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I have a Crown XTI-2000 in my home stereo, and thinks it sounds great. People are telling me that it's not a heigh fidelity amp for serious listening. Is this true, am I just kidding myself?
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I've used a 25 year old BGW 550 in my hifi for a few years now. It's a great amp, with a flat LF response down below 20 (it's DC coupled) and drives even the most inefficient speakers (drove a pair of JBL 4412s no problem) without breaking a sweat. I have no experience with any BGW products built since ATI bought the company, but their older gear is awesome, and if you're lucky you can pick one up used at guitar center for a steal. Unless you have a seperate closet for your power amps, you'll need to replace the fan with something a bit quieter.
Also, check out AE Techron, the laboratory/medical branch of Crown Intl. They have some lab grade power amps designed for shaker tables and MRIs and such that have crazy power capabilities, bandwidth that's flat from DC to ultrasonic frequencies, and a noisefloor that's impressive to say the least. Of course, you will need a 3 phase mains hook up
I was looking on the Yamaha website and noticed the Tn Series amplifiers; they are a class AB design and seem very well built. Check the presentation movie and the interview with the engineers who designed them. I'm really curious how they sound...
http://www.yamahaproaudio.com/topics/engineer_interviews/2007/tn_series.html
T3n - 2400 US$
T4n - 3000 US$
T5n - 3800 US$
I'm pretty ignorant about these pro amps. Must one have a preamp with balanced inputs? I have a tube preamp with unbalanced inputs, can I even use it with an amp like the QSC? Are there cables that enable this, or am I just stupid ?
http://www.rane.com/note110.html
I have to agree with the 'Hafler' advice. If you can find one, snatch it.QSC as well has always been of top quality.
If you ever run across a couple of Macintosh 2100's that would make you cream!
I bought an 1804 model as a lark (after all, guitar center gave me two freakin' weeks to bring it back for refund, and 4 weeks for upgrade).The long and the short of it is that it replaced my vertically biamped Threshold T-200's driving my Analysis Omega panel speakers.
It also replaced...Atma-sphere M60 (not a good match for the panels), Bryston 4BSST (for what, less than a third the cost), Spectron Musician II (beats the Spectron at its own game). I have also had in here some assorted Levinsons, Cary, Plinius, and many others. Fact of the matter is, the QSC, on These Speakers and This System, just kicks musical butt. There is more, and better controlled, bass. During those huge bass transients, there is no loss of mid and hf info. There is a clarity to the music at realistic levels that nothing else quite managed (the Thresholds were very slightly better from mids on up but only when playing softly and if there weren't any bass transients going on). The Bryston was also colored compared to the QSC; on the QSC there is just NO shift in timbre when the going gets rough.
Accurate tonal colors, and accurate timing make music just that much more toe-tapping delicious. Heh, and massive power is another good thing on Planar/ribbons. Strange thing is, the speakers sound more dynamic even at low levels where my other amps should have been loafing.
Fact of the matter, my friends and I are aghast at how many high-end amps are...well...compressed sounding compared to this little beast. The ones that arent compressed are maybe ten times the price of the qsc!
Give Me Ambiguity or Give Me Something Else!
I got a 1450 a few months ago and it does a very good job with the MMGs.
I did a lot of research using pro amps in the late '90s. I used my background as an EE which proved to be a big help. I studied Carver Pro, Crown, Hafler, Mackie, QSC, Samson and Yamaha. I eventually bought three Crowns, two Haflers and a Mackie.
Crown certainly had the most models with overall build quality ranging from fair to very good. The others ranged from good to excellent overall. The Haflers were the best sounding by far.
The bottom line is that you get a lot of bang for the buck. They are not nearly as transparent and sweet sounding as the best home audio amps, but they cost a lot less too. In terms of $/watt, there is no comparison. If you can get past the looks of most of them that is!
