Not sure what receiver is good enough.... possible separates? - Page 3

 

The really, really expensive ones  with the secret sauce...

Yeah , but in my defense he said it's his first forray into HT from an HTIB, what followed was atypical advice which I feel hurts more than helps.

I've been at this for over thirty years and have come to appreciate where tangible differences are attainable and what's a waste of effort at certain points. We don't have a clue what size room he has and yet people a saying "get an external amp" ... it's just plain bad advice.
The practical approach is to determine useage, then start from the listening position and work backwards. If in his room he's sitting 5ft from the mains, an HTIB might be all he needs to get accurate & decent sound, but if he's 20ft it's a hole new ballgame...

These threads and the external amp angle always seem to have an Emotiva flavor, and it's not surprising given they're an internet based company with marketing focused there.

But I find a delicious irony in how they advertise their inexpensive gear as competing with uber high-end stuff and then in the same breath their supporters say there's no way Yamaha, Denon or HK could figure out how to give you value for dollar amplification...

 

So true. I'd imagine that at least half, or even more, of the people who have bought external amps don't really benefit from them, objectively. People see them as a panacea, hence the immediate advice you refer to of "get an external amp" without any rational thought as to speaker efficiency, listening levels, seating distance etc.  Of course, some people like owning and using the gear as an end in itself, which is fine of course, and they do get a 'subjective' benefit from ownership. 

 

:)  I dislike their current advertising (I spent my entire life working as an advertising copywriter and owned my own agency for 30 years) because it lacks credibility to compare, for example, their $600 UMC-200 with a $4,500 alternative, with no sort of objective proof or evidence offered (or even a subjective comparison for that matter). The response I would expect from that headline - if they did some focus groups - is "I don't believe it" which then actually demeans their product. But I am not sure that what you say above is correct - they are not really comparing their gear with uber high-end stuff as such - I think they are just trying to say that the other manufacturers are, not exactly ripping you off, but let's say, not offering very good value for money. The subtext, as I see it, is that they could, but they choose not to for various reasons: to maximise profits, to support a dealer network, to prop up ailing departments in their conglomerates etc etc.  Whatever is going on, there's no doubt that, really, nobody needs to spend more on an amp than Emotiva charge for theirs. They are superlative value for money however one looks at it.

No argument here. My point (which I think you get) is if they can do it....

If their new pre-amp's TaCT room correction is as good as the one I heard a few years back in TaCT's two channel all digital system, it's not hard to imagine an Emotiva separates combo being a better value than most receivers in that price point.

 

Yep - if they can do it...

 

Isn't there some doubt about TacT even finding its way into the (so far) mythical XMC-1?  I thought Emo had said they may introduce the unit without it. It would be a tragedy if they did - otherwise I agree with your sentiments entirely.

And how is hearing everything that was on the stage adding anything??? The soundstage is a combo of everything in the chain. Yes most certainly speakers and how they are setup in any given room. But do not make the mistake that an amp does not contribute...it does. And I am not just talking power amps, its the same with pre-amps.

It not that a better pre-amp/power amp is adding anything extra, its what a cheaper amp is not providing.
If I am in a concert hall and hear many instruments, layered from the front of the stage to the back, and I do not hear that same reproduction on a home audio system, then that system is lacking. I could start with ML. Although I will confess to not having heard a ML in years.
But I am convinced one does not have to go that high up the audio chain to hear a difference.
Grab a Parasound Halo pre-amp or power amp, even compared to their older models.

Comparing my Halo P7 to the pre-amp in my HK AVR3600 or 3390, the P7 is better at providing a better soundstage.
And for the record, that same power amp used for all three pre-amps, in the same room, same speakers, same locations.

And how is hearing everything that was on the stage adding anything??? The soundstage is a combo of everything in the chain. Yes most certainly speakers and how they are setup in any given room. But do not make the mistake that an amp does not contribute...it does. And I am not just talking power amps, its the same with pre-amps.

