Change to Horns or stay Dynamic

Dgad, you nailed it. The room, even treated, will likely produce more distortion to the frequency response curve than the speaker's curve is off-kilter in the first place.

I would, however, take issue with people's ideas that horns "cop out" in the bass. The worst that happens (if you choose your implementation), is as good as any other form of woofer section out there.

My horns systems never cop out in the bass. Horn bass has wonderful detail notes are not lost to drivers massive movements, its fast with less distortion than convetional designs, plus the amazing bass pressures one can generate with ease realy the only -s are size and cost. If you can get around that then horn bass to me is the best reproduced bass can get.

Johnk, yes, thoes horn bass units do get huge and expensive, fast.

Dave

There's no denying horns win hands down in the efficiency and dynamic department. This is why they are used for high SPL applications. Yet, all driver types have their advantages and disadvantages. Keep in mind that we're talking about *home* audio. This is not the large scale amplification that very big spaces need. So, do we need horns to accomplish our goals at home? Conventional cone/dome drivers can provide ample SPLs and dynamics (in a well designed system) for home-scale rooms without the drawbacks (cost, size, limited dispersion) of horns.

One solution is to get rid of the passive crossover. Active systems eliminate the power loss of passive crossovers allowing for greater dynamics while also providing other benefits. For home audio, this is a viable, cost effective alternative that takes advantage of fewer compromises.

Pacific Island,

I have heard some excellent active systems. The main negative with them, is that the market is unresponsive to them. I think, audiophiles would rather be able to choose thier amps then have them dictated. Yet, I am in agreement that well executed active systems (I have only heard a few, not ATC or PMC yet) can easily outperform most passive systems in terms of dynamics. A speaker that truly surprised me was Backes & Muller that is fully active with what appears to be a digital crossover or something similar. But the price was close to 100K fully executured.