Sigberg Audio SBS.1 Active Loudspeaker Review

[MrBoat]

I have some active speakers. Some have failed in around 5 years. I come from an era where speakers and amps lasted 20-30 years and were mostly serviceable. I am not a fan of one stop solutions. They tend to be more disposable than the alternative.

Electronics in a high vibration environment is a concern. It's just an unnecessary possibility of environmental failure in exchange for. . . convenience? Fine for people with the mentality and wherewithal to upgrade cars and such every couple years, but this would always be in the back of my mind as a source of premature failure. If they want to include specific amplification, it should be as a separate module, especially with the more powerful speakers that include any kind of bass.

 

[TLS Guy]

I have some active speakers. Some have failed in around 5 years. I come from an era where speakers and amps lasted 20-30 years and were mostly serviceable. I am not a fan of one stop solutions. They tend to be more disposable than the alternative.

Electronics in a high vibration environment is a concern. It's just an unnecessary possibility of environmental failure in exchange for. . . convenience? Fine for people with the mentality and wherewithal to upgrade cars and such every couple years, but this would always be in the back of my mind as a source of premature failure. If they want to include specific amplification, it should be as a separate module, especially with the more powerful speakers that include any kind of bass.

Modern amps can be made very reliable. As I have pointed out before car audio systems have been active for many years now and hardly ever fail, despite lots of vibration, and worse, coupled with a harsh environment of temperature extremes. The bigger issue is that active crossovers allow for much better crossovers, especially with DSP allowing for the "holy grail" of phase coherent speakers. Passive crossovers, especially in the lower octaves leave a lot to be desired, which is why my reference systems have not used passive crossovers in the lower octaves for around fifty years now. In addition passive crossovers in a box waste 50% or more of the amp power from insertion loss.
Active speakers are the way forward, and will produce huge gains in accuracy and all round performance, especially in high powered systems, where the gains become truly substantial.
What are not reliable are receivers with 11 power amps crammed in a box all driven from an overloaded and inadequate power supply. That is, and will be, an increasing point of failure, if we don't change our ways.
The way ahead is definitely active speakers with an amp connected to each driver and active electronic crossovers.

 

[Sigberg Audio]

I have some active speakers. Some have failed in around 5 years. I come from an era where speakers and amps lasted 20-30 years and were mostly serviceable. I am not a fan of one stop solutions. They tend to be more disposable than the alternative.

Electronics in a high vibration environment is a concern. It's just an unnecessary possibility of environmental failure in exchange for. . . convenience? Fine for people with the mentality and wherewithal to upgrade cars and such every couple years, but this would always be in the back of my mind as a source of premature failure. If they want to include specific amplification, it should be as a separate module, especially with the more powerful speakers that include any kind of bass.

I wonder why we readily accept subwoofers to be active? I also think @TLS Guy's point about AVRs is interesting, those are out of date very quickly not necessarily because they fail, they just don't contain the latest tech.

Directly to your concern:
Our speakers are not likely to fail prematurely, we have taken great care to monitor temperature / cooling etc. But in that unlikely case, they are fully serviceable.

Both drivers and amps can be replaced by basically anyone who can hold a screwdriver. I would happily trust my 8 year old to do it. We have a five year warranty and we promise to stock spare parts for a decade. We use the best amps we could possibly find.

The speakers are also not designed to be a one stop shop, they're speakers with digital filters and power amps. You still need preamp and a source. This means there's not really any tech inside that grows obsolete or stops working. No app or streaming functionality that are no longer updated.

You can connect your preamp or streamer to the speakers via xlr / rca / optical / coax and you're up and running. This will still work perfectly fine 20 years from now.

 

[Will Brink]

122 db. is off the clock for a speaker that size!

It's even smaller in person than I'd expected.

 

[Will Brink]

The article is not intended to be groundbreaking. It is intended to help our customers set up our speakers so they can get a good starting point for good sound, in the case that they don't have the knowledge to do so already.

