Pros and Cons of built-in amps?

Judging by the number of emails I get daily asking me to describe the sonic differences between products X and Y

Not wanting to get involved in the bantering here, I find this statement to be pretty dubious although it may be exaggerated. I get an average of 2 emails a year(not daily) and it's getting pretty quiet lately. I guess Paul must be quite a knowledgable and renowned audio enthusiast having such good reception!~

Well, at the end of the day it doesn't matter whether state of the art passive-based systems will be better than active systems or vice versa. The most important is as long as any particular system brings enjoyment to the listener that truly matters. Furthermore, it is to my opinion that there is no rule of thumb to create a supposition in that the best systems today are passive speakers driven by tube amplification although all matters related to audio are entirely governed by subjectivity.

Let's not get too carried away with some responses here fuelled by contradictory ideas and opinions.

This discussion should be helpful and fun rather than descend into a heated debate between the members of The Flat Earth Society and National Geographic!

Pink Floyd use David Gilmour's studio "Astoria"....it has plenty of tubes and several miles of Van den hul (audiophile) cables as well as Shunyata. They even have different wiring to the woofers and mid range on their active speakers.

Great, so I guess Shadorne, David Gilmore and I all agree in the superiority of tubes and the value in exotic high end cables!

I'm glad Mr. Gilmore has learned enough about high end audio to have gotten that far. I doubt however that he is an expert in this area like he is in making music and playing guitar.