Here is the blog from the Kipsch site, I've cut a portion out for reading here.
So where’s the controversy? Just taking two stereo amplifiers and hooking them up to your speakers (removing the straps on the input terminals) is called passive bi-amping (or “fool’s bi-amping” for the non-PC) and is very close to being just a waste of money (again many people will disagree). You are sending the entire music signal to both amplifiers and both amplifiers are amplifying the entire signal, but you are allowing the passive crossover network to filter the amplified signals. I can’t think of any benefit in doing this. The tweeter amplifier is still reproducing the bass signals and they are still causing the amplifier to clip. (Perhaps there is a slight benefit by not requiring the current of the bass notes, as this can increase the headroom of the tweeter amplifier – by not drawing down the power supply rail voltage.)
That person seemed totally confused. Please do not let silly things posted in some blogs confuse you. I sure hope that post was not endorsed by the design/engineering team at Klipsch. In passive biamp scheme if done correctly the
power amplifiers do not amplify the full bandwidth (unfiltered) signal. If it does then yes you may as well get a bigger amp and just biwire. I think the person might have misunderstood Mr. Elliot's articles on the biamp topic, not that the contents in those articles are totally accurate either.
That being said, as long as you are happy with the SPL well below your speaker's limit from your listening position, you may need to have real golden ears (borrow from birds
) to hear the kind of theoretical improvements by passive biamping. If you go active, then you need know as well or better than the designers over at Klipsch or you may end up simply tuning the sound to suit your personal taste as you will then have control of the tonal characteristics of the speakers through the electronic filters. Zumbo is sort of part way there by using two amps with independent gain controls but no active filters (hence quarter way or less) so he could alter the tonal balance to a very limited extent, such as less energy to the tweeter without altering the signal spectrum.
