I Was Considering Active, Then I Watched This ...

And about amps failing... I do agree that the original ls50w’s had a horrible app and electronics (ie amp, dac...) that weren’t the most reliable.  The dynaudio xeos that I had felt like they’d last for a long time.

How many of us are using old amps that we bought used?  I bet quite a few.

People are selling 30 year old Classe or Bryston amps...  I’ve owned at least 15 different amps, all bought used, all of them anywhere between 5-15 years old whenI bought them.  I’ve not had one fail on me.

And dacs are to the point now where improvements from here are going to be minimal.  The Schiit gungir multibit I use is 4-5 years old I believe.  
So give me a dsp speaker or even analogue and give me well built, solid, reliable electronics...



I’d take any class amplifier with any amount of dsp with electronics inside the speaker IF it sounds better... wouldn’t you?

+1 Genelec

A person whose livelihood relies on reviewing systems/components done the traditional way certainly has a conflict of interest. Many are willing to adjust the sound of their system with a different amp, preamp, cable, etc. Doing all of that in the digital domain, plus controlling phase and driver out of band behavior before the signal gets to the amplifier makes perfect sense. You want a little more midbass, dial it in, without messing up phase. The biggest plus is getting rid of the crappy passive crossover, which is without a doubt the worst component in any system.

Wow. I think everyone has missed Steve’s points. 

I think I'm going to learn a lot from this thread!