@texbychoice wrote:
Wins in what specific technical and measurable ways? Trade offs must be honestly identified and considered. That is the only damn fact that matters.
Now suddenly measurements are a convenient step (i.e.: "Measurements do not tell the entire story")? Apart from perceived listening impressions (they still count, don’t they?), you have a purer ohm load when an amp channel (a dedicated one, no less) is looking directly into a driver’s terminals, avoiding the likelihood of large impedance swings and steep phase angles through a passive crossover and hereby providing for much better working conditions for an amplifier, with better driver control and lower distortion to follow.
Buy two more similar amps for 3 way setup, eh? So say I have a quality 100 Watt amp, so buy two more that would add several hundred dollars of cost. That is a hypothetical that makes no sense to support the case for all active. Conflating potential reliability facts with trouble sleeping is an illogical comparison.
There’s no "case for all active" to universally go by. Why would you impose specific terms for active to make sense, other than the potential for better sound quality or to whomever it applies? That’s on you, pal.
The case for active, from my chair, is sound quality via outboard active configuration and high efficiency speakers where size, by and large, isn’t an issue. Whatever it takes, it takes. For others it may be convenience, simplicity (yes, you heard me right), small size, and even an overall lower price with a bundled, preassembled and -designed package.
The good thing about active is that of being able to make more efficient use of a given amplifiers performance envelope, and thus you can save money per unit and keep yourself from buying overbuilt, hugely expensive amps that would otherwise be needed with passively configured, heavy speaker loads. So, what may seem to be more expensive with the need for more amp channels actively to begin with, can turn out to be much less so than expected or even save you money eventually.
The sleep remark was hardly to be taken in the literal sense, but merely a play on words to address your claimed issue with reliability.
The more complexity is added, the more the entire system is at the mercy of the weakest link. Cheap out on any item and the entire system does not achieve it’s potential.
You’re making a problem where there needn’t be any. Added amp channels and a DSP in themselves don’t necessarily equate into introducing a weak link. Buying a cheaper, bundled active package on the other hand (not least subs with built-in plate amps) can be an issue where reliability goes, but as I pointed to earlier my advocacy is outboard active config., and this way any quality gear can be in the loop for a purchase decision, where reliability is no bigger issue than it is passively.
The core premise of active being cheaper, easier, better completely fails. Pick any 2. You can’t have all 3.
Says who? Why don’t you get your head around the fact that some, if not many of us actually pursue active from a sound quality measure first and foremost, without "cheaper and easier" being part of the primary incentive?
Do your system as you see fit. Personal preference extrapolated to claims based on broad generalization does not equate to a clear path for all to duplicate.
Oh I do make my own system as I see fit. I hope you do too. We’re debating crossovers here, and I added my experience with a way to implement them to make their presence less of an issue in the signal path. Please note that amp to driver interfacing is but one part of many to be considered. I’m not implying it’s a ticket that in itself makes everything else magically fall into place, nor do I mean to impose my views on others.
