because each speaker needs an outlet. This makes satisfying the significant other more difficult. Speaker cables are bad enough, add power cords to the mix and the "Speaker of the House" will go nuts.

Not all active speakers have the amp in them. Wisdom for example uses outboard amplification and so does the higher end Genelecs.

Factor 2 I like mixing and matching amps and loudspeakers. I simply can't do this with an active.

I have listened to Wisdom with third-party amps and they do sound better. So for the high-end part of the market, neither one of these is a real limitation.

Phelonious Ponk · Jul 2, 2010

tonmeister2008 said:
For me, active speakers have so many advantages (price, performance, usability, configurability, portability) that they will have to eventually replace passive speakers.

Add to that a speaker that is wireless (e.g. the new IEEE AVB protocol handles both wired and wireless HD multichannel audio + video over Ethernet) you simply plug it into the wall, and it automatically configures and calibrates itself to the system as a main theater speaker or as part of zone ( kitchen/bedroom/outdoor speaker) --whatever you want it to be. Every audio component in your house intelligently communicates with each other via TCP/IP so that you can control your music and the system's parameters (volume, surround mode, etc) at your computer or a remote like an iPhone or iPad. Imagine a speaker consisting of an array of powered speakers with DSP where the directivity/beam of the speakers can be adapted and optimized to the setup conditions (loudspeaker/listener placement, room acoustics,etc). Something like Wave Field Synthesis requires many small powered loudspeakers to recreate or approximate the sound field of the original acoustic event in your room.

These types of scenario are hard to realize with a "dumb" passive speaker that has no amplifier/DSP or the ability to calibrate itself and communicate with the rest of the system.

I'm not sure why active speakers have not caught on in consumer audio, when they are so popular in pro applications. Of course, active speakers are the standard for computer/multimedia/mobile audio products. Within the high-end audiophile community, I'm sure many customers want to be able to tweak/swap out their amplifiers and have that added flexibility. High-end amplifier companies certainly don't want to encourage active speakers unless they get in that business too. I also don't think the performance benefits of active speakers have been well explained or marketed to consumers.

For the other 90-95% of the audio market, today the driving purchase factors are price,ease of use and setup and form factor, which active speakers can potentially deliver in spades. The fact that there are potential performance improvements to be realized will be icing on the cake. For some market segments, these performance improvements will be very important factors in their purchase decisions.

If you build them, we will come!

Seriously, the advantages of well-designed active systems seem huge to me, but consider the source -- I spent a decade listening almost exclusively to reference headphones. When I returned to speakers, all I seemed to be able to hear, even in some very good speakers, was this edge in the midrange that was completely absent in my headphones. I thought it was lack of headroom, but wattage and current didn't solve it, then, when told that I might be sensitive to the distortions of passive crossovers, I started listening to pro monitors. Then I found a pair with built-in preamp and DAC. Now I run lossless files straight from my MacBook pro to the speakers. I may try other active options (I'd love to hear a pair of Linkwitz Orions) but i'll never go back to passive systems.

Phelonious Ponk

mep · Jul 4, 2010

Call me old school I guess. I can't help but think I am not going to buy an active speaker with an amp the quality of my Jadis built in. It is most probably some Class D switching amp made from frosty ICE cubes which I guess is fine if your music source is digital. It's just one more switcher in the digital chain of switches. Some of those that love the digits have eliminated their preamp by going straight into their amp(s). I guess the next logical step is to eliminate the amp as a stand-alone product and have it built into the speakers. Less wires to deal with and one more step down the "look ma, no hands" approach to music reproduction that some people crave. This is starting to remind me of the Bose commercial for one of their shit-boxes that they claim eliminates the need for the separate components that normally make up a stereo system because they built all of the magic in one box and their tiny little speakers will fill your room with sound just like a real stereo. I guess the next step will be to eliminate the speakers entirely. You will get a D/A chip implanted in your brain with built in wi-fi and you will just stream the music straight into your brain and bypass that pesky listening room.