That so many don't appreciate how important speaker placement, be it spacing location to rear and side walls, etc. is apparent by the many photos of systems on line I visit, especially FB audio groups. Very common to see people having spent serious $ on a system only to have speakers placed poorly. No doubt forums like this help people not do that, and get the most from their gear. Many (most?) of us have limitations on placement to deal with and have to work at optimizing the space we have to work with.

 

[Will Brink]

Modern amps can be made very reliable. As I have pointed out before car audio systems have been active for many years now and hardly ever fail, despite lots of vibration, and worse, coupled with a harsh environment of temperature extremes. The bigger issue is that active crossovers allow for much better crossovers, especially with DSP allowing for the "holy grail" of phase coherent speakers. Passive crossovers, especially in the lower octaves leave a lot to be desired, which is why my reference systems have not used passive crossovers in the lower octaves for around fifty years now. In addition passive crossovers in a box waste 50% or more of the amp power from insertion loss.
Active speakers are the way forward, and will produce huge gains in accuracy and all round performance, especially in high powered systems, where the gains become truly substantial.
What are not reliable are receivers with 11 power amps crammed in a box all driven from an overloaded and inadequate power supply. That is, and will be, an increasing point of failure, if we don't change our ways.
The way ahead is definitely active speakers with an amp connected to each driver and active electronic crossovers.

Gene and others have been saying for a long time to be sure. That's been my understanding and feeling also, although I lack the SME level of knowledge/background as he et al do on the topic. If/when I do make a major change to my system, it will be to go with actives which have been on my radar for a while now, and been keeping an eye on the tech, companies offering them, etc. Currently listening to the Sigberg active system (SBS.1 and sub) as I type.

 

[Sigberg Audio]

It's even smaller in person than I'd expected.

Just to be clear, the 122dB figure is from the Manta. The max spl for sbs is 116dB, which is still very loud.

I can't from the top of my mind think of any similarly sized speaker that comes close.

 

[TLS Guy]

Just to be clear, the 122dB figure is from the Manta. The max spl for sbs is 116dB, which is still very loud.

I can't from the top of my mind think of any similarly sized speaker that comes close.

Nor can I. It strikes me you might have a major market for Hauptwerk organs. This market is growing like crazy. As far as I can tell, Def Tech are supplying this market extensively. I would bet your speakers are a lot better. It is often customary to use multiple speakers for different divisions. So there is potential to sell more than one pair per customer!

 

[MrBoat]

I wonder why we readily accept subwoofers to be active? I also think @TLS Guy's point about AVRs is interesting, those are out of date very quickly not necessarily because they fail, they just don't contain the latest tech.

Directly to your concern:
Our speakers are not likely to fail prematurely, we have taken great care to monitor temperature / cooling etc. But in that unlikely case, they are fully serviceable.

Both drivers and amps can be replaced by basically anyone who can hold a screwdriver. I would happily trust my 8 year old to do it. We have a five year warranty and we promise to stock spare parts for a decade. We use the best amps we could possibly find.

The speakers are also not designed to be a one stop shop, they're speakers with digital filters and power amps. You still need preamp and a source. This means there's not really any tech inside that grows obsolete or stops working. No app or streaming functionality that are no longer updated.

You can connect your preamp or streamer to the speakers via xlr / rca / optical / coax and you're up and running. This will still work perfectly fine 20 years from now.

I don't own active subwoofers. There are plenty examples of those amps failing though, at a much higher rate than separate amps.

The skill level needed to replace parts isn't a concern for me. I can rebuild the engine and transmissions/systems in my car from the ground up, but doesn't mean I should want to.

My post was in response to those not understanding why people are not so willing to give in to active speakers, and why I don't, or why I don't need, or want to. I have certainly built and repaired enough amps and speakers to understand the current tech involved and I even went to school for it. Regardless of yours and others claims, it does not instantly add historic legacy to the technology. While I am a fan of class D amplification, I still don't want a self contained system in anything more than a desktop or portable.

