New Linear Parasound Halo JC1+ monoblocks, an even more improved new John Curl design

Who cares about a few speakers that are hard to drive? Only their owners and you. You keep saying it is so important....but to whom? If 95% of speakers (including low impedance ones) can be driven by the NC1200 then who are you talking to? I said MIGHT on purpose, because many of those so called hard to drive speakers....I am betting, would work fine with an NC1200. Never heard anyone say otherwise.....but you never know till you LISTEN.....which neither one of us have. So we know nothing......just guessing......but I would not bet against 1200 watts into 2 ohms (the amps rating). Why are you so obsessed about the few extremely hard to drive speakers? Are they the only good speakers on the planet? Maybe you should get out more.

If I were one of those looking for an amp in the Parasound price range and below (even if I was one of the 95% that does not ever need the current it gives).....then I would evaluate it to see if it sounds great on my speakers....even if my speakers were 95db and 8 ohm. The sound of an amp is what I am interested in......how transparent is it? Does it give me goosebumps.....does it sound real and wow...ish. If I were one of those few that had a super hard to drive speaker and I could afford the Parasound then it would be an obvious amp to try and I also would try the $6K Apollon all out NC1200 because it competes with $20K Krell mono blocks and there is nothing wrong with paying less.....more other toys to buy......or give it to charity.

Only by trying something in your home can you know something.  It is not what someone "thinks" and "states" on a forum that is real.  It is only what you experience that is real.  Please, trust yourself.

Who cares about a few speakers that are hard to drive?

First overstate then understate, more than a just few, probably around 50% of what speakers Stereophile reviews would come into it.

Question for JC1+ owners: how good are the stock power cords that come with the units? I currently use AQ Hurricane but am contemplating ordering the stock power cords and moving the Hurricane PCs to the DAC and streamer.

I owned the Pass Labs X260.8 - I called to ask Pass Labs and they recommended using the stock power cords (as they were voiced using them during design) instead of the AQ Hurricane.

Parasound does not take calls from customers anymore, hence the query.

I would rather see (and hear) a new CD/SACD/Universal spinner building upon the CD-1.

 

Happy Listening!

Ric is spot on (as usual). A long long time ago I had Harry Pearsons personal pair of Genesis Vs. I tried a lot of amps, but the one that grabbed them by throat and made sing was Kinergetics KBA 75- class A amp, but man the electric meter spun and even in the winter it kept my house warm. Of course that was long before class D was around, let alone top flight designs. Sadly, I blew it up while swapping out power cords, so the Gen Vs went down the road. Many many speakers later, I got a pair of Emerald Physics 3.4s which are very efficient/amp friendly, and amazing. Alas, they are no longer made as they do everything very well, however hey do come up on the used market from time to time, or the 2. series which has the same 12", but augmented with either one or two 15" woofers

For around 3 years now (or is it 4?) I have owned Rics EVS 1200, dual mono (don’t know how it compares to the Hypex 1200. After a couple months with the EVS, I got a LSA 350 GaN Voyager, which I preferred as to my ears it sounded more continuous, at least until I replaced all my WW series 8 cables. Sadly, I managed to take out a GaN module and was glad I kept the EVS1200, which sounds considerably better after I replaced the WW cabling with Ali-E mostly Odin Gold cables, which I replaced one at a time (each upgrade easily improved the sound) with the speaker cables being the last, and boy, it tied everything together. Talk about saving money!

hth