Help with bi-amping

greg: very informative post & right on the mark. BRAVO!

Thanks!

First of all, Greg's thread is very good.
Personal (and limited experience):
I have owned B&W800's (quad wired) for about 9 years and love them. This year, I finally was able to actively bi-amp them (with all Krell). With everything else in the system staying the same except the addition of the 2nd amp and x-over, I experienced the biggest improvement that I have ever experience in my system, bar none.
Although Krell and others recommend that it is better to vertically bi-amp (one stereo amp per side), I have two different amps so I had to horizontally bi-amp them (one stereo amp for the bass and one for the mid/highs). There are some theories about the benifits of horizontal bi-amping such as:
1. Complete separation of the top and bottom frequencies at the amps so each amp must only "worry" about certain frequencies.
2. Complete separation of the frequencies at the speakers so there is no chance of any interaction of the bass to the mid/highs.
3. Ability to use different amps which favor top or bottom frequencies.

Everyone that I know that has gone from bi-wiring to bi-amping, either active or passive, has found large improvement, but as Creg said, much more improvement with active bi-amping, assuming it is done correctly.
Have fun!
Richard

I recently biamped my Martin Logan Odysseys using a tube amp on top and solid state on the bottom - I really liked the effect but even more after adding an active crossover - since it allows for better control of gain and frequency separation.

Thanks to everybody for the help. And thanks for the very informative post, Greg. I will be trying out both horizontal and vertical methods and seeing which one works best. One question that I don't think anyone mentioned- how does the power work when you bi-amp? Does a 100w stereo amp then become 200w, since you're using it to drive just 1 speaker?
Thanks again.