Before continuing this discussion, I would like to say that I’m in favor of the open and polite discussion of ideas, even for respectful debate, but a “clash of personalities” or similar is not why I participate here.

Quite a few years ago, anyone who wanted more than stereo was a niche customer. Once surround started being common, anyone that wanted more than 5.1 was a niche customer. Features and capabilities that start out being ‘niche’ sometimes move to the mainstream if the marketing people think they can increase sales.

There are snake-oil extremes, and there are genuinely beneficial extremes. Having a driver connected directly to the amplifier is a benefit for many reasons and is not always extreme.

The B&W Nautilus with the tapering cones behind each driver utilizes a crossover preceding amplification and four channels of amplification are needed per loudspeaker. This loudspeaker is certainly an extreme case and requires a niche market – an exceptional loudspeaker priced like a car – but ±½dB from 25Hz on through 20KHz is an amazingly flat acoustic output curve achieved in part due to the active crossover and direct amp-to-driver connection.

I would not consider the Mackie HR824 to be an extreme niche product. This is a self-powered, true bi-amp loudspeaker showing good control of its drivers with an acoustic output that varies ±1.5dB from 39Hz on through 22.5KHz. Mackie sells thousands of these in the professional market. Even some in this forum use this speaker, or its siblings, in their HT. These are amazing speakers for their size. I would not be surprised to see this type of application end up being touted by marketers-to-the-masses in the not-to-distant future. A 990/7.1 system using this family of speakers would allow one to try out long balanced line-level cable runs instead of long speaker cables and have true bi-amp listening throughout the room.

Back to the marketing angle: balanced line-level cables were once considered only professional or niche, but are increasing in home usage, even if their use for short pre-amp out runs has a list of pros and cons that come up nearly even with unbalanced short runs.

In the Outlaw’s tradition of offering unique products at great value, it actually wouldn’t surprise me if Outlaw ventures into the ‘full-range’ loudspeaker market at some point with self-powered loudspeakers containing active crossovers and true bi-amp or tri-amp, direct-to-the-driver operation. (Hint: Scott, if you get to this point while my hearing is still good, count me in on beta testing!)