Dear folks,
as I feel the urgent need to build the beautiful F3 and some time later a clone of the X-series, I'm running into the "more amps than ears", err "more amps than needed" situation.
So I read biamplification. Sure, probably best thing is reduced intermodulation distortion when used with an active crossover, but I'm really not keen on fiddling with crossovers.
I like my speakers very much and feel fine with their crossovers.
Since these 2.5 way thingies offer dual binding posts that can be separated, I thought of passive biamping.
What do you guys think about that?
I found a lot on active biamping, but only subjective opinions about passives. Rod Elliott says it's a waste of money - would you all agree? Is it really that worse?
I thought of using the 10W F3 for mid-heights and the 100W+ X for the bass.
All the best, Hannes
as I feel the urgent need to build the beautiful F3 and some time later a clone of the X-series, I'm running into the "more amps than ears", err "more amps than needed" situation.
So I read biamplification. Sure, probably best thing is reduced intermodulation distortion when used with an active crossover, but I'm really not keen on fiddling with crossovers.
I like my speakers very much and feel fine with their crossovers.
Since these 2.5 way thingies offer dual binding posts that can be separated, I thought of passive biamping.
What do you guys think about that?
I found a lot on active biamping, but only subjective opinions about passives. Rod Elliott says it's a waste of money - would you all agree? Is it really that worse?
I thought of using the 10W F3 for mid-heights and the 100W+ X for the bass.
All the best, Hannes
IMHO-
There is great value in passive biamping.
You can use a PP amp for bass, and an Aleph for the mids and highs.....
If you build your own speakers, you can use a lower efficiency bass driver (plays deeper in a small box) with a higher gain amp to make up the difference in level.....
I am sure there are many more.
Mr Elliot has written many excellent and some very amusing articles. In fact, his ELF subwoofer project was sort of the basis for my sub.....But he only recently emerged from the Mosfet Haze to design what he believes to be a great sounding Mosfet amp.
There are many other varying points of view........
JJ
There is great value in passive biamping.
You can use a PP amp for bass, and an Aleph for the mids and highs.....
If you build your own speakers, you can use a lower efficiency bass driver (plays deeper in a small box) with a higher gain amp to make up the difference in level.....
I am sure there are many more.
Mr Elliot has written many excellent and some very amusing articles. In fact, his ELF subwoofer project was sort of the basis for my sub.....But he only recently emerged from the Mosfet Haze to design what he believes to be a great sounding Mosfet amp.
There are many other varying points of view........
JJ
Naah, of course for me it's not a waste of money!
I stated Elliott since waste of money equals completely useless and that's what I want to know if it's really that worse.
Sure, everybody here has a surfeit of amps (thanks Nelson for a new word in my vocabulary ;-) and of course for all the nice amps!), probably except me since I just started getting addicted to DIY.
If space wasn't an issue
Nelson, how do you quint amp your fullranges? Sure one amp or two for your big boom boxes, another one for your Kleinhorns and then?
All the best, Hannes
I stated Elliott since waste of money equals completely useless and that's what I want to know if it's really that worse.
Sure, everybody here has a surfeit of amps (thanks Nelson for a new word in my vocabulary ;-) and of course for all the nice amps!), probably except me since I just started getting addicted to DIY.
If space wasn't an issue
Nelson, how do you quint amp your fullranges? Sure one amp or two for your big boom boxes, another one for your Kleinhorns and then?
All the best, Hannes
Hannes,
My experience with passive bi-amping isn't real DIY but it is real-world.
I recently bought a Proceed AMP2 (150 wpc) on Audiogon to complement the AMP2 I already owned for 6 years or so. I passively bi-amped my speakers, hoping that the gain of two production examples of a single model would be very close.
I was expecting to hear more dynamics and perhaps a little more solid bass. I was wrong.
What I got was:
much improved left-to-right imaging (on well recorded albums the vocalists is now solidly in the center between the speakers; instruments are locked into place between the speakers)
more mid-range clarity (especially noticed on female vocals)
greater sense of the timing of musical notes (more silence between the notes)
I don't know whether this experience can be generalized. Would different amp designs show the same benefit? Would different speaker cross-over designs affect the result? Don't know.
But I was very impressed with this experiment.
Now if I could find time to actually build the 4 Aleph-X monoblocks I have boards for...
BR,
Ren
My experience with passive bi-amping isn't real DIY but it is real-world.
I recently bought a Proceed AMP2 (150 wpc) on Audiogon to complement the AMP2 I already owned for 6 years or so. I passively bi-amped my speakers, hoping that the gain of two production examples of a single model would be very close.
I was expecting to hear more dynamics and perhaps a little more solid bass. I was wrong.
What I got was:
much improved left-to-right imaging (on well recorded albums the vocalists is now solidly in the center between the speakers; instruments are locked into place between the speakers) more mid-range clarity (especially noticed on female vocals) greater sense of the timing of musical notes (more silence between the notes) I don't know whether this experience can be generalized. Would different amp designs show the same benefit? Would different speaker cross-over designs affect the result? Don't know.
But I was very impressed with this experiment.
Now if I could find time to actually build the 4 Aleph-X monoblocks I have boards for...
BR,
Ren
Hi,
I do passive bi-amping like post12, =very short speaker cables.
I find results similar to post10.
The only down side is the extra cost, but this is mitigated by avoiding the need for expensive and/or long cables.
I now always bi-amp and have done so for about 18years. Every speaker I have tried benefitted from separating the amplifier functions.
I do passive bi-amping like post12, =very short speaker cables.
I find results similar to post10.
The only down side is the extra cost, but this is mitigated by avoiding the need for expensive and/or long cables.
