Opinions and recommendations on active loudspeakers

@lp2cd 
Haha, nothing that fancy yet. Using a pair of trash cans in plastic as stands. Good to know there are custom made stands. Vertical position as I'm using the Questeds for mid-field listening. When I got used to them and integrated them well in my room (have the woofer adjustment on -9 db at the moment - a little much but there is just a big step from -3 db), I will play them against a pair of Unity Boulders mk2. And after that the main systems. Quested have a homogenity in their sound that is very nice. Everything sounds natural, handclaps, the cash register in Money etc.

Always been interested in the PSI monitors but only heard the A-17 model in a shop once. Didn't give me much impression but am sure they are very special. Would be very interesting if you had some words for them, e.g. why did you choose the A-21 model?

And do you happen to have something about the RCF Mytho monitors? Another not very well-known monitor that have some rave reviews. At least very good measurements. Would like to try the 6 model.

@gosta. Interesting. Those "trash can" stands may account for some "interesting" resonant bass interactions and effects. You may not need to spend the dime for Quested's stands, but something better should be a priority.

I've no special insights into either the Unity or or RCF monitors, altho I might expect the Unitys to at least play in the same league as the Questeds.

As for the PSIs, I use the A-21s as mastering monitors in a close near-field setup with a Focal CMS SUB taking the "flat" system response down to 32 Hz. They perform brilliantly. (I upgraded from Focal CMS 65s. Fine monitors, but they made everything sound too good. Great for casual listening...) The larger PSIs are for mid- or far-field listening. I've not listened to the other PSIs, but by all accounts they are as a family closely similar in sound. The A-17s would have undoubtedly worked fine for my purposes, too. PSIs are rather fussy about setup and positioning. I wouldn't expect any of them to stand out at all in a "shop" environment. PSIs tell the truth, they don't scream about themselves.

All good recommendations, above.  Now for something completely different:

You should probably go listen to a pair of Meridian speakers.  Everyone thinks of them for home theater but they can sound very, very good for music.  One of the best 2-channel rigs I ever heard was a Meridian 3-channel system for music.  I listened to a recording of Van Cliburn's Beethoven Piano Concerto No. 5 and it was sublime.  Absolutely the closest reproduction I have ever heard to a real concert hall.

The best part is that there is a ton of used Meridian stuff out there for sale.  Meridian gear tends to be well cared for and there is a healthy dealer network.

@lp2cd 
I expect the Quested to have much better control of low freq. than the Boulder. The two 8" woofers in the Boulder moves exceptionally fast at low freq. and in my opinion tend to lose some control, lots of air. The Quested you can hardly see move at all. Like a big ATC. The Boulder has an interesting flat mid from Elac with their Jet 5 ribbon mounted inside. So very different setup. Both have heavy amplification. "Small" monsters!

Besides PSI 17 maybe the smallest Neumann KH80 would be really good for very near-field usage at a much lower cost. My recommendation is for anyone interested in actives to try a Neumann monitor. 

I think the major reason for active has not been said yet: linear phase.  You can adjust the phase of each driver electrically, before the amps and within the electronic crossover, where this is impossible with a passive crossover.  All the loss in passive crossover+ cable is another issue (lots and lots of copper) and then the not so small issue of changes to crossover behavior as voice coil temp increases.  

And our pro division would take issue that pros don't care about sound.  We know a mix engineer that spends two days getting the snare drum sound exactly right. Or another engineer who uses different converters on every song to match the artist vision of how that song should "sound".  There are people who don't care but it's rare anymore since the artists are funding most records.  

Brad