The reasons why people don't trust hidden electronics are not my fault. It's because they have failed in the past, in spite of what manufacturers have claimed to the contrary. In spite of your "8 year old" being able to change the parts, these pages are riddled with comments of those much older, who don't even own a screwdriver, or know which is the business end, for that matter.

Who is Sigberg Audio? Sounds like one of may startups that happen across this industry daily. Just how many decades/products/ track record can you possibly have for such claims? Basically, at this point, we have to hope you are still here 5, or even 2 years from now. I believe your speakers are actually good, but I'm still not willing to trust $5k of my money to a pair of startup brand active speakers.

 

[Sigberg Audio]

My post was in response to those not understanding why people are not so willing to give in to active speakers, and why I don't, or why I don't need, or want to. I have certainly built and repaired enough amps and speakers to understand the current tech involved and I even went to school for it. Regardless of yours and others claims, it does not instantly add historic legacy to the technology. While I am a fan of class D amplification, I still don't want a self contained system in anything more than a desktop or portable.

The reasons why people don't trust hidden electronics are not my fault. It's because they have failed in the past, in spite of what manufacturers have claimed to the contrary. In spite of your "8 year old" being able to change the parts, these pages are riddled with comments of those much older, who don't even own a screwdriver, or know which is the business end, for that matter.

I have not suggested anything is your fault.

I will admit that failed subwoofer amps are something that happen from time to time, but even there my impression is that this is something of a long-lived memory from the early days where you typically had cheap and overheating AB-amps. Modern class D sub amps live a pretty good life, as an example during our testing with temperature probes, we rarely measured more than 40C (104F) directly on the amp modules within the subwoofer enclosure - and this was driving them hard on hot days. More typical was less than 30C / 86F.

With regards to why people expect active speakers to fail, I think this is more of a myth or perception of the concept than actual fact. I have not seen a lot of reports of failed active speakers. Even the cheap desktop speakers (from logitech and the like) you mention typically just keep on working.

A stand-alone amp can fail as well (yet rarely do), and have just as much hidden electronics as a plate amplifier in an active speaker. We've had active speakers for many decades, and it's the norm rather than the exception for pro/studio use. Do you think people in studios don't care about reliability? I can assure you that they do.

Who is Sigberg Audio? Sounds like one of may startups that happen across this industry daily. Just how many decades/products/ track record can you possibly have for such claims? Basically, at this point, we have to hope you are still here 5, or even 2 years from now. I believe your speakers are actually good, but I'm still not willing to trust $5k of my money to a pair of startup brand active speakers.

This is of course perfectly fine, and this means you are not within the target audience of our products. Products from a new brand will by definition be for early adopters, those interested in new tech and those that are prioritizing trying something new over proven longevity. This is logically impossible to do anything about.

So if you are not an early adopter type, products from Sigberg Audio are not for you (yet). That does not mean they are not the right fit for others.

 

[Sigberg Audio]

Who is Sigberg Audio? Sounds like one of may startups that happen across this industry daily. Just how many decades/products/ track record can you possibly have for such claims?

I think it's also fair to mention that we don't build our amplifiers ourselves, they're built by Hypex. They have been building amps for active speakers for almost 30 years (founded in 1996, and started out doing exactly that).

 

[MrBoat]

Modern amps can be made very reliable. As I have pointed out before car audio systems have been active for many years now and hardly ever fail, despite lots of vibration, and worse, coupled with a harsh environment of temperature extremes. The bigger issue is that active crossovers allow for much better crossovers, especially with DSP allowing for the "holy grail" of phase coherent speakers. Passive crossovers, especially in the lower octaves leave a lot to be desired, which is why my reference systems have not used passive crossovers in the lower octaves for around fifty years now. In addition passive crossovers in a box waste 50% or more of the amp power from insertion loss.
Active speakers are the way forward, and will produce huge gains in accuracy and all round performance, especially in high powered systems, where the gains become truly substantial.
What are not reliable are receivers with 11 power amps crammed in a box all driven from an overloaded and inadequate power supply. That is, and will be, an increasing point of failure, if we don't change our ways.
The way ahead is definitely active speakers with an amp connected to each driver and active electronic crossovers.

