A few months ago I completed an 8 page review of the Active T10s, which James has, and referenced the conclusion page in a post around that time. I'm not attached to any publication, so it's not published in full anywhere. James has offered to make copies available to anyone who requests via email
Your concern on whether the digital conversion lessens the ultimate sound quality was very much on my mind; I was thinking it may well be an unspoken concern with some potential upgraders to active, so I chose to address it in the review. To do this I took the time to set the system back to passive mode and listened for a few days, to re-orient to the changed status, and then went back to active. I was careful to use some of the same tracks and volume levels. Listening at the same volume is key; a minor change in volume can change your perceptions of the sound quality.
Following is the excerpted part that discusses my experience in freshly comparing passive to active, while keeping all other parameters the same. Part of my interest was whether my analogue source, a turntable feeding Bryston BP2 phono stage, would show any "oh buts" in the comparison.
"The Elephant In The Room
I hadn’t done a passive vs. active comparison between a T type speaker since upgrading my original Model T speakers quite a long time ago. The BAX-1 crossover uses DSP for very fine-grained control of crossover characteristics, much more so than can be achieved using passive components. Bryston claims that such levels of control even help to improve the sound power characteristic of the speaker, the relative evenness of the total envelope of sound all around the speaker cabinet, not just the frontal frequency response. The analog signal that leaves the preamp is converted to digital in the BAX, and back again to analog at the outputs to the amplifiers. I got to wondering: is all that A-D and D-A doing any harm? Somehow leaving something good on the cutting room floor, so to speak?
So I took the time to revert the system back to passive crossover operation, and listened to selections from a demo playlist, of both digital files locally stored, and vinyl from the SL-1210G turntable, using my old Shure V15 V with new Jico SAS/B stylus, eventually switching back to active mode, and re-listening to the same material. (Digitally speaking, I don’t stream digital files. I use music stored on local drives.) The comparison was completely subjective. I did no measurements, apart from checking volume levels.
The change to active mode was unquestionably an improvement, in every way that matters. Not only were dynamics improved overall, but micro-dynamics, that make for subtle shadings and details within the aural canvas were clearer, less homogenized. A specific instrument within an ensemble could suddenly be played or struck with more emphasis, without affecting the other sounds around it. The soundstage was at least as wide, high and deep as with passive, and with certain recordings, extends with a sense of three dimensionality well outside the speakers, and further back in depth. If you’ve ever heard a tall line-source speaker design, you already know that soundstage height is usually abundant. (Depth is a discussion unto itself – I’ve never sat in Carnegie or Massey hall and thought “I can hear the rear wall of the stage”. I tend to think of audiophile discussions of recorded depth to be relative to various recorded instruments and performers within the aural “stage”.)"
Hope this helps.
Brian
