Opinions and recommendations on active loudspeakers

jon_5912:
Whoever told you passive crossover (a static device with lots of lots of loss through wire) offers more precise control than active crossovers (where the crossover is before the amplifiers; an electronic circuit with very precise control) has something to sell in passive crossovers!  

@lonemountain - it was Tom Thiel, brother of Jim Thiel of Thiel audio.  He hangs out in the Thiel thread sometimes.  He's long removed from the business at this point, Thiel no longer exists, he's not selling anything.  I'm a fan of both brands and it's funny because both designers have a fair amount in common.  Both were piano players.  I think I like listening to piano more than anything and both brands excel there.  Jim Thiel had wanted to build active speakers but since he was building for the home audio market he didn't because he didn't think he could sell them.  I assume ATC builds passive speakers for the home market for the same reason.  

ATC does build passive because some folks just want a passive.  We know this is the reality of the market.   But we spend a lot of time talking about active because its genuinely a step forward (and it costs the customer less for higher performance).  ATC active beats ATC passive on multiple technical fronts.

We have done demos at shows with the same speaker both active and passive right next to each other on the same source, using ATC amps (which have the same circuit design and output devices to the active system) and its a clear advantage to go active.  The image and clarity and resolution of details is dramatically different.  The "tone", meaning the spectral info, the sound character of the piano if you will, is the same.   SO active versions of speakers have better imaging, greater resolution of the finer details of the music than passive versions of the same speaker even with identical power behind them. 

True. I don’t know anyone who prefers the LS50 passive over active.

Why don’t studio monitors come with optional magnetic grills so they can be acceptable in a home? 

An active Magnepan would be incredible.

Active speakers properly engineered, designed and built with top parts should sound great at home or the studio.   The is nothing about a studio that is different other than lower noise floor and perhaps more absorption.  The problem is a"better" speaker does not always make every recording sound better.  Reducing distortion reveals more and more about a recording- details or flaws that you've never heard before.  Distortion in playback, regardless of source, has a masking effect that covers up details.  It's the effect of getting glasses after a lifetime of blurred vision: you now really see enormous detail, but what you see is often not so pretty.   You might then ask why would we ever want that, to hear how awful our recordings are.  Well the benefit of hearing clearly is that you can finally hear the details the artist, engineer, mastering worked very hard to capture and reveal.  You cannot appreciate a Renoir if your vision is blurry.  If I play a high rez version of Michael Jackson Thriller, chances are you will hear a LOT of information you never heard before that will make you smile like never before.  Or play a George Massenburg recording and the same thing will happen (here's a list:
https://www.allmusic.com/artist/george-massenburg-mn0000945891/credits 

Play something poorly recorded and you may not be able to turn it off fast enough. Yuck!  An old rock and roll recording is likely quite bad, like Led Zeppelin.  Awesome music, horrible recordings (that did capture a cool moment in time anyway).  You sort of have to learn to separate great music from great sound because they are not related.  It's still fun to hear Elvis Presley with a band panned to one side and him to the other each with their own (very limited bandwidth) ribbon mic from 1958.  But you aren't listening to be amazed by the audio quality.  There's nothing you can do to fix this other than buy speakers with massive EQ built in to them and are high enough distortion you don't hear any flaws in the recording.  You would not buy expensive speakers if that's the only music you listen to.  But if you heard Sarah Jarosz on a fantastic pair of speakers- even if you dislike Americana-the recording is just so darn amazing its magical-a thrill in itself just to hear something that good.  You'll never hear that magic on a low rez, high distortion system. 

That's why active is important.  Its the only way to get a lot of distortion out of the speaker.


Brad