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Monoblocks, passive bi-amped or passive tri-amped?

I have been doing lots of research, but to no avail. Some writers & speaker builders say you will get sonic benefits from passive bi or tri amping, some say you get nothing. Some say running 2 identical amps will give a 50% increase in power to the speaker…some say zero. IMO it seems logical that an amp pushing 1 driver, as opposed to many, would have an easier load, and thus more headroom, control, speed, detail, etc.

The options I’m considering:
250W D monoblocks
220W D bi-amped
140W A/B tri-amped

I can’t active amp…so need technical info on which of these would sound best, and why. Thanks!
manoterror

Showing 1 response by gregm

gregm
3,395 posts
 
Mano -- "I'm assuming that Mirage built them this way". That is unlikely: they would have supplied the crossovers separately had that been the case.

In my passive days, I invariably found that "single amping" with the (sonically) better amp invariably outperformed multi-amping with mediocre amps.

All things considered, you're probably best off using a good quality amplifier spec'd at, or above 100W / 8ohms.

If you opt for a multichannel amp, choose "quality" over higher power output specification... and drive the woofs separately.

IF you opt for a super multichannel amp, with discrete PS for each channel and you have channels to spare after hooking up whatever, you might as well drive the mids separately too.
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