DSP vs. active analog crossover vs. passive analog crossover. What is your take?

I started off repairing speakers as help to my friends, maybe 35 years ago or a bit more.

Then started making and selling one off customs when I realized the process was fun and has huge markups.

So I began designing by the books, and augmented that by ear, not by looking at graphs on a screen. My speakers were always made with the room, placement, and listening position in mind, as well as the buyer's tastes and intended usage.

The past few years I have returned to the coherence of a good full range, integrated with a sub. For this, I've settled on an active two crossover. Compared to a couple of DSP models, (friends lent me and greatly helped configure) it just sounds more natural to me.

I'm impressed with the time alignment capabilities of DSP, but ultimately my design doesn't need it, and the limited room interaction of the dipole speakers doesn't need room correction . Whether the processing scrubs some sort of detail, or the active crossovers add some coloration, I can't determine.

I this simple setup I have a better sense of space with analog, not high end professional crossovers.

My one glaring example is with movies.

In my all in one 2 channel system, pretty often an on-screen vehicle or event will have the sound of something with front to back effects.

To a lesser degree, most records played will seem to make my speakers vanish (and they aren't small, 4 foot 5 inches tall), and instead it's like looking through a window at a 3D area where the sound comes from the whole front wall.

This is the effect I was after with a couple assisted kicks at the can with DSP, and couldn't find it over the course of a month or so.

It could be very doable for someone more experienced , but I'm not going to chase it if I already have it with what I've already got in stock.

I recently ran a project with a pair of vintage Altec Lansing Valencia 846b and a Lyngdorf TDAi 2170.

I removed the XOs from the speakers and used the XO function in the 2170. I ran the woofers from the 2170's internal amp, then used the analog out from the 2170 into a First Watt J2 to drive the horns. I'd say it was a pretty successful experiment. 

I'd used an upmarket passive XO from Great Plains Audio on the Valencias and found the speaker to sound quite rolled-off on the top end and a little muddy in the mid-bass. The experiment with the Lyngdorf lead me to conclude that it isn't the horn/driver that's rolled off, nor is the woofer necessarily muddy sounding, most of the damage was being done by the passive XO.

Of course, the experiment came to fruition when Room Perfect EQ was utilized, which really helped turn this classic horn speaker into something that could compete with a more modern design - detailed, dynamic, good soundstaging ability,  respectable imaging, etc.

Active crossovers remove coils, capacitors and resistors from the amp-speaker interface with huge benefits in overall system performance: dynamic range, 'speed' and control of drivers. The benefit is due to lacking those energy storing or energy dissipating components, the amps have an easier load, less phase shift and less time smearing/latency/hysteresis and more control over the driver.

I agree, that’s why many of us like full range speakers. However, what do you do with two, three, or got forbids, four way speakers? Are you suggesting DSD perhaps? If so, they have other problems, as noted above from some members, or active analogue crossovers as well. How about simple 1st order crossover? I have noticed that some of the ultra expensive and sound wised desirable speakers today use 1st order passive crossover.

@panzrwagn wrote:

Active crossovers remove coils, capacitors and resistors from the amp-speaker interface with huge benefits in overall system performance: dynamic range, 'speed' and control of drivers. The benefit is due to lacking those energy storing or energy dissipating components, the amps have an easier load, less phase shift and less time smearing/latency/hysteresis and more control over the driver.

Exactly.