Active or passive?

I would have thought the complete control over the amp by a speaker manufacturer would offer amazing results...to the point of choosing active over passive in many cases.

Simple, I’ve always found the more "active components" that are in the signal path the more sterile and two dimensional the sound becomes.
 I would love for a source to be able to drive the speakers direct

Cheers George

that should be revealing dumb auto correct.

George, what I meant is that there are some active speakers I"ve listened to that I didn’t like the voicing. Even in passive mode it wouldn’t have mattered.

I’ve done a lot of this with very reviling ESL’s >150hz with dynamic bass drivers <150hz, for me in active mode for mids and highs you’ve suddenly added two hand fulls of "active components opamps ect", compared to just half a dozen passive components in passive mode, "active sterilizes" mids and highs compared to "passive". But for bass the active is better.

Cheers George

There was always something special about the active speakers that I found alluring even if I wasn’t in love with the voicing.

For bass active is the best, tightness and control "the alluring"
But for the mids and highs go quality passive, then you be happy with "the voicing".

Cheers George

Active on the bass and good quality passive on the mids highs.
  
I've yet to hear an active xover (even discrete) better the sound of a good passive (>200hz) on the mids and highs of my ESL's, active's seem to sterilize the music. But on the bass 2 x 12" SV12(<200hz), definitely an active. Or on a 3 way box speaker.
 
If you have a two box speaker way then it's different as much of the mids are in the bass unit. I would just have a very good passive xover.

Cheers George