None of our speakers are active.I am not a fan of active bass. You always need another ampifier to complete it. Makes it not better. Why not making the speaker full active. Much better results.
The power amp on the ULTRA 55 is a booster amp. It allows you to control bass volume +/- 6db from the original signal. It makes the speaker very versatile for room placement. The amp on the ULTRA 9 is for the 15" subwoofer on the back of the speaker.I am very surprised. I have no difficulty with reading. Everytime poweramps are mentioned !
Your spot in Mikenot to butt in here, but you guys need to define terms.
to me a speaker with integrated powered bass, keeping things analog, with typically being room adjustable in some way, can be considered 'active' bass. a separate amplifier would power the passive upper frequency portion of the speaker.
but also 'active' bass could be where there is DSP (digital signal processing) involved using software to solve room problems by changing the input signal. normally this would require digitizing the input signal.
both situations are referred to as active bass but are fundamentally different.
there is a very good reason for not having completely active speakers. they don't sell. period.
buyers want to choose their amplifiers, and integrating an amplifier into a speaker full range means that the customer is stuck with that amplifier. the marketplace has spoken that that works only at the bottom price level, not at audiophile performance price levels.
so no upper level speaker manufacturer will build a completely active speaker. too much risk.
it's left for the DIY (do it yourself) people to do full active.
I was going to write the same thing.
I think Goldmund do some fully active stuff but that is all that comes to mind for the big brand domestic “high end” stuff afaik. Maybe Linn do something.
I do not represent Goldmund any longer in the US, but Goldmund has been selling active speakers for almost 10 years now. I sold four pairs of $600K Goldmund Apologues in the last 3 or 4 years as well as maybe 10 other pairs of $30K-$135K complete active speakers.
I actually have two pair of completely active Goldmund Satya that are current models and retail for $135K for sale right now.
Perhaps Farbak might be interested in hearing these Bob
They sound REALLY great, but you don't get to change dacs/amps etc.
Steve Williams Site Founder | Site Owner | Administrator | Ron Resnick Site Co-Owner | Administrator | Julian (The Fixer) Website Build | Marketing Managersing |