Originally posted by jaze2
Mr_Sukebe - the more powerful an amp is usually means the higher quality it is. Mine is high powered and has excellent specs.
May I just add that even using the £99 mini-hifi as source the sound is still amazing, like they are playing/singing in your front room. Using the RME, the detail is even more fantastic. Using mini-hifi speakers/source sounds very mediocre...just shows it's not so much the source but the amp and speakers.
Hmm, this could be a lengthy reply, for which I do apologise.
You right to say that there is a myth out there that the more powerful an amp is, the higher quality it is.
Unfortunately, this is often simply not true.
Let me try to explain why. Think about the essential element of what an amp actual does. It takes a low level input signal (e.g. from a CD player), this is usually around 2v. The amplifiers job is then to increase the size of this signal so that when it is given to the speakers, that it is capable of driving the speakers.
The only other key features of an amp are really control over the gain involved (i.e. the volume control), and if you're using more than one source, being able to chose it.
Absolutely EVERYTHING else that is added as a facility to the amplifier will simply add to the signal path, and because it is an analogue signal, will degrade it. So for example, adding bass and treble controls is usually bad news, as it will degrade the sound.
Once the signal gets down to the speakers, there are several key factors. The voltage defines the absolute volume that is capable of being put out. The current capability defines the ability to drive and control the speaker. Lastly the linearity of the amp will define how it will perform over the whole frequency range (typically 20hz-20kz, although that is changing with SACD).
Typically, low priced high powered amplifiers are built to look good with on paper specifications. In reality they are often not as linear, don't have as clean a signal path, don't have the current capability and lastly use cheaper components.
The implications of this is
- having tone controls screwing up signal path
- maybe having lots of outright voltage, but bugger all current capability. Current capability is MUCH more expensive to add to an amp than voltage. For marketing reasons, the Japanese are well known for claiming high power, but not much current. The results of poor current capability is an inabilty to be able to control the speakers at a given voltage. They may be loud, but it'll sound rubbish because the timing and distortion characteristics will be lousy
- Cheap components are a fairly obvious thing. Put a cheap capacitor in, and it won't perform as consistently and well as a more expensive one. One of the critical elements of an amplifier is of all things the power supply. Most power supplies in cheap kit do the absolute bare minimum, which in hi-fi terms is simply bad news. Mains supply is most certainly NOT perfect 240v sine wave. In reality all the loadings that exist on it (e.g. your TV, cooker, fridge, next doors house, the national grid), have a massive impact on just how close to a sine wave it really looks. Good hi-fi put high quality power suppliers in, and these make a LOT of difference
Hopefully the above will highlight the fact that outright power is NOT a guarantee of good quality.
As already stated, kit like valve amps have terrible power capabilities on paper, but in reality they can sound amazing when done well, and matched with appropriate speakers.
As for your own amp and it's amazing specs.
Just what do you mean by that? Are you saying that you bought it because it has great paper based specs, or because you listened to it in comparison to a number of competitors and bought it because it sounded better?
Let me take this in a little more depth.
You have stated that it produces 200w into 4 ohms.
Do you even know when impedence you speakers actually are?
Most budget speakers are rated at an average of 8 ohms.
Using basic level physics, half the resistive load, and you half the power. So chances are that you amp is actually rated as 100w into 8 ohms.
Now lets look a bit deeper. Most Japanese manufacturers claim their power outputs at specific frequency points and for large levels of distortion. This is simply NOT representative of their actual real world capabilities. It's all well and good claiming 100w at say 10kz, but if it then has 5% levels of distortion, it will sound truly awful. Go check some hi-fi mags that genuinely measure amplifier capabilities (e.g. Hi-fi choice) and you'll find that they check the ability over a large frequency range and with low distortion levels. Frankly I'd be surprised if your amp is capable of anything like 100w across a full frequency range.
Ref the other excellent specifications, are you saying that the specifications talk about the type of power supply and components within the amp, or simply that it has lots of knobs, buttons and dials on it? See the bit earlier in this post where I attempted to describe the differences between screwing up sound quality with unncessary features (e.g. tone controls), and actually improving sound quality using high quality capacitors, power supplies etc.
Ref your findings with a £100 mini hi-fi as a source component.
Frankly I think it's great that you find it sounds so good.
I need to ask though, have you ever tried putting in a high quality dedicated CD player as a comparison? If not, then how do you know it sounds that great in real world terms?
From my own experiences, the best way I've found to assess how good my system sounds was to go listen to other kit, which I've done far more of recently. One of the things I've identified is that a little like yourself, my CD player is actually not up to driving my amplifier and speaker well. Seems that I have a good amp, great pair of speakers and have been using a fairly mediocre CD player (Teac VRDS-7). Now as I say, I've only found this by trying different kit, but I did find a massive discrepancy by trying different front ends on my kit.
I'd now actually advocate doing things the other way around to the way I have. When I upgraded my CD player, it made a HUGE difference. Yet when I've tried using cheaper speakers, they still manage to put across the "key musical message". No they might not have the control, depth etc, but they are fun. The reason for being so fun is that they are being sent a high quality signal. In comparison, my very expensive speakers sound frankly a bit yawnable with a low quality source. But hey, that's just my findings.
Hope you find the above useful.