Digital crossovers

I use the Velodyne SMS 1 for the low pass to my sub.  It's a digital crossover with a parametric EQ.   I run my mains full range with no high pass x-over employed.  I've never been a fan of EQ or tone controls but I have a nasty room mode at 40Hz that muddies the sound and makes everything seem bloated.  That said a number of the speakers I've owned are stand mounted small speakers with a sub.   The SMS 1 not only allows me to flatten that hump,  it does a great job of integrating the sub with the mains.  I can select the x-over in 1 dB steps and choose 6 dB through 36 dB slope / octave.  I use a steep slope right around where my mains roll off and it eliminates that double bass that can occur in the x-over region.

An additional AD/DA step shouldn't be necessary if the entire system is properly designed. The digital crossover would accept the digital out from a CD player, media player, and computer.

Of course, a digital crossover would require a dedicated amp for each output range, be they built-in to the speaker or stand-alone.

And if one wants the option to use a specific DAC, then the digital crossover would need to have a number of digital outputs (no biggie), each requiring its' own DAC (biggie).

.Hmmm maybe a digital crossover is too much bother for the benefit.

From what I've read, Avante Gard Zero 1 is a very intriguing implementation of a self-contained self-powered digital speaker. But then one speaker communicates to the other wirelessly ... at 16/44.1 ... all that effort then dumbed down unnecessarily at the last moment!!!!

Yes, it is currently a lot of bother to go this route. Agree with you, too, on the Avante Gard. You’d think by now someone would’ve figured out a semi-reasonable way like that to do it....even if it was a proprietary approach that did mean sacrificing some mix-n-match capability among brands for the sake of minimizing cost, complexity and technical redundancies...in fact I don’t really see what’s stopping anybody from doing it that way...they just may have to be able to update the level of DAC performance now and again... ;-)

Ivan,

I believe that Salk offers (or at least once offered) an option along these lines.

You might also be able to do it with DEQx and something like the Linkwitz Orion. The Orion features a separate, active (analog) x-over box, which you’d either delete from the order or (if that’s not an option) discard. Instead, you’d run a digital source signal into the DEQx, adjust the x-overs to taste, and take analog out of the DEQx to the amps of choice - then onto the various inputs of the Orion’s drivers.

I'm not 100% sure, but I think it would work.

With the exception of an analog input, there are a number of digital EQ options like DEQX that can provide a digital output (as well as taking digital inputs), so there is no need for unnecessary A/D/A conversion if one wants a different DAC to handle those final analog out duties. The DEQX is remarkably transparent in its A/D conversion (I was pretty shocked, to be honest). And the quality of the DAC has not felt lacking to me. Of course there may be less successful A/D/A implementation in other devices.