Of course Kudos want to sell crossovers,but as their passive crossovers were beaten by active filters from other companies,they needed to come up with something else, to get all the money.
I think it would have been very easy to just rely on the electronics manufacturers to provide the active crossovers for their speakers. Linn and Exposure were popular for activating Kudos speakers, but it was really all about the SNAXO, with specific versions for the Titan range. When Naim stopped making them, Kudos took a fairly brave approach in my opinion and delivered an excellent solution.
I decided to move away from an active setup with my T808s and I’m much happier with a super-integrated driving them passively. It’s good to have the choice though. Gone is the cable spaghetti, which is a relief. It is part of the reason I moved on from Naim because of the Burndy and extra PS boxes. I miss the name sound to a degree, but I knew if a pair of NAP 350s came home they would be followed by the Naim pre, streamer, multiple PSs. It was just too much to contemplate. I’m not discounting a bare NSS333 in my future though!
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Yes,many goes for convenience over performance these days ..
I actually got a boost in performance with a much better and dynamic sound. Power brings control.
It wasn’t about convenience or I might have ended up with a Nova PE. It was to remove unnecessary faff but make a big leap forward at the same time. I expect things to just work. There is certainly nothing wrong with the T808 passive crossover.
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Interesting post.
I’ve had a move around of my two systems. Right now I have the unlikely combination of T808s driven by my 52/SC/135s. Fed from my excellent analogue sources I can’t say that I’ve heard the Titans sound much better . They have a very simple efficient 91db low order crossover fitted and as long as the source is up to it and the amps driving them provide clean rapid current they can sound great. A single 250 might not be as good a match as 135s based on this reasoning. Obviously your Integrated provides good synergy with the 808s
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Given that you have previously run yours active with 3x NAP 500, that’s quite a statement.
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Indeed. I can only report it honestly as I hear it Ian. My turntable has improved since active T808 days. That obviously contributes . But I’m using a Grahams Hydra for the mains, basic Naim ICs and KS1 speaker cable.
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Source first as always and Nap 135’s are fantastic!
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I have never ran mine active, and hearing your report i don’t think i will ever bother.
But never felt they were lacking if you get what i mean, whereas certainly with the old SBL’s they respond hugely going active.
Different times and different speakers i know, but certainly interesting to find someone else that finds things like myself
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But you have also left Naim equipment,so you probably don’t want anything that sounds like
Naim…
It’s not a matter of something wrong with it, but simply or else being equal active drive is inherently better!
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*different.
And don’t forget, he runs no USB stick on his Vivaldi.
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No Vivaldi here.
I bought my 505’s after a demo in passive mode driven by a non Naim amp (can’t remember what it was). Then tried them with 1x500 passive then 2x500 active which was a good step up in my opinion.
Adding Townsend Podiums give it another lift.
I could probably do to treat the room properly but the wife isn’t up for that.
She turned a blind eye to the 2nd 500 but won’t tolerate sound panels etc
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I guess if you already have the active gear and just need to change the crossover to the right setting, then carrying on active makes complete sense.
But if starting from fresh i see little sense in doing it, unless you are really going for it. With that i mean a good beefy amp on the bass, something with atleast twice the capacity of the 500dr ( i dont me watts per channel) but all this is going to cost a lot and then you need to adk yourself maybe better speakers and one amp would be better again?
Just thought if you have say 2 x 500dr Amp’s already, then maybe use them on the midrange and treble and get something else for the bass, that could be a great combo. But even then i would have to ask myself is the cost worth it? Only one way to find out i guess..but it won’t be me as i am extremely happy with my set up.
I asked kudos directly about podiums on the 808’s and was told not to do it by them.
The base on the 808’s is already tuned apparently and adding them will upset that.
I guess if you are on a wooden suspended floor it would help with vibrations getting back up into the rack and gear? But as far as kudos say its a no, but would they say that anyway and have they tried them, probably not.
Yeah - they are on a fairly springy suspended wooden floor and we are in an 1870(ish) Victorian terrace, so wanted to avoid vibrations in the room and through the walls.
They deffo tightened the sound up a bit and vibrations considerably less obvious
Literally!
Re acoustic treatment, I don’t know if you are aware that acoustic panels can be printed with aerwork - potentially anything other than infringing copyright, so that can be prints of paintings, or your own photographs etc. GIK do a range as standard, and when I enquired a while back they said they could do that with almost all of their panels not just the ones advertised that way.
I can certainly see them helping in that situation as i said previously.
Probably not so if you have a soild floor.
Plus kudos made it a bit difficult to put different feet onto the 808’s as the fixings hole is massive compared to more normal fixings, so nothing will screw in to them unless you make something