Active Owners -- do you miss having rearfill and other questions?

[BodegaBay 10+ year member]

Ok, call me old school but I've always had passive systems -- components fronts, rear coaxes, and a sub. Now I'm seriously looking into this ACTIVE phenomenon that all the veterans here are evidently using. I've read almost all the ACTIVE threads last night and am fascinated.

It seems that you guys are using ACTIVE frontstage and ditching rearfill altogether. Can you tell me if you're missing the rears at all? I've always been taught that you have to have some rearfill to help with the front imaging, but then that was old school. I have a Ford Escape SUV so basically my rear passengers will only be hearing front speakers if I go ACTIVE -- not a biggie but I'm concern of any holes in the sound of the SUV.

I have an Eclipse 8455 and am currently evaluating two different amps rated at 200watts/ch. 1-4Ohms. I take it that going ACTIVE will likely yield using 8Ohm drivers and thus take less power out of these amps (BTW, can 1-4Ohms rated amps use 8Ohm drivers)? Will 100W still be too much for a tweeter? What if I run into a tweeter rated at 4Ohms, will 200W be too much?

Thanks guys.

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[alphakenny1 10+ year member]

as for the rears, i don't miss them at all. i recently stepped into a car with a rear fill and did not liked how it sounded at all.

as for the other questions, i think this will be a good read for you. http://www.diymobileaudio.com/forum/showthread.php?t=31.

 

[Cris 10+ year member]

I haven't run active yet, will sooner or later.. but my passive system has no rear fill.

Rear fill is the devil. Rear fill will key your car. Rear fill makes out with your girlfriend, puts its feet up at the dinner table, and doesn't do the dishes afterward.

I ditched mine a long time ago, and never looked back. I don't miss it at all. I hooked it up once (months after I had ditched it) and my soundstage was so confused, it almost seemed like it was out of phase. Total waste to have rear fill.

-cris

 

[squeak9798 5,000+ posts]

I haven't had rearfill for >5yrs, haven't missed them one bit.

 

[turnstylez18 10+ year member]

hey sorry to come in to this..but whats the difference between active and passive? right now i have components at the front, no rear fill, and a sub.

 

[squeak9798 5,000+ posts]

hey sorry to come in to this..but whats the difference between active and passive? right now i have components at the front, no rear fill, and a sub.

http://forums.caraudio.com/vb/showthread.php?t=130958

http://forums.caraudio.com/vb/search.php?searchid=931070

 

[guitarslanger 10+ year member]

yeah im my car i have some comps up front and the stock speakers in the rear the comps are run by dual monoblocks while the rear fill goes off the head unit...while by myself i turn the fader all the way towards the front but if i have passengers and am playing a song they really like i put it back a lil...when i put the rear fill on the sound stage goes towards the back and you hear the right rear more then the left rear...not good

 

[slim j 10+ year member]

Active is a lot of work. I am working through it now. They have some 4-ohm mids and tweets, so 8-ohm in 100% mandatory. You have a good HU to run an active setup. Much of this is "playing around" to find what sounds good to you. I have going with ology's mid and npdangs' custom tweet. It can be more or less cost effective than a passive componet set. Also, because you have much more flexibilty, you can still fill the whole cabin up with good sounds

 

[UndercoverPunk 5,000+ posts]

No rearfill for well over a year now, don't miss it nor do I plan to have it ever again unless I get the 5.1 bug. You CAN set the gain do deliver lower power to the tweets, you can also attenuate the signal down if need be.

ACTIVE is awesome, I'd reccomend running ACTIVE to anyone with half a brain.

 

[bikejunkie223 10+ year member]

100w sounds like an awful lot for a tweet, 50 would be plenty. I am considering going active, but don't really want to buy another amp for what may be a minimal gain- I'd probably be better served by a new sub amp- though my current setup is friggin nice, the sub is getting underpowered. As for rear fill, read my sig- real fill was designed by communists to destroy our way of life and should be considered highly evil.

 

[UndercoverPunk 5,000+ posts]

I'd rather go active than improve substage... more information... that IMO is more important, comes from the fronts.

 

[slain93gsr 10+ year member]

have been with out rear fill for quite some time 8-9 years. almost bothers me to sit in other applications and hear it

 

[BodegaBay 10+ year member]

Rear fill is the devil. Rear fill will key your car. Rear fill makes out with your girlfriend, puts its feet up at the dinner table, and doesn't do the dishes afterward.

//content.invisioncic.com/y282845/emoticons/thumbsupwink.gif.129404938effda6ad9cca39e7f4b58a3.gif Something Dennis Leary would say!

Hey thanks guys for the input. I spent the last 2-3 hrs. listening without the rearfill (using passive fronts only) and am convinced. Frontstage is much more solid and defined (less confused). And sitting in the rearseat to test, I didn't even miss rear speakers at all -- in fact it's even better because there is only one frontstage, not two.

With a some tweaking, I'm sure I can get better imaging and thus create ambient reflections.

I can't believe I've been using rearfill all these years. What a waste of amplification, speakers, wiring, and money. Again, thanks guys.

 

[Savstyle 10+ year member]

havent gone active yet, in a few months tho. Ive been without rear fill for about 4 months, and when my alt ied last time and had to reset everything on my deck, when it played through my 6x9's in the back(to lazy to unhook) it made me want to jump off a cliff, my imaging was ruined by rearfill

 

[req 5,000+ posts]

lol, rearfill?

i ripped out my rear deck... so i dont really know where rearfill would fit //content.invisioncic.com/y282845/emoticons/smile.gif.1ebc41e1811405b213edfc4622c41e27.gif

but thats a big negative. i could care less what people hear in the back seats //content.invisioncic.com/y282845/emoticons/biggrin.gif.d71a5d36fcbab170f2364c9f2e3946cb.gif