Active speakers are bi-amped which equals less distortion.
Active speakers allow better optimisation of the crossover.
Active crossovers increase headroom because the bands are separated reducing the chance of distortion.
Active monitors have amps specially matched to the drivers. Better damping.
Active monitors can connect the bass driver mechanical motion in the amps feedback loop. Better high freq response, reduced ringing, reduces driver distortion.
Passive crossovers waste energy as heat.
All else being equal active always beats passive. That's why it's almost impossible to buy high quality, new monitors that aren't active any more.
If you can afford it that's what you want. Active.
So yeah. kids right. Actives will be more 'revealing' because they are by nature more accurate, produce less distortion and play louder.
1. Active does result in less distortion generally than passive but not always. Some actives have too weak kneed power supplies such as Tannoy's 5 inch monitors back a couple years ago. They were obviously heavily EQed & lacked the power to match & as such ran into heavy distortion at quite low volumes. This was a built in EQ to get strong bass from a small driver.
2.Crossover optimization is another possible benefit that though true not always realized in the final product. See above.
3. Active crossovers do not really increase headroom, The output is not sufficiently narrow band in most cases too have any benefit. Also generally amps are generally smaller than would be used in a passive setup. Where the benefit is that if you clip the woofer amp the tweeter doesn't get sent the resulting distortion causing it to fry with an active setup which would happen in a passive setup.
4. Better damping is definitely a benefit. It is more the other way around as far what needs to be matched to what though as the driver needs to be matched to the amp too prevent from being over damped instead of the amp matched to the driver.. you can match the amp closer to the driver capability power wise though Yes there is such a thing as over damping. Either magnet strength needs reducing or fewer turns of wire needs to be exposed to the magnetic field in order to keep the sound balanced & not bass shy when connected directly to the amp as in an active speaker. .
5. this last point needs to be separated into 4 separate points
A. Yes woofer can have motion feedback & hence have lower distortion but this is really only applicable to subwoofers as above a certain frequency the feedback becomes positive instead of negative feedback & when that happens distortion increases instead of decreases.
B. High frequency response is not increased by motion feedback or damping, Contrary high damping prevents the voltage from rising with impedance as happens with all dynamic drivers as the get near their max frequency response. Result is sooner rolloff with high damping than without. except with electrostats & possibly piezoelectric tweeters.
C. Yes, reduced ringing of the driver units especially in the bass. This of coarse does not apply to cabinet resonances, hence poor cabinet design can negative affect the sound though so far most active monitors do ok here, not as well though as some high end passives though
D. Yes, reduced distortion
6. Yes reduced heat in the crossover compared to a passive design. Parts can be smaller , cheaper & generally higher quality as well than used in many passive speakers, especially cheap passive commonly use cheap poor quality crossover components compared to the components found in the active crossover which though even cheaper they tend to be much higher quality as they don't have to deal with high power they are much smaller.
Note that yes I am in the active generally better camp but don't believe that to always be the case