It not that a better pre-amp/power amp is adding anything extra, its what a cheaper amp is not providing.
If I am in a concert hall and hear many instruments, layered from the front of the stage to the back, and I do not hear that same reproduction on a home audio system, then that system is lacking. I could start with ML. Although I will confess to not having heard a ML in years.
But I am convinced one does not have to go that high up the audio chain to hear a difference.
Grab a Parasound Halo pre-amp or power amp, even compared to their older models.

Comparing my Halo P7 to the pre-amp in my HK AVR3600 or 3390, the P7 is better at providing a better soundstage.
And for the record, the same power amp used for all three pre-amps, in the same room, same speakers, same locations.

It never happens, particularly if you are personally at the exact same live performance that was recorded.

True in the sense that having a complete chain is required to have any sound at all.

However, not everything in the chain puts a unique imprint on the sound quality.

The room, the speakers and the original recording put the strongest unique imprint on what you hear.

I'm trying to figure out what you think you are saying. For sure the preamp and the power amp are required for their to be any sound at all. However, it is easy to show that there exists broad interchangability of amp snad preamps that result in the same perceived identical audible results.
.
There is no evidence that reasonably priced amplifiers are failing to reproduce anything that is tangible and could reasonably be expected present at their output terminals. They produce signals that are as audibly perfect as any amplifier. I can take a any of a goodly number of good modestly priced AVRs and compare their speaker output signal with a typical loudspeaker load to that of many different very expensive and highly touted amplifiers and show that they are indistinguishable to every listener.

Here is a challenge - produce reliable evidence that something is missing. Not your say so or some golden ear's say so on your personal authorities. I want to see reliable evidence that something that should be there is missing.

Actually, you are saying that to someone who has done that very thing with over a thousand live performances. I can tell you that there are many things that happen on that stage that you don't hear live, and that there are even more that you don't hear in the best recording when played with the best equipment.

I was asking strictly about power amps not preamps. In your post that I quoted earlier you specifically mentioned amps not preamps. I owned a Parasound A52 amp awhile back and it was a very nice amp. But the A52 did not sound any better in my system than a Boston Acoustics A7200 (Sherwood Newcastle A-965 clone) that replaced it. The A7200 was about half the cost of the A52 with two additional channels.

I have had a number of different amps in my system over the years. Amp changes in my system over the years have accounted for minimal if any SQ differences. The A7200 was one of the first amps I bought. Then I went on an amp buying spree which ended with buying another A7200 used. I have now had the A7200 in my system for several years and it will be in my system for a few more years .

Bill

Sadly they seem to have a pretty poor track record with their HT pre-amps so it wouldn't surprise me if they didn't deliver.

 

Arny has beat me to it with his reply and I have nothing to add to it.  If you can produce the evidence he asks you for - that you can prove something is missing or changed - I’d be interested to read it.

Time to break out the Lirpa Labs A.S.S. (Analyzer of SoundStages)? It will tell us how many Harleys and Fremers a good soundstaging amp produces versus a cheaper amp.

And I do not have to prove a damn thing.
And if you or Bill Mac or anyone else has switched amps and heard no difference, only means the amps in question were quite close in their outputs. And I never said all amps are different. I said some can be different, either better or worse.

4DHD, I've done a blinded, level-matched A/B comparison between a Parasound HALO and several other components (a couple of integrated amps and an AVR).

I heard no differences at all, either in soundstaging or imaging, or, well, anything.

I asked you before whether you could explain how/why an amp would affect soundstaging, and now I ask that again, rhetorically.

Soundstaging comes from the recording, the speakers, and the room. The amp should have nothing to do with it.
Edited by beaveav - 2/25/13 at 5:01pm

Nobody (well, nobody with half a brain) is arguing that ALL amps sound the same.

In my blind test, a 20 year old stereo receiver I owned failed miserably. It sounded like crap compared to all the others.

