Here in the UK there are two main companies that sell to studios (e.g. studios that aren’t using Genelecs), they are ATC and PMC. Both these companies have always provided separate binding posts for their 3-way speakers so that tri-amping is possible. I went for PMC because I like transmission lines (I detest reflex). When I bought mine about six years ago I based what I purchased on their BB5-XBD-A (the XBD stands for Extra Bass driver and the A for active). The BB5-XBD-A was sold into studios (or pop stars) with Bryston analogue crossovers and Bryston power amps - I didn’t want the Bryston stuff because I wanted to choose my own crossovers, dacs and amps so that I’d have total flexibility in the choice of components (especially choice of dacs). I couldn’t expect PMC to sell me just the speaker cabinetry but they made passive versions of the BB5 (they also made an equivalent box with just a bass driver in it, no crossover). I bought a pair of BB5s and a pair of the extra bass boxes. Pete Thomas knew exactly what I was planning to do with it (and said he favoured the analogue Bryston crossovers). I couldn’t get directly to the rear of the input terminals because of the transmission line cabinetry but by removing the bass driver I could get to the crossover board connectors and join the input and output leads together to bypass the three crossover elements. My system is super clean. PMC now make a BB6-XBD-A and, guess what, it uses their own crossovers and amps (but they still don’t offer the flexibility that I have with everything external and software crossover).
Thats amazing that you’re actively bi amping with something of the quality of a BHK amp. The only thing I’ve ever had against active is that generally it’s done with quality amps, but not outstanding ones.
I’ve dreamed of someday bypassing the crossovers of my TAD CR-1’s but I would not want to settle for anything less than BHK’s and that’s not practical for me to add an extra pair of 250’s or quad of 300’s.
In fact I use my 300’s just the opposite of active. I have 2 pairs of speaker wire to the two sets of amp terminals feeding Mids/highs, bass, supertweeter and sub high level, each with their own crossover. (variable for the sub and for tweeter units).
If I ever went active I would want to crossover in the digital domain and use multiple DACs from something like Jriver (and add room correction as well). While possible with multi channel DACs I don’t know if that could be done with something the level of DS (and the expense if it could) Also the preamp has to be multi channel or you’re stuck with each DAC at less than full volume directly feeding an amp.
There are no dacs within my BB5 based speakers. A summary of the system is:
a pair of P10s (it’s in a 30’ * 20’ room with a 7.1.4 PJ based system)
source - Melco N1A with mostly ripped CDs, via a Chord M-Scaler (converts the 44.1/16 to 88.2/24) then via a Wyred4Sound femto reclocker (outputs 24/96) into:
DEQX HDP-5 digital crossover and equaliser - this works internally at 96/24. It has internal dacs but I use the 3 coax outputs (via 3 W4S reclockers). I’ve spent a lot of time setting EQ to my liking (I don’t like upper bass/lower mid that can muddy the other stuff) to:
three Direcstream dacs (sometimes referred to as seniors), connected balanced to:
a pair of BHK250s for mid/treble and the Crown CE4000 for bass directly into the BB5-XBD-A style drivers
The data is therefore processed digitally all the way through to the dacs (I do have record playing stuff also and the DEQX crossover has a good ADC in it). I’ve lots of room absorption and bass traps. The system has had accolades from two well known UK industry figures (but these days magazines aren’t interested in readers’ system reviews).
Hi Dirk, good to hear from you. Because the Leonard Cohen track, Alexandra Leaving, sounded so good I decided to stick with Windom. Chopping the DSs between Snowmass and Windom seemed to cause all sorts of consistency problems to the point that I couldn’t repeat the magic that I had with Snowmass (and running a ‘clean’ on the P10s also changes things especially if I’ve not done it for a while). I decided to stick with Windom and after a couple of weeks made my final EQ alterations (which were in fact very similar to some settings I’d previously used with Snowmass). I’m now very happy with Windom as it’s definitely very focussed and some stuff really sounds excellent. It’s amazing how each firmware release has sounded so different from every other release. It would be interesting to go back to earlier releases such as Yale, but it really seems that the sound changes over time and I don’t want to ruin, again, what I already have!
Thanks for all the info:)
Volume control done digitally?
I have effectively the (very) low budget equivalent of your system, but have to do volume with a 6 way passive "preamp ".
