Chances are very high that, the first time you listen to your newly actively-crossed over system, it will sound worse, or VERY worse than it did with the stock passive crossovers.

Thia is because of the fact that not only is all "voicing" which the manufacturer labored long and hard for is now gone, but also the balances between the drivers is all out of whack.

You are now at square one. You are in the driver's seat. You are now at the place where the manufacturer was before he got down to designing a crossover for his speaker.

The active setup most certainly has the potential to sound significantly better than the passive one, but it is NOT plug-'n-play!!!!!

Patience, and the ability to "listen through" the sound you are getting, to the sound you want, is everything.

It could be that this thread is meant for mains/sub(s) crossover rather than 'full-range' passive crossover replacement - the exchange is good anyway.

Altec: Chances are very high that, the first time you listen to your newly actively-crossed over system, it will sound worse, or VERY worse than it did with the stock passive crossovers. BB4TB: Yup.

Altec: This is because of the fact that not only is all "voicing" which the manufacturer labored long and hard for is now gone, but also the balances between the drivers is all out of whack. BB4TB: Yup - that's why having all kinds of 'adjustability' is a good idea, hence the Behringer unit to aid in determining what's needed before building a less flexible crossover of better components.

Altec: You are now at square one. You are in the driver's seat. You are now at the place where the manufacturer was before he got down to designing a crossover for his speaker. BB4TB: Nearly square one. I do have the manufacturer's frequency response graph and will have a limited set of my own acoustic measurements before and after. I can also make make a schematic and take electronic measurements of the original crossover in action to know about any attenuation beyond frequency division. If I don't like the results, I can always restore the original crossover.

Altec: The active setup most certainly has the potential to sound significantly better than the passive one, but it is NOT plug-'n-play!!!!! BB4TB: Yup.

Altec: Patience, and the ability to "listen through" the sound you are getting, to the sound you want, is everything. BB4TB: It is significant, and part of the enthusiast's experience to explore the possibilities, enjoying the process as much as any potential results.

Beyond a division of frequencies, do the crossovers you made contain any significant 'voicing' and, if so, did you work from a circuit already designed for the drivers you were using, work it out on your own or ???

Yup...

All the "voicing" was arrived at over considerable time by ear, and listening to many, many recordings. Even now however, I can easily adjust the HF to suit certain recordings.

The crossover it's self has no frequency response altering capability.

The output of the crossover which goes to the woofers is routed through an active 1/3rd octave equalizer which more than anything corrects for some weirdness in my room in the vicinity of 200Hz.

The crossover to the HF horn is at 500Hz (they're designed to operate down to this frequency) to allow the single horn to cover as much of the audio range as possible. Having a single diaphram and horn cover such a large range aids tremendously in creating a coherent wavefront.

In the crossover's HF output is placed a line level passive shunt L-C-R variable Q filter with two fixed frequencies which were chosen by experiment and listening. The amount of impact the EQ has can be varied by two potentiometers, one for each filter frequency, which varies the depth of the notch and the filter Q.

Now before somebody squauks about my use of a passive filter, I must point out that there is a world of difference between a line level passive filter like I'm using and a speaker level passive filter (crossover). Line level passive filters are noiseless and distortionless, which is why I went this route. The passive filter guarantees that no electronic degredation will take place in the equalization stage.

Speaker level passive filters (as in crossover networks) produce all kinds of distortions because the filter is it's self driving a reactive element (the speaker driver). Additionally, because of the high voltage and currents involved in a passive speaker level crossover, it is extremely, if not impossible, to find parts of the quality and precision that can be used at the much lower voltages and currents of a line level passive filter.

To address Lizards original question "Can somneone recommend a good active crossover that I can use with both subs, a an anit-resonance filter and the ability to adjust what goes to my mains?"

I use a similar one of these from NHT. I use the X1 version since I have their speakers but the X2 version is for non NHT subs. Lots of capabilities.
http://nhthifi.com/current/products/speakers/x2.html

Thanks, I must look at this since it uses RCA's


"To address Lizards original question "Can somneone recommend a good active crossover that I can use with both subs, a an anit-resonance filter and the ability to adjust what goes to my mains?"

I use a similar one of these from NHT. I use the X1 version since I have their speakers but the X2 version is for non NHT subs. Lots of capabilities.
http://nhthifi.com/current/products/speakers/x2.html"

Actually allows use of either RCA or XLR on both input and output.

The Counterpoint is no longer in the system. I now use a VAC Pa100/100 tube amp.