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How to judge an amplifier's performance with a "powered-woofer" speaker?

Hello, I can't seem to find a definitive answer.  Nowadays,many speakers are made with a built-in woofer amplifier. Vandersteens, Martin-Logans , Von Schweikert,etc.
How will your amplifier affect the tonality or dynamics of this type of speaker?
What type of influence will your amp have on the bottom end? Will your million-watt amp be zeroed out by the speaker amp? 

Interestingly, I was reading a review of the Parasound JC1+ Mono's paired with Von Schweikert Audio VR-55 Aktives, and the reviewer raved about the powerful ,deep bass of the JC's. But wait! The speakers have a 525 watt amp driving the woofer!!! Does the 450 watt JC trump the 525 watt speaker amp??
If you are going to review an amplifier wouldn't you get a "truer" report by using traditional speakers?

====How does your amplifier and a powered speaker interact? Who does the heavy lifting?====

Thanks for your time.

michaelpaul


128x128mikepaul
avanti1960
1,480 posts
 
Turn a powered woofer into a positive by reducing the demand on and for an amplifier.  
For example you can power them with a smaller amplifier than with a typical passive woofer speaker.  
For example a tube integrated Primaluna amp driving a powered Goldenear Triton 1 powered tower speaker sounded excellent- tube soundstage and midrange bloom with the dynamics and bass impact of a robust solid state amp.  
You can get large room sound with a modestly powered decent quality amplifier.  No more 80 lb. behemouth amps required.  
erik_squires
16,118 posts
 
Coming back to the OP's question:  Amplifiers are not independent commodities. You don't gauge their worth and put them in your closet, waiting for the to appreciate for years before you take them out and sell them still in the box.

Who cares if an amp performs well on speakers you don't own?

Amps are part of systems, tightly coupled to the speakers.  When evaluating the performance it is the system behavior that matters, not a test bench and not in a system you don't own.

In general, yes, most amps whether solid state or tube are more impedance dependent than we'd like to believe.  Using a powered bass section in a speaker will stress this particular issue less than a traditional multi-way speaker would.  It does not by itself change the value of an amp, unless you are a reviewer, of course. :)
ditusa's avatar
ditusa
1,886 posts
 
MIKEPAUL a passive speaker is a biamp speaker amp for woofer amp for tweeter when you buy a passive speaker your buying two amps then you buy two more for the tweeters the bad thing with passive speakers the bass amps are junk thats why market is full of them amp in side a speaker is not good
ditusa's avatar
ditusa
1,886 posts
 
MIKEPAUL powered speakers not passive may bad
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