Just To Get An Idea Who's Active And Who's Passive

[UKHero 0]

Nope.. thats the difference between "powered" and "unpowered". Active and passive are different things but have just been confusingly adopted to mean "powered" and "unpowered". This is because by the nature of "powered" speakers, in a mid/top cab there will be seperate amps for the horn and bass driver.. so it is actually active in its true sense, as well as being powered. But it shouldn't work the other way round because I have what you would call an active setup (by its true definition).. but the amps are seperate, so the speakers are active un-powered... not passive.

 

Active - An active crossover and seperate amp are used for different freq. ranges. You can have active mid/tops where there are no amps, but seperate inputs for the horn and bass driver to use seperate amps. (i.e. bi-amping)

 

Passive - A speaker is fed from one amp and a passive crossover splits the freqs within the cab. (i.e. not bi-amped, hence the contradiction i pointed out)

 

Lots of reading here - http://www.pa-direct.co.uk/downloads/Activ...20explained.htm

 

 

Lol well you have stumped me on this one... In that case I have both still just the other way around...

 

How ever my Speakers with built in amps have two amps built in them one for HF one for LF so what are they now ??????

 

Are you sure that post is not more about the Cross over being active or passive ie an Active Cross over before the amp and a passive after the amp usually fitted in the Speaker casing????

 

Dunno im not as technical speakey as you lol

 

 

Nik

 

[norty303 0]

In the truest sense then, my system is 5 way active (crossover) using 3 stereo pairs and 2 mono crossover channels, and 12 channels of amps. *waves willy* :P

 

 

@ukhero - the correct term for your speakers would be self-powered active boxes. If they had a single amp running through a passive crossover then they'd be self-powered passive (which is bloody confusing to people really).

 

I just think its easier nowadays (as the terms have been misappropriated and adopted into regular talk on the subject) to state whether you're referring to the crossover setup or the amp setup. Not all people will necessarily know if there's one or two amps in their cabs anyway.

[Andy Westcott 0]

Right then!

To be precise, my system is... umm... 3-way active passive bi-amped.

 

That is, 4 amp chanels, two for each side.

The bass signal being produced by an active crossover, and fed directly to the bass units.

Anything above around 200Hz is fed to the mid-top cabinets, which incorporate a passive high-pass filter for the tweeter horn. Midrange connected directly to the amp to best utilise amplifier damping.

 

See?

You don't get that with commercially available speakers. (very often )

[norty303 0]

which incorporate a passive high-pass filter for the tweeter horn. Midrange connected directly to the amp to best utilise amplifier damping.

 

So you're saying that the midrange driver gets a full range signal then? (or at least a 200hz upwards signal?) I'd say thats fairly unusual, as most passive mid/top cabs will have the mid and top both running off the crossover. If your hi end is on a horn i'd think that there would be phasing issues between the output of the tweeter and high output of the mid driver. I wouldn't have thought it would sound too nice up past about 3khz either.

[TonyB 0]

So you're saying that the midrange driver gets a full range signal then? (or at least a 200hz upwards signal?) I'd say thats fairly unusual, as most passive mid/top cabs will have the mid and top both running off the crossover. If your hi end is on a horn i'd think that there would be phasing issues between the output of the tweeter and high output of the mid driver. I wouldn't have thought it would sound too nice up past about 3khz either.

 

My tops are the same with just a high pass filter for the compression horns. The compression horns are wired out of phase otherwise there was frequency cancellation when they were wired in phase. My Mids handle up to 4.5khz but the high pass filter is 3.5khz which makes the highs smoother.

 

Edit: Incidently, a lot of budget speaker cabs that have piezo horns don't have crossovers - usually just a resister to protect the horns.

[jeffwall 0]

Bloody hell...................

 

Do you use powered speakers that plug into the mains and accept a line signal from your mixer

 

 

 

OR

 

 

Do you use speakers which accept speaker level (amplified already from a seprate amp) ie no built in amps inside the speakers?

 

 

Far to technical for me!

[UKHero 0]

Bloody hell...................

 

Do you use powered speakers that plug into the mains and accept a line signal from your mixer

OR

Do you use speakers which accept speaker level (amplified already from a seprate amp) ie no built in amps inside the speakers?