I use the DS remote to alter the volume (the DEQX unit also has a volume facility but I leave that set just below max) - the DS volume display is brilliant - nice big numbers that I can see across the room and as long as I point the remote roughly towards the thee dacs they all do the same thing. I too have used passive attenuators (QED with Alps Blue inside IIRC). Over 30 years ago I cut some crossover board tracks on my 4-way transmission lines to allow me to quad amp. I then went to analogue crossovers then to cheap digital ones but when I found about the DEQX unit I went for it immediately - it’s fantastic once one sorts out the room and EQ.
When I first needed a digital volume control I bought an RME UCX - I’ll bet there are other much cheaper digital volume controls. The UCX is a digital mixer and doesn’t seem to reduce sound quality.
I still wish the audio hobby would shed the desire for external amplification but I realize this would change the entire industry dynamic and, potentially, be harmful.
At the end of the day, wouldn’t the AN line of speakers truly sound their best if they were 100% active?
Depends on how the active filters are arranged. DSP in mid and treble?
Analog, OK.
Digital, I could foresee this happening, please do not take this offensive, it’s sarcastic as I actually like active speakers very much:
Algorithms will allow the perfect simulation and selection of amplification method by a simple tap on a touchscreen:
Why experiment and spend tens of thousands of dollars on high end amps when the DSP simply allows you to download pre-sets and choose between, different sorts of vacuum tubes, mosfets, bipolar transistors in PNP-NPN or NPN-inversed NPN configuration, a truck load of feedback options. We’d be happy to pay a US$ 699 life time subscription fee for a “FooMP” (Fool Me amP) software that puts the images of the correct glow in the dark vacuum tubes or VU meters on the High Res High Dynamic OLED display, just as the second US$ 899 life time subscription will be for Roon 2.0 that allows the display of the cover art on the top part of the 17" vertically positioned OLED screen.
Then you have Apple iTunes Genious, the only left over of the mighty Apple music store, advise you on the next music you will have get to know and like.
But hey, why would the firmware provider give away all those features for free, instead of simply charging license fees for new vintage sound algorithms to simulate the good old times.
Get the idea? Does the picture I paint look dull to you?
I guess it explains why there are still people around who like turntables and complete analog sound paths. And when the above becomes reality there will be only the very few lucky people left who will be able to compare the DSP algorithms to the real analog chain, which by that time has become unaffordable.
Will the AN speakers sub control have firmware? I just loaded new firmware for my subs and the impact on sound was unexpected. This is an example for me of the appeal of components and cables to choose among. Now if I could afford to experiment, I would.
Chas
You’ll notice the on screen routing mixer controls and the Mackie midi control surface that allow you to fully interact with the rack mounted interface.
The other cool thing is that it allows for remote multi track hi res recording without a computer attached. I made this recording with the RME and did the video as well as a one man crew as part of a camera test with some new gear.
In retrospect the mic position was compromised for the video, but it’s listenable.
The RME stuff is really excellent (and the UK Distributor is not far from me and very helpful).
When I was using the UCX (which is a half sized UFX) I needed it purely as a digital volume control (I bought their tethered remote control). Back then, before I had the Melco, DEQX, DSs, I decided to store my music losslessly on an iPod. Onkyo made a unit called an NDS-1 which would read the data out of an iPod and sent it over coax or optical (I later used the Wadia equivalent). I had Behringer DCX2496 units (digital in, 6 crossed over dacs out) to make my speakers active but I needed a digital volume control, hence the RME Fireface UCX. I like to come up with novel solutions. I then used iTunes a lot and discovered how useful an iPad can be to control software (I now use the iPad to control the Melco with the DSs volume control facilitated by one DS remote. A weakness of the DEQX unit is that their remote volume control is about as useful as a chocolate teapot)). Dan.
That’s a nice piece of kit (the UME stuff) - I went with 6 gang analog vol, partly for cost and partly for soldering fun, but digital is the way to go I think…
Yes, probably they would. That said, if we made internally amplified the only choice we’d not sell many. This is because what the market wants is to use the gear choices they’ve already made. That’s just reality.
Our plan has always been to make a removable passive crossover that, after we establish the speakers in the marketplace, we can make a module to replace the passive crossover and then it’s all active. But, that will take a good deal of time to
get to that point where we can make it available.
