Opinions on Bi-amping...

[pearsall001]

Has anyone given it a try? And if so what were your thoughts. Did you use 2 identical amps (vertical) or two different amps (horizontal). Did you use an external active crossover & bypass the speakers passive crossover? In the end was it worth the expense & the trouble. Just toying with the idea. I've read many positive comments & a few negatives. Thanks

[whoaru99]

I've tried the in-speaker passive crossover method of biamping with three different sets of speakers and never noticed any difference worthy of the added cost, time to set up, and complexity of the wiring - even when all those factors were relatively minimal.

BTW - horizontal biamping can also be performed using the same amps. It's just that it's most commonly used to facilitate different styles of amps such as tubes for the mid/high and SS for the lows.

[Gregm]

I have tried biamping -- in fact am still using 4 amp channels on my 2channel setup. Am driving mid-high and bass separately. Mid-high still uses internal passive xover.

Cutting a long story short: no comparison whatsoever.
Before I had an external, electronic xover bypassing the spkrs' passive circuit. The two amps were not the same (still aren't) but the xover had/has discrete volume adjustments and phase (as many/all do)
Horizontal biamping.

Note that one needs precise info on the passive xover -- better still a schematic -- to reproduce the xover points, slopes & q, etc...

Tried biamping the passive way: little improvement as per whoa above, insufficient to justify cost and hassle. Cheers

[Kingdaddy]

There is only one type of bi-amping that will always net a benefit and that’s active bi-amping, passive bi-amping is generally a waste of time and does nothing for the SQ, except in rare cases where you have a big motor on a woofer that is feeding a lot of back EMF to a sensitive amp. My entire 5-ch system is activly bi/tri amped, I would never use a passive crossover again, their evil.

[brishea]

There is only one type of bi-amping that will always net a benefit and that’s active bi-amping, passive bi-amping is generally a waste of time and does nothing for the SQ, except in rare cases where you have a big motor on a woofer that is feeding a lot of back EMF to a sensitive amp. My entire 5-ch system is activly bi/tri amped, I would never use a passive crossover again, their evil.

newbie question. what do you mean by active or passive bi-amping? how are they done? please be patient. still trying to learn terms. thanks.

[twitch54]

newbie question. what do you mean by active or passive bi-amping? how are they done? please be patient. still trying to learn terms. thanks.

The basic difference is that in ACTIVE Bi-Amping you utilize an electronic crossover between the preamp and amp. Whereas in PASSIVE you are utilizing the speakers crosover with the preamp split into two left and right channel signals feeding their respective inputs on the two amps.

The primary benifit of active vs passive is that each amp is called upon to provide power only within it's bandwith as opposed to the entire spectrum, thus making it more efficient. Also in some cases with active bi-amping you can connect the bass driver amp directly to the woofer, thus eliminating the crossover and being able to provide better damping.

[ShadowZA]

Here's a detailed article on active bi-amping:

http://sound.westhost.com/bi-amp.htm

[andrewT]

Hi,
I am very much in favour of passive bi-amping.
My first foray was about twenty five years ago when I converted my Tannoy Berkleys to bi-wiring. Then I wired up four amps (two stereo amps, one to each speaker) with VERY SHORT cables and the improvement from the original to bi-wired was big, the improvement from bi-wired to bi-amped was nearly as big.
I have run passive bi-wiring ever since (AE1s and WAD KLS3g), recently tried but failed to improve using active conversion.

[laneza01]

Alright, so I think see how active and passive applies to a pre/pro system. On my receiver, Sony STR-ES5200, i have the option of using the back 2 speakers (7.1, i only use 5.1) to bi-amp my front speakers. Is it worth it (the extra like 200 bucks for another pair of speaker wire)? i mean does it get louder or something? It seems like twice as much power=louder, obviously not much maybe a decibel or two, but more is better right???

[twitch54]

Alright, so I think see how active and passive applies to a pre/pro system. On my receiver, Sony STR-ES5200, i have the option of using the back 2 speakers (7.1, i only use 5.1) to bi-amp my front speakers. Is it worth it (the extra like 200 bucks for another pair of speaker wire)? i mean does it get louder or something? It seems like twice as much power=louder, obviously not much maybe a decibel or two, but more is better right???

1) save your money

2) doubling of power equates to 3db increase in spl

[jayman_1975]

It is quite unlikely that you will notice much gain other than that from the actual bi-wiring that will also take place. When bi-amping with the same receiver you are robbing peter to pay paul.

[Kal Rubinson]

1) save your money

2) doubling of power equates to 3db increase in spl

In addition, passive bi-amping does not even double the power due to the uneven power distribution of most audio signals.

Kal