My 7 channel amp, all crammed into one box, and that is almost constantly on, is 20 years old this year! I have another just like it the same age. My Pioneer SA-8500 amp, is from 1976 and was finally refurb'd by me, 3 years ago, and we all know what audiophiles think of '70s and '80s mass market electronics. My AVR is my desktop audio system and is on the whole time the PC is on, which is around 15 hrs/day. Hat's off to Denon, for what amounts to an incredibly robust system for 20 years that owes nothing by now.

Active crossovers don't necessarily need to be included into the speakers. Also, I never said active crossovers are bad or inferior. Only way this will surpass the separate component trend, is if it's all there is to choose from.

Passive crossover quality still tends to surpass mass market recording quality and neither school of thought can remedy that to any kind of level standard. Active crossovers are still mostly at the mercy of the room and the recordings. The so-called "disasters" of audio only really exist for OCD audiophiles. A lot of speakers and music work fine without active components, and well outside of disaster survival mode.

 

[MrBoat]

I think it's also fair to mention that we don't build our amplifiers ourselves, they're built by Hypex. They have been building amps for active speakers for almost 30 years (founded in 1996, and started out doing exactly that).

I have Hypex and Icepower amp modules and a few other off brands from China, as well. I have no doubts to their performance. I just don't have to put them inside the speaker cabinet. A lot of external amp brands use these amps as well.

All the same stuff, arranged differently.

My JBL speakers at work are active. I leave them on all the time. But when talking about a serious hi-fi system, I'm still not going to trust having all of my audio eggs in that one basket.

 

[Sigberg Audio]

I have Hypex and Icepower amp modules and a few other off brands from China, as well. I have no doubts to their performance. I just don't have to put them inside the speaker cabinet. A lot of external amp brands use these amps as well.

All the same stuff, arranged differently.

My JBL speakers at work are active. I leave them on all the time. But when talking about a serious hi-fi system, I'm still not going to trust having all of my audio eggs in that one basket.

Again it's not all in one basket. Two units have been combined. Power amp and speakers. Everything else is still separate. It's not any more of a "all eggs in one basket" than your AVR which is DAC, preamp, processor and poweramp in one unit.

And again, that you don't want to have active speakers is perfectly fine, no one is trying to sell it to you?

I struggle to understand why you are in a thread concerning a product you don't want explaining that you don't want it. To what end?

 

[MrBoat]

Again it's not all in one basket. Two units have been combined. Power amp and speakers. Everything else is still separate. It's not any more of a "all eggs in one basket" than your AVR which is DAC, preamp, processor and poweramp in one unit.

And again, that you don't want to have active speakers is perfectly fine, no one is trying to sell it to you?

I struggle to understand why you are in a thread concerning a product you don't want explaining that you don't want it. To what end?

"So anyone planning a superior theater at this time, should be asking themselves continuously: - "Why am I not building and active system." Even very fine speakers like Perlisten, are still yesterday's technology and out of date on the drawing board, fine speakers though they may be."

Because this question repeatedly comes up, is why. It really had nothing to do with your speakers particularly. As someone with a tech and manufacturing background, I can certainly understand why. I can also understand who this technology would likely appeal to.

You started a new product thread on an internet audio forum, is why I replied to it, whether favorably, or not. I had already established earlier on in this thread that I am a fan of your design goals, otherwise. The included active components would tend to send me looking elsewhere though. Why? Because I simply won't need it.

 

[Will Brink]

Just to be clear, the 122dB figure is from the Manta. The max spl for sbs is 116dB, which is still very loud.

I can't from the top of my mind think of any similarly sized speaker that comes close.

Thanx for clarifications.