Mark

Really, it is great that we have so many choices in audio. There truly is something for everyone.

Phelonious Ponk · Jul 4, 2010

mep said:
Call me old school I guess. I can't help but think I am not going to buy an active speaker with an amp the quality of my Jadis built in. It is most probably some Class D switching amp made from frosty ICE cubes which I guess is fine if your music source is digital. It's just one more switcher in the digital chain of switches. Some of those that love the digits have eliminated their preamp by going straight into their amp(s). I guess the next logical step is to eliminate the amp as a stand-alone product and have it built into the speakers. Less wires to deal with and one more step down the "look ma, no hands" approach to music reproduction that some people crave. This is starting to remind me of the Bose commercial for one of their shit-boxes that they claim eliminates the need for the separate components that normally make up a stereo system because they built all of the magic in one box and their tiny little speakers will fill your room with sound just like a real stereo. I guess the next step will be to eliminate the speakers entirely. You will get a D/A chip implanted in your brain with built in wi-fi and you will just stream the music straight into your brain and bypass that pesky listening room.

Mark

Really, it is great that we have so many choices in audio. There truly is something for everyone.

Well, it depends on what you think of as quality. First of all, the better actives use A/B amps, not class D. Do they have the same "quality" as audiophile-grade amps? No. An audiophile (or a decent, high-current midfi, for that matter) amp has no idea what speakers will be used, what kind of crossovers they will have, what load it will be expected to drive. So they are quite deliberately over built, which can be very impressive (and very inefficient and very ineffective and very expensive). If that's what you mean by "quality," you aren't likely to find it, even in the best actives. If superior clarity and control, lower noise and distortion, better dynamics and transient response are what you mean by quality, it is there for you. It's not even a fair contest. In an active system, the engineer knows exactly what the amp is going to be up against and chooses or designs accordingly. In an amp designed for passive speakers, who knows what passive speakers, the quality designer has no real choice but to build a Mack truck that he's sure can pull just about anything up any hill. And of course a Ferrari may have been the better choice. It's a big part of the reason why audiophiles spend so much time and money chasing synergy.

P

JackD201 · Jul 5, 2010

Before one dismisses passive XOs one has to take into account the quality of the active electronic crossovers that will replace them as well.

JonFo · Jul 5, 2010

I'm a HUGE advocate for active speakers. After progressing along the continuum of passive single amped units all the way up to custom, multi-way amplified DSP speaker processor based actives; I can vouch for the significant benefits actives provide.

The biggest win is getting rid of the passive crossovers. Why anyone who even stops to consider the quality of a speaker cable would not want to immediately ditch the hundreds of feet of power robbing, phase skewing and other distortion inducing components inside the passive crossover is beyond me.

Passives are a huge compromise and have significant side-effects, like raising the resistance on woofers, which kills the damping factor and loads the amp more than needed.

With actives, especially tunable actives, one can improve not only the intra-speaker behaviors, but the all important speaker to room interface as well.

Benefits such as limiting and dynamic EQ can make a speaker perform at its ideal across a large range of SPL than otherwise. This is a huge win as one can maintain a low-distortion and smooth spectrum profile across a wide range of volume levels.

To me, the only way to achieve utmost audio reproduction quality is with a full active setup. Ideally, a tunable one (whether direct parameter management or via DRC).

JonFo · Jul 5, 2010

While Meridian’s and Genelcs are great, I think there is still one more step that can be taken to optimize the signal path, and that is to eliminate the separate D/A step and go digital all the way to the drivers terminals by using Direct Digital amps such as those found in the NAD M2.

With that, one could have a pure digital stream from source, through the preamp / processor (and its DRC) through the active crossovers and directly into the amps.

With the benefit of knowing exactly what the speaker driver/enclosure does, the amp (and /or upstream processing) can be tuned to deliver exactly the amount of power and correction needed to ensure uniform low-distortion driver performance.

