"Active" or "activated"?
Is there a difference between an active state and activated state?
For example, if I activate an item, will it become active or activated? Does it depend on the context? How?
In most simple terms, active is a state, while activated is how it got there.
The former is a mere description of the things as they are, the latter reminds us that there was an action that had an agent. When something is activated, someone went and made it active.
Compare to open vs. opened.