Today Hafler is gone and Harman has positioned Crown more down market. The best amps for the money are the Samson Servos (particularly the 600) and Samson SX series, particularly the incredible SX3200. They have the best fit and finish, best power supply and circuit board quality and awesome power output. The specs. generally equal the best audiophile amps. Modification to fit low speed (silent) fans and state-of-the-art op amps are cheap, easy and sonically worthwhile.
QSC employs the most advanced power supply technology and best build quality, but they are three times more expensive per watt.
I would avoid Behringer. They are the bottom dwellers as pro amps go. The product is poorly made, does not meet published specs. and their product support is poor.
You get what you pay for there.
You tested the Hafler which is a great power amp and David Hafler
has designed superb affordable amplifiersThere is a reason studios like Abbey Road Studio do not use pro amps
to master with
They use Classe amps...Have you tested or looked at Halcro?
Sometimes test specs are not enough
Actual listening and performance of the amp in real life situations
is proof in the puddingEver hear of Dartzeel?
In the pro world you cant compare a Behringer to a Neve console can you?
You cant compare a Mackie to a PM3000
You cant compare the best QSC power amp to a Halcro either
Im talkin sonics here not power specs or noise floor specsI know there are guys here that will argue with me on this stuff
and thats ok....
> You tested the Hafler which is a great power amp and David Hafler
has designed superb affordable amplifiers <Agreed.
> There is a reason studios like Abbey Road Studio do not use pro amps
to master with
They use Classe amps... <And what is the reason?
> Have you tested or looked at Halcro?
Sometimes test specs are not enough
Actual listening and performance of the amp in real life situations
is proof in the pudding <Some of us have heard plenty of proof and plenty of tests to match.
> You cant compare the best QSC power amp to a Halcro either
Im talkin sonics here not power specs or noise floor specs <Actually, you can. Sonically.
"> There is a reason studios like Abbey Road Studio do not use pro amps
to master with
They use Classe amps... <And what is the reason?"
Perhaps that they can afford them?
If I win the lottery I'll drive a Lamborghini or Bentley, or even a mundane Mercedes SLK if it's a 'small' payout. Until then I'll survive with an Acura. It's one thing to make recommendations based on a money is no object basis, another entirely for the rest of us.
"> There is a reason studios like Abbey Road Studio do not use pro amps
to master with
They use Classe amps... <And what is the reason?"
If I remember, they were given to them. Same with B&W loudspeakers. It is called marketing.
Oh, and I forget to mention that we compared last week-end a Classé CA-M400 versus the best from Crown. No discernable difference. We swith the Crown to a gainclone. The gainclone was the winner hands down. More dynamic, better imaging, better micro dynamics, more resolution.
What loudspeakers were you doing your tests with? Bose?
:)
I am kidding on that but I am curious what loudspeakers you were
using to AB
Those chip amps are great for bi-amped little studio monitorsNational semiconductor has a real winner with those chip designs
This is the loudspeakers:http://images.andale.com/f2/115/106/3730802/2007/2/5/ENCEINTE_UNE.jpg
Ok they look like they would give an accurate presentationI noted all the Classe gear in the backround
:)
At least, better than Bose's stuff! :-)
I don't know about the XTi amps, but there are a good number of pro power amps that have superb accuracy and very low noise and actually are hi-fi in performance, if not in reputation. They're not as exotic looking or pricey as the "high-end" stuff.
Bob's too modest to mention it, but all QSC amps have superb accuracy and low noise, and are hi-fi. In fact, the S/N requirements of pro gear are higher than those for hi-fi. When you're driving a concert system that hits 150dB if your noise floor is down 80dB that still means a 70dB noise level. The entire notion that pro-sound amps are inherently inferior to 'audiophile' amps is rather silly when you think about the requirements of pro-sound. It's only when you go to cheap low end junk that 'pro-sound' amps are lacking, and no real pro uses those anyway.