Phelonious Ponk · Jul 5, 2010

JackD201 said:
Before one dismisses passive XOs one has to take into account the quality of the active electronic crossovers that will replace them as well.

You'd have to go pretty far out of your way to design or buy an active crossover that wasn't cleaner than just about any passive crossover network out there, but of course you must consider the quality of the active system. There are plenty of them out there, particularly small, inexpensive ones, with the trebles juiced-up to create the illusion of detail and the mid-bass boosted to create the illusion of extension. And to get good extension, you have to integrate a sub into your room well (unless you're willing to invest in an active mains or large mid-field system for your home). Last but not least, there are all of the usual speaker preference issues -- 2-way/3-way, tweeter types, materials, crossover points, venting, etc. You can't just go buy something with amps built in and suddenly have maximized your listening experience. But if you buy a truly active system from one of the quality manufacturers, even without listening first, you will have eliminated a plethora of problems audiophiles have struggled with for decades.

Dynaudios are a good place for audiophiles to start listening in my opinion. They are not as revealing as some, but very well-done, get at all the active advantages, are voiced on the warm side, and are very easy to listen to. See your local music store for an audition. Sam Ash is a Dyna dealer. Guitar Center probably is as well.

P

P

JackD201 · Jul 5, 2010

You think? I've worked sound reinforcement Ponk. There are a lot of dogs out there in active crossover land. If you think slicing up line level into three or four bands with active Q, slope and gain control is simple, think again. In an analog active crossover what you have is very similar to three or four parametric EQs in a chain. A dirty potentiometer alone could screw everything up. So let's not jump the gun here. I stand by what I said....

Before one dismisses passive XOs one has to take into account the quality of the active electronic crossovers that will replace them as well.

mep · Jul 5, 2010

JonFo said:
Benefits such as limiting and dynamic EQ can make a speaker perform at its ideal across a large range of SPL than otherwise. This is a huge win as one can maintain a low-distortion and smooth spectrum profile across a wide range of volume levels.

Here we go. Now we want our magic active speakers to have built in digital eq to be a limiter and provide "dynamic EQ" as well. I also need to start buying my speakers at my local music store or big chain boxes like Sam Ash. In my thread called analog apologist I jokingly referred to lovers of all things digital as digital heathens. I should have referred to the digital lovers as digital devils. When you want to build in a limiter/compresser to your playback chain, you need to be cast out of analog heaven until you repent for your digital sins. JonFo is just the type of guy I am designing the implantable D/A converter I mentioned in my above post.

JonFo · Jul 5, 2010

Hi mep, good post, I was grining ear to ear

Now, do you drive a car with manual spark advance and a single barrel carburetor?

Because that’s what I see the equivalent in terms of analog audio vs today’s (note that I refer to current state of the art) digital based actives.

Just like a modern engine, with full computer control of spark and direct injected fuel, where the computer monitors dozens of inputs and applies ever-varying spark and fuel maps to the process of ensuring the engine is in its optimum performance zone for the conditions.

Why would I not want that for my audio system as well?

Limiting is a good thing. An engine computer applies a rev-limiter to keep overenthusiastic drivers from blowing up their engines. I use limiters on my Infinite baffle sub and woofers so as to not fry the voice coils or damage the spiders through over-excursion, and more importantly, to ensure the system does not exceed my low-distortion goals.
I’d rather have my subs output limited than have it distort 10 or 20% (like many do, even when not pushed that hard). I overbuild the output capability to ensure it DOES stay in my low-distortion un-limited state.

Dynamic EQ in an active can be part of the goal of achieving consistent frequency response across the full power curve.

Speakers can have pretty different frequency response characteristics at 65dB SPL and at 95dB SPL (and everything in between). Dynamic EQ takes into account the current SPL the driver is being asked to deliver and provides a custom compensation that varies constantly based on source signal levels.

Oh, and yes, as soon as the neural tap that directly interfaces to the auditory (and physical sensory) brain circuits is perfected, I’m all over it.

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