Hello singintheblues, as others suggested, it would be useful if you can tell us your amp budget, the rest of your system, and what tone concept yours might be.... Class D amplifiers are as different as there are amps.
I am personally extremely fond of class D amplifiers designed/manufactured by Jeff Rowland.... They range from approximately $2500 for the M125 stereo/bridgeable model to some $58K for his top of the line M925 mono, which I own and dearly love. IMO the sweet spot of the Rowland line might be the M535 stereo/bridgeable at just under $6K.... A truly remarkable device... I am preparing a detailed write up on it to be posted to Audiogon. Yes, Rowland does have a UK distributor.... So, please tell us more about your requirements and preferences.
Regards, Guido
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eHello George, I have heard the ML NO.53 a couple of times, and... I agree 200% with the reviewer, for all parameters he mentioned.... To say that I did not like it would be an understatement.
If all other class D amps sounded like No.53, I would have never bothered adopting this class of operation in my system.... Thankfully, No.53 is an outlyer. THere are of course other class D amps that I have not cared for, but No.53 takes the cake, particularly at its nose-bleeding price point.
But George, haven't you learned yet that one cannot perform valid induction steps from a couple of anomalous samples?
As I said so many times.... Get out of the house, lots of nice stuff out there... Besides, who knows, you might even fall in love with No.53 *Grins!*
G.
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To @smer319.... Hello Sunil, I have not had the opportunity yet of listening to the Rowland M125 bridgeable, but have heard great things about it...
If you have a chance, give a try also to the M535.... I have a bridged pair in my system right now, and this baby is extraordinary!
Regards, Guido |
Hello artargyle, worth mentioning that your Rowland M625 S2 amps run in class A/B.
Regards, G.
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Hello rfagon, I do not have general stats on class D reliability.... I can report only my own experience... I have owned Rowland M925 since 2012, and never had a glitch.... My previous class D amp was the Rowland M312, and that one never failed either.
Regards, G.
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My experience aligns with Eric's.... All class D amps I have had in my system require warm up.... Particularly older generation class D could sound rather dry at power up time.... To sound their best, 24 hours or more were a must.... More recent amps, such as Rowland M925 and M535 sound pretty good a few minutes after power up, but if you want them to give you their very best, warm up is definitely necessary.
Don't want to warm them up? No problem... Do what I do.... Leave them on at idele 24/7.... Being some 95% to 97% efficient, you will never notice their existance on your monthly AC bill, nor will they ever heat up your house..... Just remember to unplug your entire system when thunderstorms are around.
G. |
Hello slimpikins5, if your amps do not require warm up, go with what your ears tell you....
Eric's report of very long warm up time for ICEpower amps is similar to mine.... Although with my old ROland M312 I started to hear better sound after one hour or so.... Very good sound after 24 hours of power up and crunching some signal, and best performance after one more day or two.
NCore 1200 devices seem to have a faster warmup curve.
As for George... Perhaps he and I are not talking to the same manufacturers *Grins!* Or perhaps his ears are dramatically different from mine and Eric's.
About 24/7 power up.... I confess that my wintertime 24/7 practice will come to a schreeching halt by may, when the thunderstorm season starts around.... At that time I will change to a "turn off after music" policy. ... Even now, if I hear any distance thunder in the middle of the night, I get up, power down, and then disconnect the entire system from the AC outlets.
G. |
Hello Eric, you might have been referring to the first class D generation ROwland M201 or M501 monos.... M 501 sounded to me powerful but uninspiring no matter break-in and/or warmup.... M201 tended to run out of steam.... I heard them at length at a dealer, and then again at RMAF, where I also heard the M312.... AT RMAF the three amps were powering a pair of VIenna Acoustics Mahler.... M201 and M501 sounded like interesting experiments, but they were rather uninvolving.... Then They connected the M312 stereo, and.... I fell in love! Soon M312 replaced my beloved golden toned Rowland 7M class A/B high bias monoblocks.
The logical successor of M501 was the M525, which I have not heard.... Third party reports were that while it did deliver a more emotional presentation than M501, it still sounded a little "non-denominational"... M525 was recently replaced by the bridgeable M535, which I have in my system. As already mentioned a few times on this thread, it delivers the emotional goods in spades... is an extraordinary amp under all audible parameters that I can think of.
G.
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Hello George, an intriguing press release indeed... please let us know about any adopters of the high speed Peregrine/Murata Gan power conversion modules.
While proof shall remain forever in the proverbial pudding, keeping an open mind on the theoretical potential of such technical advances is definitely worth our audiophrenic attention.
Saluti, G.
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Hi slimpikins5, your concern of ICEpower-based amps sounding sub-musical has some merits, if mostly from a historical point of view....
Examples of such unsatisfying amps could be found easily in some older class D amps such as the Wyred4Sound that I have heard at RMAF until about five years ago (They might have changed since then), early Red Dragon 500, and stock Rowland M201 and M501 (that is without being connected to the optional PC-1 PFC external rectifier).
This however does not imply that all ICEpower based amps are inherently less than musical... In fact, even some now elderly amps that I have had in my system such as the Rowland M312 stereo and the Bel Canto REF1000M were authentic musical marvels, particularly for the time.
I have heard only good third party reports about recent ICEpower implementations... ’Tis worth keeping an open mind about ICEpoweer amps designed in the last three to four years. particularly if they are not simply boxes containing more or less basic ICEpower modules and little else.