I now always bi-amp and have done so for about 18years. Every speaker I have tried benefitted from separating the amplifier functions.
Referring to the listening observations of Ren (post 12).
Could you attribute the sonic differences due to the following? I attempted to put them in order of relevance, from most important to least. Comments welcome if I got these out of order, especially the first three issues. Issue (5) is an issues of topology, which can be solved by using monoblocks and/or class-A operation.
1. Global feedback pushes distortion to higher harmonics (frequencies) but at much lower levels. By using a dedicated amplifier on the bass, the high-frequency distortion harmonics produced by low-frequency bass (due to your global feedback) gets absorbed in your passive crossover, instead of moving ahead to the tweeter.
2. The relationship between the amplifier's damping factor and loudspeaker impedance is greatly altered, as the tweeter and bass are now operating independently, instead of being a lumped parameter.
3. The tweeter amplifier is unburdened from producing low-frequency content along with the high-frequency content, arguably reducing IM distortion.
4. The tweeter amplifier is unburdened from producing power-hungry low-frequency content, narrowing the operating bandwidth and avoiding the large voltage swings that low-frequency notes require. For anything other than Class-A, this also reduces the power supply burden.
5. By vertically biamping, there is no left-right crosstalk through the power supply. Since I build mono amps, this isn't a problem, anyway. This effect is also greatly reduced with Class-A amplifiers, which draw constant current from the power supply, which greatly reduces crosstalk issues.
I find my Triangle Acoustics Stratos Solis speakers to be very damping-factor dependent. So in my case, issue (2) would probably be the most influential.
Too bad Doug Self doesn't post on this site. I'd love to see the nasty flame war he'd start over this, us subjectivists here ...
Could you attribute the sonic differences due to the following? I attempted to put them in order of relevance, from most important to least. Comments welcome if I got these out of order, especially the first three issues. Issue (5) is an issues of topology, which can be solved by using monoblocks and/or class-A operation.
1. Global feedback pushes distortion to higher harmonics (frequencies) but at much lower levels. By using a dedicated amplifier on the bass, the high-frequency distortion harmonics produced by low-frequency bass (due to your global feedback) gets absorbed in your passive crossover, instead of moving ahead to the tweeter.
2. The relationship between the amplifier's damping factor and loudspeaker impedance is greatly altered, as the tweeter and bass are now operating independently, instead of being a lumped parameter.
3. The tweeter amplifier is unburdened from producing low-frequency content along with the high-frequency content, arguably reducing IM distortion.
4. The tweeter amplifier is unburdened from producing power-hungry low-frequency content, narrowing the operating bandwidth and avoiding the large voltage swings that low-frequency notes require. For anything other than Class-A, this also reduces the power supply burden.
5. By vertically biamping, there is no left-right crosstalk through the power supply. Since I build mono amps, this isn't a problem, anyway. This effect is also greatly reduced with Class-A amplifiers, which draw constant current from the power supply, which greatly reduces crosstalk issues.
I find my Triangle Acoustics Stratos Solis speakers to be very damping-factor dependent. So in my case, issue (2) would probably be the most influential.
Too bad Doug Self doesn't post on this site. I'd love to see the nasty flame war he'd start over this, us subjectivists here ...
I've played with passive bi-amping a lot, and I've had benefits sometimes and negatives sometimes. IME it's only beneficial if you use identical amps, one per speaker. Using dissimilar amps (i.e. Meitner + NAD, Meitner + Bryston, Meitner + Classe), there was a noticeably more powerful sound, with more bass authority and clearer treble, but the coherence suffered, thus so did the musicality. I preferred any of these amps by itself, even the NAD, to the results achieved with two dissimilar amps.
Later I bought another 50W Meitner and was biamping with one STR50 per channel, and that was a knockout punch, better in every way than a single amp. A nice relaxed, powerful and musical sound.
Eventually I bought a set of 100W Meitner monoblocks (high current capability, 200W into 4 ohms). I ran the Meitner monoblocks on the woofers with the 50W Meitners running the tweeters, but it didn't make a lot of sense, because the 50W amp was still running a circuit that was 86dB, and thus it would clip before the 100W amps. Since the 100W monoblocks had ample power, there was very little to gain with the second amp. A larger amp of the same design on the bottom makes sense if you're using an active crossover, but not with passive.
I attribute the gains made with passive biamping to the increased current available to the speaker. Current starvation is a very common occurence in amps, and one of the main things that separates an audiophile quality amp from a mainstream receiver. Not just the amount of current available in the amp, but the speed at which the amp can swing the current.
So AFAIC, the decision should be either...
- two amps in passive bi-amp mode, or
- one better amp
The answer would vary situationally.
Later I bought another 50W Meitner and was biamping with one STR50 per channel, and that was a knockout punch, better in every way than a single amp. A nice relaxed, powerful and musical sound.
Eventually I bought a set of 100W Meitner monoblocks (high current capability, 200W into 4 ohms). I ran the Meitner monoblocks on the woofers with the 50W Meitners running the tweeters, but it didn't make a lot of sense, because the 50W amp was still running a circuit that was 86dB, and thus it would clip before the 100W amps. Since the 100W monoblocks had ample power, there was very little to gain with the second amp. A larger amp of the same design on the bottom makes sense if you're using an active crossover, but not with passive.
I attribute the gains made with passive biamping to the increased current available to the speaker. Current starvation is a very common occurence in amps, and one of the main things that separates an audiophile quality amp from a mainstream receiver. Not just the amount of current available in the amp, but the speed at which the amp can swing the current.
So AFAIC, the decision should be either...
- two amps in passive bi-amp mode, or
- one better amp
The answer would vary situationally.
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