[RRuskin]

Originally Posted by Pokiehat

1) you don't measure sound in 'pounds'.

I was speaking metaphorically.

2) The whole point of near field monitoring is to reduce undesirable influence of the room on the sound you hear from the speakers. If you listen 3 feet away from your head, you hear less room reflection/reverberation. If you sit back a couple more meters (assuming your room is even that big) then you start to catch flutter echos and reverb unless the room has very controlled acoustics.

In my experience, regardless of monitor systems used, almost any room will need some treatment.

In practice there are many other things to think about but the term comes from the recording industry practise of putting small speakers on the meter bridge to simulate a point source that is within the 'near field' of the sound board operator (i.e. at or just beyond arm's reach when leaning over your desk).

The 1st monitors I ever saw up on a meter bridge were Auratone Sound Cubes which were used to check mixes on "garbage" (single 4" driver) monitors. The theory being that if a mix held together on junk it would sound decent on just about anything. The practice of putting fuller-ranged units such as JBL 4310's (possibly the very 1st pro speaker system with a small footprint) or Yamaha NS-10's up on the bridge came a bit later. These smaller units were more often as not used as secondary devices to check how anything mixed on the main system would sound in a "typical" home and/or car environment.

3) You don't ever want to listen at 'killer levels' because you will destroy your ears.

I wasn't advocating that anyone should but know and have known folks that do prefer to crank the levels up on playback. I merely pointed out that it was a good way to destroy speakers.

4) If you destroy an amp you gotta replace it. It doesn't matter if you have actives or passives. If you have a spare amp lying around matched to your speakers then whats the difference with having spare active monitors lying around if you destroy your actives? More particularly, why are you blowing speakers and killing amps in the first place if you are driving them at reasonable listening levels?

IMHO, A spare power amp is considerably cheaper and easier to swap than an entire playback system. You can get used Hafler, Crown, BGW amps at very reasonable prices. A back-up amp may or may not be "ideal" for a given passive monitor system but it will get you up and running much quicker than having to move an entire system out and another one in its place. Plus, those amps are field repairable. Some active systems aren't. They must go back to somebody's shop and have complete assemblies replaced. Not fast and often not cheap or even reasonable. .