Far to technical for me!

 

 

Me too... Can I ask if i go into my local DJ shop and say 1 pair of active speakers please what would they give me.... And I'm talking a run of the mill DJ shop who does a good job for his customer but does not bu :cense: er around with technicalitys and specifics....

 

Nik

 

[norty303 0]

My tops are the same with just a high pass filter for the compression horns. The compression horns are wired out of phase otherwise there was frequency cancellation when they were wired in phase. My Mids handle up to 4.5khz but the high pass filter is 3.5khz which makes the highs smoother.

 

This has to be purely a cost cutting exercise on the part of the manufacturer. The wiring out of phase is a common one, as the path of the horn is closer to 180deg out of phase compared to a baffle loaded driver in most cases.

 

Your mids will play everything thats given to them, not just up to 4.5khz as there is no lowpass filter. Do you not find that vocals, sound absolutely horrible from the 15" driver? I got sent a pair of 3k6 passive crossovers by mistake for my last set of 15"+1" mid tops. The vocals were noticeably horrible, even cut at that frequency. 2k is about the limit for these particular drivers (and these are mid bass drivers known for their good sound into the midrange, compared with a lot of other 15" drivers)

[Andy Westcott 0]

Quote norty:

"So you're saying that the midrange driver gets a full range signal then? (or at least a 200hz upwards signal?) I'd say thats fairly unusual, as most passive mid/top cabs will have the mid and top both running off the crossover."

 

Yes. smile icon

The 10" mid range units are quite capable of good reproduction down to about 150Hz in a 5 litre sealed cabinet, which they have; Response extends close to where the HF (not mid/HF) horn takes over, and fall-off in response and inductance make a low pass for the midrange unnecessary. I'm happy with the sound, the combination seems to work a treat, with no unnecessary harshness or dropouts in the range.

[TonyB 0]

This has to be purely a cost cutting exercise on the part of the manufacturer. The wiring out of phase is a common one, as the path of the horn is closer to 180deg out of phase compared to a baffle loaded driver in most cases.

 

Your mids will play everything thats given to them, not just up to 4.5khz as there is no lowpass filter. Do you not find that vocals, sound absolutely horrible from the 15" driver? I got sent a pair of 3k6 passive crossovers by mistake for my last set of 15"+1" mid tops. The vocals were noticeably horrible, even cut at that frequency. 2k is about the limit for these particular drivers (and these are mid bass drivers known for their good sound into the midrange, compared with a lot of other 15" drivers)

 

I was the manufacturer smile icon and it wasn't a cost cutting exercise. It was done, as Andy said, to fully utilise the damping of the Amp. The tops are only 12". My tops have been custom made and tuned purely for mid/top range. I couldn't buy what I wanted so made them myself. They are okay on their own but really need to be used with bass speakers for the best sound.

 

Vocals and highs are crystal clear and natural sounding, coupled with the bass speakers, I think they are outstanding but it took me months to get them just right. I expect the vocals would sound awful from my 15" drivers as they are in the bass cabs!

[norty303 0]

Ok, now you say that they're 10" and 12" that doesn't seem so bad. In my experience most drivers suffer some bad effects at the extremes of their response curve, and benefit from a low pass filter where they cross to the HF. Ofcourse you may have found a good driver which rolls off fairly pleasantly which lessens the amount of hardware in the box, which is always a good thing.

 

Andy, which 10" did you use out of interest?

[Andy Westcott 0]

It's the Fane Crescendo 10M.

 

Their response graph for this driver shows some peaks and dips at the higher end, but in use this doesn't seem to be too much of a problem - may be due in part to the driver being mounted in a well lagged sealed enclosure, which is, I assume, different to the conditions under which Fane measured the device.

 

In practice there is some slight harshness around 5 - 6 Khz which I correct with the EQ by dropping this region by about 3 or so dB which seems to work - this could be as a result of the peaky nature of the midrange around this frequency. Ideally I would like to incorporate a decent horn to operate from 2KHz up to about 8, but that would just add to the complication and I'm not sure whether there would be any significant benefit.

 

Waddya reckon?