hey guys,
i'm currently looking ard for a 3 way active crossover but is confused abt which one to get... any advice?

Audiocontrol DXS - 3 way digital crossover
Audiocontrol DQX - 3 way digital crossover & 30 band EQ
(www.audiocontrol.com)
Crossfire have some good analog units, but don't know the product name for them

Are there any cheaper ones out there that are half decent?

I couldn't really see there being to many "cheap" options out there in the way of an active crossover, best bet would be to try and source a 2nd hand one.

Don't cut corners on this one.
Audiocontrol is one of the best there is and I would reccomend them.
PG and Zapco also do some nice signal processors.
Any of the above brands are ones I can confidently reccomend. I have used/own both PG and Audiocontrol X-overs.
Something like this will last for years and is allways handy to have lying around if the need arises.
I picked up my PG really cheap S/H this might be the way to go.

Have a look at the Tru tech F1B : http://www.trutechnology.com/f_series.htm

Everything is fully adjustable plus it has a line driver!


Bye,
Mo

Track down a secondhand nakamichi EC302.

Very nice, inovative (no pots just nice accurate switches) active xovers.

This is really the only 3 Way active crossover I would spend money on having used and tuned a few of them now.

[web:a6c639b55c]http://www.audiocontrol.com/MobileAudio/Pr...igital/DQX.html[/web:a6c639b55c]

The beauty of it is that it's also a 30 Band EQ

Can be had for around $1000 but I have heard members on here pick them up for $600 odd.

hmm thanks guys,
but now I'm thinking of going passive crossovers. What I had in mind was to make a custom passive crossovers using good quality components. Off course this will be done overseas not here... Any thoughts?

How about borrowing an active xover so you can adjust all you points to get the best sound, then model you passives on the figures your active setup gave you.

yeah dats a good way, but the thing is, i hafnt got my midwoofers or my tweeters.. haha

whilst i haven't built a passive xover before, i think it'll take a lot of patience and time to experiment then rebuild and adjust then try again.

you can have all the theory and specs, and create a good base from which to work. but you're likely to want to adjust a few things when the setup is in the car. this might include attenuating or boosting different drivers (eg: tweeters) relative to the others, overlapping or underlapping xover points between drivers, etc. plus phasing issues.

so there's definitely no guarantee that your first attempt will be the right one. then it becomes expensive when you need to change cap/coil values etc.

the high quality passive xovers i've seen are also physically quite big.

active xovers makes a lot of sense if you don't have the time or inclination to go passive. no phasing issues, and easy to dial in and adjust.

audiocontrol indeed make some excellent xovers. some of their basic ones use fixed-frequency xover points by using different rating resistors. this offers high SQ but again can be fiddly and time consuming to change resistors, etc. and a little expensive.

i prefer active xovers with pots/dials that are quick and easy to use. i personally have an alpine DRE-500 which i find comprehensive and excellent; but no longer available except secondhand (but worth waiting for in terms of value).

many namebrands offer decent units, including phoenix gold, clarion, etc and coustic make very good value ones too (cheaper end of the market but not poor quality).

obviously ensure it has the features you want. for "3-way" do you mean to HP some tweeters and BP a woofer? or is it for a 3-way front stage which would need a 5-way xover: HP tweet, BP mid, BP woofer. if the amp has an inbuilt HP filter you could make do with a 4-way active xover to LP the woofer, BP the mid and HP the tweet.

good luck

the work on the custom crossover wont b done by me, as I have no idea on how to make one. The work would be done by a audio installator overseas as labour in this part of the world is incredibly expensive thus me resorting to 3rd world countries haha..

I was thinking going the active crossovers but is considering passive after some reccomendations from others that passives are a better way to go.. any thoughtS? its only a 2 way front stage btw, thus a 3 way xover..

yes, some people swear by passive xovers for their nice fluid sound, but i can't hear the difference myself.

indeed if you can have an experienced person build and design it, plus use high quality components (at least as nice as those in high qualit splits) then it would be a great option.

you'll obviously only need 2 channels ofr power as opposed to running 4 (can be a big saving in money), and if you're happy to use the amp's inbuilt HP filter for the woofer, you'll need a 2-way passive xover (LP for woofer and HP for tweet). that'll be simpler still and cheaper.

What were the reasons for the recommendations of passive crossovers?

Personally, I think a correctly tuned active setup will be more suitable and far more flexible, especially in car audio application.

When doing an active setup, I would recommend using an equalizer as well.

The unit that Marc mentioned looks quite handy as it has an eq built in, as well as a memory - handy for comparing several tunings. Although it assumes you want to use 24db/octave slopes..

Sorry to bring this thread. In that AudioControl active 3 way crossover, there are 4 pairs of RCA sockets, 1 pair input and rest output? Does that mean each pair of speakers will be running with a amp?

Yes

woah.. ok then I better stick with passive filter