Temple Audio Bantam Class T Amp

Hi,

I've just recently got myself a pair of Wharfedale Diamond 9.1s. At the moment I'm using a Technics SU-Z11 amp (probably about 20 or 30 years old) but it's just temporary until I get a new amp (it's the amp I used with my old Technics SB3030 speakers).

For the past month or two I had been intending to buy an AMP10-BASIC kit from 41Hz, and build myself an amp.

Although I'm reasonably confident I have the ability to build my own, the reason for wanting to is not for the satisfaction of having built my own but simply because until today I haven't been able to find any ready to run amps that are what I want - I want a class T amp that is as small as possible, with as few inputs as possible and as few extra controls as possible.

My ideal amp would have an IEC power input on the back, 2x RCA audio inputs and 2x speaker outputs. On the front, just a single toggle switch for on/off. Building an AMP10 would allow me to do this. The only problem is I just don't have the time to do that right now and won't do for another three months or so.

I discovered an amp (online) called the Temple Audio Bantam today. It's a Class T amp rated at 15 Watts per channel. My current amp is rated at 50 Watts per channel. My question is, can anyone hazard a guess as to whether I would be happy with 15 Watts driving my 9.1s?

Thanks,
Mr. Brightside

What's the sensitivity and impedance of your 9.1's?

I own an Amp6 which is also 15 watts per chan, and it's ideal for bookshelf speakers, more than enough volume...

I don't own floorstanders however, but I imagine it will be fine for normal volume levels... You only need lots of power at parties

Also, take a look at the amp9 basic, it's got similar power output to the amp 10, but it's simpler to build, and only needs a single rail PSU. Oh, it's 4 channel also, ideal if you want to bi-amp later on...

Pro-ject good a good range of really simple amps.

http://www.project-audio.com/main.php?prod=stereobox&cat=boxes&lang=en

Sensitivity 86dB, impedance 6 Ohms.

Thinking about it, my current Technics SUZ11 has a power meter on the front and in normal use, it never goes about about one watt; occasionally when I have it louder, it starts to hurt/sound bad before it gets to 15 watts, so I guess either Project or Temple amps would be fine for what I want. I see that the Project amps cost about twice as much though.

86db is insensitive, i would guess you need at least 50watts to make them happy..

Your power meter probably isnt keeping up with the dynamics of music.

The power meter uses VFD bar graphs, not magnetic pointers if it makes any difference?

So would you recommend I don't bother with the Bantam and wait a few months 'till I have time to build a 41Hz kit?

I went ahead and got the Bantam XC (with headphone amp - haven't use that much yet though) in black, it arrived today.

I'm very pleased with it so far, yes it's not as powerful as the old one but the sound quality is noticeably better, and it's a hell of a lot smaller than the old one.

In terms of volume it's more than adequate for normal use, the only time I would want something more powerful is for, as people say, 'party volumes' - for which I still have my old speakers and amp - saves moving this setup around and risking damage.

With the Bantam, I don't have to worry about damaging something if I slip and turn the volume up to full

Because it takes 12V DC input, at some point I intend to connect it directly to a car battery to see if a power supply upgrade would be worth it. Need to get a spare 2.1mm plug first though, but I go back to university on Saturday (and won't be taking a car battery with me ) so might not be for a while.

Would recommend this amp if someone was looking for something matching the criteria I described at the start of the thread.

I made a battery pack out of some old laptop battery packs, it only gets 11.1v, but it does sound a little cleaner when powered from a battery, but then my PSU isn't the best quality, I used to get a little 50Hz hum...