Why do most audiophile prefer passive speakers?

[DuckToller]

- depending on your personal situation - YES, MAYBE
- Powered speaker without DSP (digital sound processing) in the digital domain may allow the use of analogue input without altering the signal
- no, but you may experience differences in sq due to better digital-analogue conversion, better filters, and  some ADC in the active speakers. You may have to deal then with more than one conversion of the signal. Using speakers without DSP may solve that problem, but can inherit others.

As in all hobbies, there is no unique way to to things ... and you may always face trade offs ...
In general, you trade the advantage of haveing a choice for amplification against an eventually more favorable design concept when going active. But .. it depends, i.e.  many people like the Kiii actives, while other prefer the Dutch & Dutch to them. The amplification of the D&D appears to be lesser (afaik) but ....

When you have a bigger budget to spend and no limitation in acoustic space, you may want to have separate units doing different tasks, as you can mod your system more comfortably by exchanging one unit at a time. Hence then you may have other factors added to the system, like cables and re-clockers or fibre-optics modules. That might work very well for you until you arrive being tired about box swapping  A good reason to separate amplifier from speakers could be for example the need for some advanced ROOM eq, which is usually applied before the signal leaves the amplification.

For enjoying some "good" audio reproduction , you need to consider the follwing factors: BUDGET, source/signal, signal path, transducers, ROOM.
At a certain level, you begin to have diminishing returns on your hobby investments. Depends on yourself to find out, when that starts.
One rule of thumb for some is: "Everything counts". Others could be: "Shortest path wins" or "straight wire with gain" " Blue lights are imperative"
Have fun!