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Active monitors can sound very good and often represent excellent yucks/buck.
Welcome non. That looks like a great hell of a deal. Lots of people love powered monitors. Most that I've listened to over any time period were hard and tiring for me, but your ears may really like that sound.
Dave
Paradigm made some killer actives in their Reference line 6 years ago. They were great but never sold. Paradigm gave it the old college try for a couple of years but eventually they threw in the towel.
Hi Dave,
I agree that active monitors are not for everybody, some could find them tiring as they are not meant for an easy listen. I really like the directness, music penetrates you. Music sounds alive, probably better for rock and modern music genres than classical though
hi audioexplorer, I wonder what went wrong with the paradigm actives
My guess is that audiophiles like seperate components, as a rule.
Active speakers kind of take the amp shopping and individual autonomy over this pairing away from the audiophile. Hence, a general lack of popularity for this type of speaker.
Curiously, we're seeing active amplification become more and more accepted in woofer set-ups, either in solo subwoofers, or audiophiles allowing an internal amp for the woofers of a multi-way speaker, just so long as our own amps get to drive the mid and/or tweeter.
Plus, keeping the amps sepeerate from the speakers allows us to more easily change things - which is one of the things audiophiles dearly love to do!
As a side note, did you audition other speakers like the Mackie, JBL, or other active lines?
The Paradigm Actives were killer sounding, but alas too different from what the accepted practice of the times were. As Buddha says audiophiles have fun mixing and matching (sometimes creating real monstrosities sometimes systems that "sing") and actives certainly reduce the number of variables, for better or worse.
Hi Buddha, I agree that thats the probably reason active monitors havent caught on all that much amongst audiophiles.
I had the pleasure of auditioning Tannoy Reveal 8D's and Mackie monitors. I found the Tannoys way too punishing on sub optimal recordings, Mackie I genuinely liked but I felt the M Audios were better spec'd.
Active monitors vary greatly in quality and execution, like everything else.
Do get truly excellent sound you need to spend some serious money, just as you do with separates.
In the $1k a pair range I like the Adam A7. It is a trickle down design from Adam's excellent studio monitors with a wonderfully extended sweet ribbon tweeter. The trade off is that they only go down to ~45Hz. As they have a gain control one could connect a CDP directly to them and have a small inexpensive system that any music lover would enjoy.
I've heard good things about ATC's powered monitors and I know that they are trying to make the transition from the pro to high-end consumer market. From my understanding they are pretty expensive but one must also keep in mind that they aren't buying amps, speaker cable, and one less pair of interconnects.
Hi Elk, I've never had the pleasure of auditioning Adam monitors but have heard lots of good things about them. I suppose it boils down to your musical tastes at the end of the day. I listen to a lot of modern music and rock for which my speakers are fantastic.
End of the day, I believe you can get your hands on some great bargains if you look beyond traditional hifi hype.
Hi Mr Lowry, ATC monitors are very hot amongst the pros. I believe Pink FLoyd mastered the dark side of the moon using ATC monitors. They are pretty expensive and I feel that there is something missing in their middle range, as it goes straight from entry level to high end.
Another thing that turned me off a bit was the low end response on their entry level models which isnt full range due to their sealed box nature (which I suppose has certain advantages when it comes to neutrality and accuracy). But you are right, one should audition them before spending even more money on separate components that might deliver an inferior sound quality.
I was listening to Diana Kralls Girl in the other room album the other day... Dianas voice was alive, and had a real presence in the room. So much so you could almost reach out and feel it. On Temptation her voice was very detailed, I could hear every breath, every piano chord, every emotion in her decadent voice...