Linn Summer Promotion 2011 Turn on, tune in and power up with Linn +2 Why not add 2 extra channels of amplification for free when you buy any Linn Majik or Linn Akurate power amplifier during Linn’s +2 Summer promotion. 2 means that, for a limited time, you can get a Linn Majik 4100 for the price of a Linn Majik 2100, or an Linn Akurate 4200 for the price of an Linn Akurate 2200, giving you +2 amplifier channels in each example. Alternatively, if you’re thinking of buying an amplifier to go fully Aktiv, we’ll let you choose between the extra channels you need or free Aktiv cards…whichever saves you the most money. Why Linn +2? Normally, one amplifier channel is required per speaker, so a Linn Majik 2100 or an Linn Akurate 2200 would be enough to power a pair of Linn stereo loudspeakers. By adding an extra two channels of amplification, it immediately allows you to bi-amp a stereo playback system to significantly improve performance. Bi-amping reduces distortion and increases separation between high and low frequencies, with individual speaker drive units powered with greater efficiency and control. The Linn +2 promo makes it easier for you to experience the quality of Linn amplification, helping you to reach the number of amplification channels you need for less and hear the difference Linn power amplifiers can make to your favourite music and movies. From bi-amping to fully Aktiv Bi-amping is an easy first step along the multi-amping path (tri-amping, quad-amping) towards the audio nirvana of fully Aktiv, where all speaker drive units (bass, mid, tweeter etc.) are driven individually by their own amplifier channels and use their own Aktiv filters. Aktiv playback systems benefit from improved timing and control, as well as lower distortion across the entire frequency range thanks to the elimination of electronic interaction within the passive crossover. Why Go Activ? A fully Aktiv playback system sounds much more natural, accurate and effortless than conventional passive playback systems Why should I go Aktiv? Going Aktiv is a simple, cost-effective way to maximise the performance of your playback system – the power amplifier(s) and loudspeakers which ‘play back’ your analogue and digital sources. The performance improvement is so great that it is arguably more significant than upgrading your loudspeakers alone. While traditional or conventional loudspeakers are almost exclusively ‘passive only’, all Linn loudspeakers can be driven actively with a simple upgrade. You can make your music system Aktiv from the very start or add extra power amplifiers over time to improve audio performance – the term ‘multi-amping’ covers bi-amping, tri-amping and so on, until you have enough amplification channels to individually power each drive unit on your loudspeakers. Once each drive unit is individually powered, you simply add individual filters or Aktiv cards for each frequency band to make your playback system fully aktiv. Passive vs. Aktiv When you go Aktiv each individual drive unit (woofer, tweeter, super-tweeter etc.) in each loudspeaker is powered by its own channel of amplification and has its own Aktiv filter. This ensures that the drive unit gets exactly the information it is meant to have – and no more – so the entire audio spectrum is covered efficiently, seamlessly and accurately with minimum noise and distortion. In a passive system the output from the power amplifier is passed through a passive crossover filter in the loudspeaker, meaning each loudspeaker is powered by its own channel of amplification. The passive crossover divides the full range music signal into high and low frequencies (e.g. bass, mid and treble) using complex circuitry to filter out the unwanted frequencies for each drive unit. In an Aktiv system each individual drive unit in each loudspeaker has its own corresponding filter, or Aktiv card. These are normally installed inside the amplifier but can be integrated within the loudspeaker like Klimax 350A or built as high quality boards housed within their own dedicated enclosure, like a Klimax Aktiv Crossover . It is the combination of each drive unit having its own amplification channel (multi-amping) and its own filter or Aktiv card which turns a multi-amped system into a fully Aktiv system. The following benefits apply to an Aktiv playback system: · More efficient · Greater control · Less distortion · Reduced Clipping More efficient A passive playback system is much less efficient than an active system as a portion of the signal energy is absorbed by the passive crossover, or worse, reflected back into the power amplifier. The passive crossover is essentially a rather basic filter which uses large capacitors, inductors and resistors to remove unwanted frequencies from each frequency band of the large loudspeaker level signal, to ensure that each drive unit gets only the signal appropriate to that drive unit (i.e. woofer gets low frequencies, tweeter gets high frequencies). Filtering a signal as large as that of loudspeaker-level audio, when combined with low-impedance drive units, results in a great deal of inefficiency and the passive crossover can only give out a lesser signal than it receives. Much of the perceived difficulty ‘driving’ some types of loudspeakers is actually a difficulty related to driving particular passive crossovers, as the drive units themselves are normally very easy to drive. Most of the energy that the passive crossover prevents from reaching the speaker drive units is expendedas heat, with some loudspeakers wasting over a third of the power supplied by the amplifier. These inefficiencies mean the power amplifier has to work harder and control over the drive units is lessened as a result. The higher the volume levels, the more pronounced the problem tends to become. In an Aktiv playback system the passive crossover is completely bypassed, making it much easier to drive the loudspeakers. Each Aktiv filter processes an unamplified or ‘line-level’ signal, which means the circuit can use very small and extremely accurate electronic components. This allows filters to apply controlled signal boosting, which is not possible with a passive filter. In an Aktiv system all filtering
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