How much do you want to spend?Rowland
Mark Levenson
Parasound
Marsh
Halcro
Coda
Hafler
Bedini
Eagle
Krell
PliniusSome are higher dollar then others
The list goes on and if you want a quality power amp your gonna
have to hand out some serious chingYes it does make a difference with serious electronics and interconnects and most of all quality loudspeakers
They all go hand in hand
Whatever the amps are in my powered monitors...OK, that's a bit of a cop-out. I have put together my own BI-amp monitor speaks - also triamp. - even dabbled with a quad Amp setup using a super tweeter to do 10K-40KHz. What I've decided, is that all the amps I've tried don't effect the sound very much compared to other components - at least amps with nice low output impedance. I can pretty much pick out audible differences with measured frequency response variations do to the driver (I don't care whether W,M or T). Of coarse I've tried some of the "audiophile" tube amps - SET and others - and most of them do sound a bit different - do to usually much higher impedance - but also that added fill - extra detail - cause by the distortion products of the amps.
I am a Mastering engineer and demand the most realistic reproduction of the recorded material. I use Pass Labs amps as do other ME's that I know. I have a Post room also where I use Pass Labs. I'd also look into Classe' too, since they're being used at Abbey Road. Can't go wrong with either one!
Perhaps that is why my Pass sounds so good??I always recommend Pass gear because they just sound so right, and will get you off the gear head merrigoround.
Good is good, but better exists if purity is your goal. I went through a Crown stage myself. To what else have you compared your amp?
It's funny that there are people who feel the same way about speaker. About a year ago, I bought a pair of KRK V6 series 2 speakers for the purpose of near field listenting.These speakers are outstanding given the price.
I am currently looking for good solid state amp and don't mine trying out the pro amp as long as I can audition the amp in my home.
Just wondering what you guys think about BGW amplifiers?
"People are telling me that it's not a heigh fidelity amp for serious listening."
Here is the thing. Pro sound amps are built with a difference set of design criteria in mind. Much like a Semi Truck. designed to be tough, haul any load, go many many millions of miles through all sorts of conditions. and for there intended function they do quite well.
Sports cars, much like high end amplifiers have a much different set of design criteria. they are designed to be light, fast, nimble, handle corners well.
You would not do well taking a semi out to a road course event. the truck wouldn't be very fast, wouldn't handle well, would be skidding and sliding all over the place.
and if you connected a trailer to say a Porsche or Ferarri, the results would end up in a spilled mess of pistons, rods, clutch packs and oil all over the ground in short order.
Pro amps are built to be solid and reliable with a large variety of loads. Not necessarily with the lowest distortion or to be uncolored, or colored in some cases, or to preserve the utmost in fidelity and extract every nuance possible. They are in fact designed to be brute force tough and not die when abused within reason.
SOME pro amps have been reported to sound pretty good. The Crown Macro reference amps embarrassed a lot of MFG's when they came out! and some Home amp MFG used there designs for pro use like the Haflers. and some folks used Home amps for PA use like the old Phase Linears. so its s bit confusing i know. but most of that went on because at the time there just wasnt much of anything better. now days that split is much larger.
a Lot depends on the resolution of the rest of your components as well. I have heard customers tell me they cant hear a difference in there system between a mega buck high end amp and a cheap QSC they just bought. then i find out they have old Klipsch speakers and no wonder why they don't hear a difference. the speaker system doesn't have the resolution needed to accurate comparisons. or they are using an Ipod with MP3's as there playback source. and some peoples ears don't have very good resolution either! but thats another post.
Don't kid yourself. PA amps are generally not in the same class as audiophile grade amplifiers for high resolution playback. But high resolution sound does not have to cost as much as a small village either. careful selection of components that compliment your system/room is key.
Cant seem to edit my post so let me just preface my comment above about QSC amplifiers. the term cheap was not to state that QSC amps are inferior only that they generally cost less then the mega buck home audiophile grade amps. as a pro sound guy myself i own all QSC amps for my PA and i am quite proud to state said fact.
Zc
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