Is Bi - amping worth the trouble?

Getting in a little late on this one, and, I have not read every thread in response so apologies in advance for any redundancy.

I am a big believer in byamping, have been for quite some time, in my opinion, it must be done using an active crossover. I have tried using a passive crossover and I think the gains are not worth the expense. It is quite a bit more expensive going with an active crossover over a passive crossover. You will need two amps, two sets of interconnect, three power cords (one for the mid/base amp, one for the tweeter amp and one for the crossover), an active crossover (all active crossovers have gain controls for the top and bottom, at least I have not seen one without) and two sets of speaker cable. The results are quite impressive. Going in this direction one can than pick amps that suit his/her taste. SET on the top for the sweetness of a SET, SS on the bottom for the dynamics, weight and overall slam, or SET on the top and SET on the bottom, etc, etc.

When using an active crossover you will have to run your speaker cable from your outboard crossover directly to the individual drivers of the speaker. You will be bypassing the internal crossover within the speaker. You can't just hook up to the binding posts on the back of your speakers because you would not be bypassing the internal crossover.

I have found, as so many have referred to the blacks, the blacks are blacker, and the noise floor is lowered beyond belief. Each artist is positioned and stands alone without competition from others or movement. Each artist has his/her space; even on coral pieces there is depth and width without haze. The highs are so clear, a brush on a snare, one can count the number of bristles, obviously an exaggeration but I can hear various bristles making contact, shocking.

I am sure that there are many who will say the expense is not worth the return and to many that is true. For me, I will not be going back to a single amp to reproduce the whole frequency range running through a passive internal crossover anytime soon. Good luck with whatever you decide to do…………Bob

Bmotorcycle: This is one of those things that people won't / can't understand until they experience it for themselves. After doing that, they can't believe they wasted all of that time before stumbling upon this "aural revelation". As i've called it before, "direct drive" i.e. amplifier to speaker cable directly to the raw speaker driver is the real deal. Sean
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10-25-06: Sean
Perfectionist: Given the fact that you're using mono-blocks, you wouldn't be vertically or horizontally bi-amping. You would simply be bi-amping with mono-blocks.

Hmm, I guess I'm not fully understanding then. But I decided to pass on it anyway. I'm very happy with my system and don't want to screw it up. But I am patiently awaiting the arrival of an XPS2 to compliment my CDX2 :-)

Sean, I was one of the doubters for 30+ years. A recording engineer as well as a tube designer friend of mine kept hounding me to do nothing more than to try bi-amping. About two years ago I get a care package from him including an active crossover by his design and a highly modified 2A3 amp also by his design. Well, needless to say he has not seen the crossover or the amp for two years, I did pay him for them of course. Since than, I have added a true ribbon tweeter and again the addition was astounding, I will never go back to a conventional cone drive for the top.

I guess what continues to astound me, every time I added or changed a component and there was a positive improvement, after several weeks or maybe several months that improvement kind of just became the status Que. It has been 2+ years since I have bi-amped and the system continues to just amaze me. Before I bi-amped I would love to read while the stereo was on, now I have a hard time doing that, I just sit with a big smile and totally get involved with the music. I know it sounds kind of over the top but until you have tried it you may never know what I am talking about. The other side benefit is I am not always looking for that next fix, although I did just buy an 845 amp for the mid/base. More of my money is now spent on software. Sorry for the ramblings but I am a real proponent of bi-amping only if one uses an active crossover................Bob

I agree about passive vs actice bi-amping. The only time that i think passive bi-amping is worth the added cost is if the speakers are a very tough load and / or extreme volumes are required. Obviously, i would prefer to do so using an active crossover, but in some cases, that just isn't feasible. Increasing the headroom on such a system can make for a noticeable difference, but in such cases, you really need GOBS of power to overcome that type of handicap.

On the other hand, going active with "direct drive" sounds better under most any circumstance that i can think of. Sean