Active crossovers... I like it!
Yes, it's been pretty sweet. I've had the crossover for like 20 years now (I've had the speakers a bit over 23 years now; I bought them in the fall of 1995. I remember buying Tori Amos' Boys For Pele just to try the harpsichord out on it (IMO one of the best recorded alternative "rock" albums [if you can call it rock as it's all over the place on that album] of all time, IMO, recorded tracks went straight to DAT and Tori's sound engineer built a "room" over her piano and harpsichord keyboard areas and shared bench to separate her vocals from the piano and harpsichord so she could sing live as she played in a church in Delgany, Ireland). The drums were the only analog recorded exception (her previous album Under The Pink was all analog and also had pretty good sound quality; I've got her first four albums on vinyl as well as CD along with Abnormally Attracted To Sin and the rest on CD). I started using that album along with some Pink Floyd to test speakers at hi-fi shops.
The active crossover has no off switch so I've been concerned a bit about its longevity. OTOH, it has no caps in it (inductive only) and they along with cheap transformers are the primary components that go bad. As long as I can figure out what eventually does go bad, I can just replace the part. I don't have the schematics, though. And the guy that made them disappeared (web site vanished) shortly after his divorce went south so I'm afraid another isn't an option (I'm afraid something happened to him too).
Frankly, my ribbons should be dead by now from everything I read (they did start going flappy/snappy sounding as the ribbons loosened; the lifespan was rate as around 8-12 years based on humidity where you store them). But it turns out they have built-in tensioners that seemingly few knew about. You can tighten them back up similar to a guitar string. I wasn't sure that's what the screws did, but they felt like it turning them and the odd thing was the effect wasn't instant (they are also possibly fastened in other ways too), but within a day or so all the noises disappeared. They came back about 5 years later. I tightened them again. Good again. I think the left ribbon is about as tight as it can go at the top, though now. I do have a spare in the closet downstairs, though that hasn't been tightened yet.
There's a guy that makes replacements, but it's pretty pricey for the original material (I read he bought all Carver's inventory when they shuttered) and he's disappeared now and again at times too, I think. There's another company that makes replacement ribbons also, but they use mylar (like electrostatics typically use) not Kapton film and while they claim it's within +/- 3dB of the originals, that's the typical range for ALL speakers (up to 6dB peak to peak isn't tiny). I'm not convinced the speakers would ever sound as good as they do ever again. The crossover is based on the Kapton film material and it's frequency response too. However, my active crossover does have three "tonal" controls that supposedly match the variation in the original passive controls on the back. I know the top one makes a hell of a difference in the high frequency output or lack thereof (also a bit harder to drive the more you crank it up). It took some time to find the optimum tonal settings I like the best. The controls are pretty subtle except at the very top (turning that one down to the middle is a bit like listening to a record with a CD; the highs just start slowly rolling off above 12kHz.