ICEpower modules are very flexible... A manufacturer can use them all by themselves to create an entry level amp, or can use them as building blocks in the design of amps of any increasing level of sophistication.
Saluti, Guido
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Hi Singingtheblues, I have listened to Devialet several times at RMAF, including I believe the 250.... I am not surprised that eventually you found it to be grating.... The overall house sound is certainly open, but a little too treble-happy for my taste... Some small amounts of treble hardness may have been traces of intermodulation.
Regards, G. |
Hello jonasandezekiel, I am not surprised that you are not blown away by Wyred4Sound ICEpowered amps..... I have not heard yet Wyred4Sound amps that I have liked.... To be honest, I have not heard them for a few years, but what I have heard at RMAF until a few years ago sounded rather hard in the treble.
If you can tell us your budget and power requirements, several of us can make some concrete suggestions based on models that we have experienced, and/or brands that we have learned to appreciate.
Regards, Guido |
I have not listened to the Technics SU-G30 yet. By reading the product page, it is evident that this is a fairly complex device, and that GaN transistors are a small component of the overall design. It is outwawrdly not possible to draw definite conclusions as of the relative contribution of GaN to the performance of Technics SU-G30
Worth pointing out that GaN transistors are not particularly new. Prototypes have been demonstrated as early as 1993... That is some 25 years ago. GaN-based transistors have been commercially available in one incarnation or another since 2006. See:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gallium_nitride
Nor GaN are the exclusive domain of Niche companies: major semiconductors fabs, such as Panasonic Industrial Devices, offer Gan transistors and GaN-based assemblies:
https://na.industrial.panasonic.com/products/semiconductors/x-gan-power/power-devices
Relatively novel is only the application of Gan to high end audio amplification. If more amplifier designers adopt GaN, The next couple years will tell if transistors based on some forms of GaN inherently correlate to class D modules and circuits that contribute to enhance the audible performance of power amplifiers beyond the current state of the art. Or if the advantage afforded by the application of this semiconductor technology is purely a theoretical one. The danger of overoptimistic disconnects was nicely expressed by Mr. Berra:
"In theory there is no difference between theory and practice. In practice there is."
Yogi Berra
Regards, G.
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Noble100+++
"class D amplification sounds just dreadful to those familiar with the sound of real
music, instruments, and acoustic spaces."
My experience with live music and spaces is puny... You are right ClearThink... heard a live violin for the first time when I was six years old.... So I decided that I needed to learn music.... Started to take piano lessons and at 16 I got a Steinway baby grand.... Started to attend classical concerts at 13 at the Sala Verdi and the Teatro Alla Scala in Milan... Became a member of the selection committee for the Italian Concert Season of the Gioventu’ Musicali when I was 18.... Briefly trained as a bass baritone, and sang in a variety of classical choirs... Studied phylosophy of music and composition at college..... Attended music camps where daily I listened to violins by Antonio Stradivari, Guarneri Del Gesu', and Guadagnini.... Coached my daughter for 12 years when she was studying cello... Wrote articles on PFO.... At 65 I play the euphonium, flugel horn, cornet, trumpet, flute, and baroque recorders....
But apparently I know nothing about acoustic music and live spaces, and that’s probably why I am fond of such class D amps as the Bel Canto REF1000M, The Merrill Veritas, the Mola Mola Kaluga, the Rowland M312... Even worse, I absolutely adore the Rowland M535 bridged amps, and my Rowland M925 monoblocks... Somehow I managed to delude myself into believing that I am experiencing musical nirvana.
Nothing wrong in not liking current class D amps, ClearThink... Provided you experienced at some depth some of the best examples out there... Just please refrain from passing judgement on people who feel otherwise.... Their musical experience might be very well as deep as yours, Yet they might have developed opinions very different from yours.
Regards, Guido
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Thank you ricevs, Tim, and Jetter... Admittedly, I have been soaked in music since I was a tod... The only reason why I did not become a professional composer is that my retinas failed me in the late 1970s and could no longer use pencil and paper, so I switched major and took a degree in Comp Sci instead.... Good move, as I managed to make a reasonable living with the maddening machines until I retired at the end of '18. Yet, throughout all this time, music has continued to be an integral part of my life in one way or another.
I have no idea if I have expertise beyond anyone else, or if my ears are good or not, but they are the primary tool that I use to perceive the World... What I sometimes post are the stories about the beauty of music and sound that my ears tell to me... It is my joy to continue to share with you Audiogon friends the tonal magic that I hear through my system.
Saluti, G.
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Hello Tim, Bruno Putzeys has left Hypex more than two yers ago, and as far as I know, he is not involved at this time with NCore technology development.
He has since founded a new company, called Purifi:
https://www.purifi-audio.com/
And within Purifi Bruno is developing new class D technology.... No, as far as I know, Putzeys may not be applying GaN transistors in his new design.
Saluti, G.
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Hello @aolmrd1241 and @KLH007, I will post some observations about the darling Rowland M535 tomorrow... It won't be the complete review, but I'll try address some differences between M535 in stereo mode, and a bridged pair.
Saluti, Guido
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Hello @aolmrd1241, you are right... My review of the Rowland M535 bridgeable amp is woefully late. I have written some seven MSWord pages this ffar, but
it is still not complete... I'll try to speed things up. Saluti, Guido
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