HIFI Speaker active crossovers ...


Since the speaker and crossover are where most of the distortions and loss come from in the audio path, why has hifi not gone to active crossovers to eliminate these effects. Most active studio monitors and touring PA have... 

sozocaps

To save money! An active circuit is way more complex and costly than stringing together a bunch of caps, chokes and resistors. It requires a power supply - a part of the total cost. 

Hi, please read the 2  dozen discussions in this very forum on this topic. :) Thanks!

Like everything else, there are outstanding and poor examples of each type, and there are pros and cons to each. Many crossovers have to address multiple issues as well as the basic function of blocking low or high frequencies. The execution of the crossover and addressing all of it’s task is more important than the type. Many, many speakers have really dreadful crossovers and lousy parts. Even many that are well engineered still use low grade parts, so ultimately many of us have only been exposed to very poor examples of passive crossovers.

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What I will use in biamp setup, has dual sub outs, crossed for Sub at 60hz/24 db for dual tekton 2-10 and 500/12db mid highs for a pair of bi-amp wired tekton double impact se upgrade with the actual tweeter BE upgrade.  
 

SS amp for mid bass and will get be getting an 85w/c tube amp for mid highs.

Unfortunately, I am still gathering all the pieces.. waiting on the subs and the tube amp.  But just the SS to DI/SE from a Gustard r26 using bt 96khz PCM input (qobuz) sounds really good. (Just dac pre-amp out.. waiting for my rebuilt vintage pre-amp I had heard 20 years ago and always wanted)

Still having issues with tidal dropping out often.. so far I have never had qobuz stream interruption . (24/96 mainly from qobuz) though my purchased 24/192 and dsd do sound better, especially at higher volumes.. to me anyway, higher volumes really showcase the amount of data getting put under the curve.

Had my old klipsch bi-amped with some older amps with this active crossover and just one sub and it sounded alot better than without xover and bi-amped..  the new setup should (had better) sound even better when I have everything.. else I’ll be selling some stuff..

 

For an active crossover to make the most sense, the speaker needs power amps built in. Historically, audiophiles have not wanted that. Maybe views are changing with a new generation.