So, as many may know, I recently purchased a Mcintosh C49 preamp because I wanted all the functions it has and no one really has all that for much cheaper. I have it connected to a Crown XLS1502 amp and PSB Imagine T2 speakers. Something in my semi-audiophile mind says that I should have a better quality amp even though I don't have any real sound quality objection to the Crown. I window shopped on line for over a week. I know the preference by most here is the Benchmark or a class D amp based on one of the newer modules.
I am an old fart retired engineer. I just don't like the idea of buying an amplifier from a company that doesn't make the actual amplification device because they probably don't have the expertise to engineer it. When it comes to state of the art class D, only a few companies actually design their own amps, the rest of them are merely packagers. Tech support and repair is just put a new module in it.
I have seen (and I know I don't have a statistically valid sample) well respected Hypex/Purifi amps being sold used by their second owner and they are less than a year old. In a few months, two owners have decided to sell them for something else. Is this just audiophilia nervosa or something else?
Even though I currently own a class D amp, I have always thought that class D in the home setting was a solution looking for a problem. An audio system is simply not a major contributor to household power consumption. I see it for the pro's as the efficiency and light weight make hauling and setting up much easier.
I know we are all about the measurements and I mentioned this in another thread and got dismissed, but a speaker amp is for driving speakers, not warming resistors. I read somewhere that I can't recall of a designer of respected amps that says they spend a lot of time investigating the behavior of their amps when actually driving a speaker. A speaker is not only a reactive load, it is an active load, generating its own voltages because of the inertia of its drivers. I suspect that how an amplifier deals with this is not completely described by a single number of output impedance or damping factor, neither of which are purely resistive or the same over frequency. I also suspect but can't prove that some of "amplifier sound" is attributable to this
I know that hi fi reviewers are held in little regard here. Heck, I have little regard for many of them myself. I do think that they are not deaf and, having listened to tons of gear, can probably make some value judgements. Bias is real but it doesn't overcome everything. If an audio device really sounds bad, bias can't completely obliterate that. Further, since these folks are heavily biased towards expensive gear, when they say something inexpensive sounds good, it probably does. I also recall that a couple of Stereophile luminaries got 100% correct on a blind amplifier challenge. Since it is a statistical probability that some test takers will score 100% by random chance it didn't weigh heavily on the test outcome that the amps were indistinguishable. If I had been running the test I would have retested those 2 guys enough to establish a statistically valid yes or no to their ability to distinguish. Some people just do have trained hearing and can hear things that are masked for most people. I have seen this in professional sound engineers. I have a disk for ear training for sound engineers. I haven't played with it yet but it is a for real course.
I ended up ordering a scratch and dent deal on a Rotel RB 1582 Mk II amplifier. It am sure it sounds fine. I am sure it would measure as mediocre by ASR standards. It may not sound better than my Crown. It is, however, a well made class AB amp that, should it fail, I know how to fix.
I have said here and other places that I was going to use my Crown amp until it failed, and then buy another one. I changed my mind. I have a suspicion that the switching frequency hash on the grounds has raised the noise floor of my phono preamps. I haven't measured it, but they seem noisier since I got this amp.
Anyhoo. This is entertainment not heart surgery so I am going to play with my new amp soon. I will soon be selling a DAC, phono pre, two preamps, and an amplifier.
I am an old fart retired engineer. I just don't like the idea of buying an amplifier from a company that doesn't make the actual amplification device because they probably don't have the expertise to engineer it. When it comes to state of the art class D, only a few companies actually design their own amps, the rest of them are merely packagers. Tech support and repair is just put a new module in it.
I have seen (and I know I don't have a statistically valid sample) well respected Hypex/Purifi amps being sold used by their second owner and they are less than a year old. In a few months, two owners have decided to sell them for something else. Is this just audiophilia nervosa or something else?
Even though I currently own a class D amp, I have always thought that class D in the home setting was a solution looking for a problem. An audio system is simply not a major contributor to household power consumption. I see it for the pro's as the efficiency and light weight make hauling and setting up much easier.
I know we are all about the measurements and I mentioned this in another thread and got dismissed, but a speaker amp is for driving speakers, not warming resistors. I read somewhere that I can't recall of a designer of respected amps that says they spend a lot of time investigating the behavior of their amps when actually driving a speaker. A speaker is not only a reactive load, it is an active load, generating its own voltages because of the inertia of its drivers. I suspect that how an amplifier deals with this is not completely described by a single number of output impedance or damping factor, neither of which are purely resistive or the same over frequency. I also suspect but can't prove that some of "amplifier sound" is attributable to this
I know that hi fi reviewers are held in little regard here. Heck, I have little regard for many of them myself. I do think that they are not deaf and, having listened to tons of gear, can probably make some value judgements. Bias is real but it doesn't overcome everything. If an audio device really sounds bad, bias can't completely obliterate that. Further, since these folks are heavily biased towards expensive gear, when they say something inexpensive sounds good, it probably does. I also recall that a couple of Stereophile luminaries got 100% correct on a blind amplifier challenge. Since it is a statistical probability that some test takers will score 100% by random chance it didn't weigh heavily on the test outcome that the amps were indistinguishable. If I had been running the test I would have retested those 2 guys enough to establish a statistically valid yes or no to their ability to distinguish. Some people just do have trained hearing and can hear things that are masked for most people. I have seen this in professional sound engineers. I have a disk for ear training for sound engineers. I haven't played with it yet but it is a for real course.
I ended up ordering a scratch and dent deal on a Rotel RB 1582 Mk II amplifier. It am sure it sounds fine. I am sure it would measure as mediocre by ASR standards. It may not sound better than my Crown. It is, however, a well made class AB amp that, should it fail, I know how to fix.
I have said here and other places that I was going to use my Crown amp until it failed, and then buy another one. I changed my mind. I have a suspicion that the switching frequency hash on the grounds has raised the noise floor of my phono preamps. I haven't measured it, but they seem noisier since I got this amp.
Anyhoo. This is entertainment not heart surgery so I am going to play with my new amp soon. I will soon be selling a DAC, phono pre, two preamps, and an amplifier.
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