Class D - heaven or hell ? - Page 3

LMAO Steve you are way out there

Yep. This is exactly it. People want "cute lifestyle products" not high quality performance. Look up Hoffman's Iron Law for the background on what Dave's talking about - you get extension, size, and efficiency. Pick two. Amplification (in terms of output power) is cheap; so what's easy?

Honestly I feel it's a little nuts to have a 1000W amplifier for a bookshelf speaker.


That made my day.

 

For what it's worth, I haven't heard a better monitor than the 86dB Nola Micro Grand, and yeah that includes Magico. Opting for low efficiency can still produce incredible results.

 

Alternately, you can go the more efficient route:
(Okay, I found this image looking for images for another thread, and it reminded me of Steve's post - I just wanted to post something bigger and more absurd).

Those are uh, 97 dB/W and take 300W. Those are 12" woofers if memory serves.

Full range and they use less power than most audiophile bookshelves to do it. Sign me up!

And before you ask, no I haven't heard them. I've heard other (lessor) members of their series (they're Technics Linear Phase SB-9500s; they're bloody rare and I've never gotten a decisive answer as to whether they, or the equally huge SB-10000s, are the top model), and there's not a one of them I haven't liked.

Basically make the choice: can you live with speakers the size of a fridge? If not, buy a bigger amplifier, if yes, enjoy your 10wpc SET or whatever else you've got.

 

They're certainly bigger!

 

Though I don't see anything particularly absurd about them.

 

se

I'm also for the high(er) efficiency speaker route. I've been using 93 dB/Watt speakers for the last 3 years; that should be considered on the very LOW end of efficiency. Recently heard the Tannoy Yorkminster SE (95dB; one model up from my Kensington) in my same setup, and holy cow what a difference those extra 2dB efficiency and 6Hz deeper bass extension make! Doesn't look like much on paper, but it's extremely audible -- completely effortless lifelike dynamics, and bass extension that will frighten you. The difference in cabinet volumes (105 L vs 200 L) is more telling. Those Yorkminsters are big boys; the combination of efficiency and extension is paid for in size, as with any proper speaker. Not quite as sweet mids as with my Kensington though; maybe I'll have to look to the next model up. What I like about the old school Tannoys is that you can keep scaling up the cabinet and woofer sizes while the sound remains coherent and integrated from top to bottom, due to the dual-concentric driver arrangement. Sound is as coherent as with great headphones, except that they're also far more resolving and dynamic (and have a soundstage).

 

With even 93dB speakers, you can't quite get away with ~20 Watts in a not-small room while playing high dynamic range material loud. There's some really sweet sounding tube amps in that power range, too. 95-96dB/Watt speakers can do that with gusto. The more efficiency the better, I imagine, as long as you're not sacrificing extension and/or coherence to get it.

 

Something else to keep in mind with the modern horrendously inefficient small bookshelves and mini-standers (sacrificing all efficiency for a cute size and "wish-it-were" bass extension): by the time you're dumping in enough power to coerce them into attempting decent levels & dynamics in a normal room, you're probably hitting and/or exceeding their power ratings (and likely frying a tweeter). Remember, for all the internet demonization of clipping: it's power that kills tweeters dead; too much clean power will do it just as well! Not to mention the huge excursion required of tiny woofers at higher levels, and the resulting issues with linearity. Just because you've got a 1000W amp doesn't mean you can safely use a fraction of it on your "WAF-fi" speakers :)

 

Get the biggest damn things you can afford and are able to haul into your space. Do it before you get a wife that has been granted veto powers -- that way they're grandfathered-in :)

You're both alright.

 

The 87dB, $3650 Vapor Cirrus isn't that far off from them. Buying direct certainly has its advantage in terms of pricing. Efficiency has never been a top priority for me, I'm much more interested in the quality of the drivers, crossover, and cabinet design and construction. The Cirrus is made from stacked Baltic Birch Ply, just like the original Magico Mini. For $3600 most speaker companies are still giving you an inch of MDF.

 

The Micro Grand is indeed very expensive at $14K, but it also provides about 95% of the performance of the $25K Metro Grand floor stander, the only thing missing is a small amount of deep bass impact. The Grand Utopia Be is a $90K bore. Incredibly underwhelming. I've yet to hear an impressive speaker from JM Labs.

 

I also don't really agree with the concept of just buying the biggest things you can afford and squeeze into a space. I'm not really a fan of horns to be honest, most for me have at least some of the "cupped hands" issue, and have trouble disappearing as obvious sound sources. I'm much happier with a speaker that runs out of breath at 55Hz, but completely disappears into the image.

Edited by DaveBSC - 5/16/12 at 2:35am

 

JA has ripped many products based on poor measurements.  claiming that Stereophile is "play-for-pay" is a bit much.  

Remember Tyll too works for the same parent company as Stereophile, and he definitely isn't play for pay. They've crapped on quite a bit of gear that had issues. I feel it's more an issue of how the measurements relate to what we hear, which isn't discussed enough.

My $0.02 - I've owned class D amps from Channel Islands, Wyred for Sound, and Bel Canto, and I've been happy with them; the main reason is that my planar speakers demand a lot of current. Implementation of the ice power gear has improved quite a bit, I think; still it's no match for class A amps, if price is no object. Since price is always part of the calculation - as are size and efficiency - I find that I'm well served (and I can always go for a different flavor with my tubed headphone amps). Getting this level of control out of my large panels with any other type of amp would require significantly bigger monetary commitments, and I want to play with other toys, too...

 qui

 

 

Thune,
Once again on forums I make an apology after a late-night post, sigh.  You're right, I couldn't find one either after long searches on diyaudio and many other places.  In short the Johnson noise monster battles the low-Z monster to a draw.  Best I found was Benchmark Dac1HDR at -111dB THD+IMD.  Looking at opamp performance on the front end and available buffers, it looks possible.  I expect exotic resistors, caps, matching, and complementary devices could buy another 4dB(?), since the can amp section of the aforesaid unit probably accounts for half of the $1800 unit.  But that is still 5dB short.  Again my apologies!

 

On the Hypex ncore amp question, *its* measurements beat the best Halcro in most or perhaps all respects.  There is no HF nastiness to contend with, and I expect those who decry its sound before listening will be upset.  If anybody thinks the Hypex guys can't do great circuits, they had better look at DXD circuits and Grimm's lineup and their implementation in audio recording and mastering.