The argument is that solid-state amps that measure sufficiently well (freq resp, thd, snr,, etc), and operating below clipping, will sound the same.

The only real debate is/should be this: "what does sufficiently well mean?"

And why would you have a problem with discussing pre-amps and power amps in the same sentence??
According to you, all amps sound the same. The only difference between the two are the input voltages and the output voltages. They both amplify the signal, just at different levels.

But the fact you keep changing amps says something about your dissatisfaction of your system.
Hell, I've been using the same power amp for over a decade. If it ain't broke, don't fix it.
But adding the P7 did make an improvement.
To date, the P7 has the best phono stage I've ever used. Though, I suspect the JC3 is an improvement over the P7.

Edited by Bill Mac - 2/25/13 at 7:35pm

That is completely true, but you should understand that credibility is worth something, not having it is not fun, and it comes from some place besides unsupported assertions.

Exactly right. Some of that happened because we were careful with our testing. If you don't take care, the outputs of the amps will be very different when you listen to them. I suspect that your amp comparisons lacked the necessary care.

I never said you did, so now you are arguing with yourself.

I agree so again you are arguing with yourself.

Why not try something new and different and actually answer the questions I asked instead of these detours into arguing with yourself? -)

 

There's no debate over that really - the amp should measure flat from 20Hz to 20Khz (they all do these days) and distortion levels should be below the threshold of audibility (they all are these days).

 

I don't think anyone said that they should all measure sufficiently anyway - what was said is that they should be operating within their designed parameters and not clipping.

 

And the issue is with modern SS amps - not 20 year old receivers. 

Several times some great questions have come up... but never asked. the size and arrangement of your room along with other factors will depend on what size receiver to get.
How many feet will you be sitting from the front speakers?
how many square feet do you have in the room, will the room have attached or adjoining rooms and hallways? or be a designated HT room?
How tall are your ceilings so that we can get an idea of total cubic feet?
Will you be using this for music and HT, if so what percentage will it be? (since I up graded my speakers I listen to more music than I did before. something to think about.)
Do you listen to music while you move around the house, or as a relaxing time in your favorite chair?
And of coarse do you have a price range that you would like to stay with in. (I am a very frugal person and want the best at the lowest price possible. so that is where my recommendations originate. while others may suggest the best money can buy.)

you mentioned that you loved the sound of the NS777 with a 100watt amp and wanted to know if a larger amp would make them sound better? IMO To get a noticeable sound difference you would have to double the power, or go to a 200watt amp. This is what the pros seem to say.

IMO every company has a product line that they do best. So I would exsplore that avenue and not buy every thing from one company, other wise you end up with a box system. and you are trying to get away from that...right? just a thought.


Edit: post a picture of where the HT will be if you would like.

Don't be silly Keith.

What is "flat" exactly? I've measured more gear than I can count (with an Audio Precision, because my job for 17 years was in design, development, and test of audio/video consumer electronics). I never measured a single thing that was perfectly flat.

So given that nothing is perfectly flat, my statement stands correct.

 

Really?

 

What would you call these?  Emotiva XPA5:

 

 

 

Please tell me you're joking...

I guess this is what happens when an engineer and a sales/marketing guy try to communicate.

I'd call those graphs useless, as they aren't zoomed in nearly enough to provide any information worth looking at.

C'mon, you're a smart guy and knowledgeable, but are you not aware of things like component tolerances, manufacturing QCT, etc?

 

Will more resolution make a flat line look anything other than flat?

 

Components these days are a non-issue in amplifiers. Even cheap amps of the type we use in HT are made with components whose key parameters put them well below the threshold of audibility. To suggest that one component will be 'better' than another makes you seem rooted in the past, when it was true. Once a component has sufficient quality that its distortion thresholds are below the level of human audibility, no further 'improvement' can be possible 0.05% and 0.01% may make one thing appear 'better' than he other but it's totally irrelevant if it is physically impossible to hear a difference.

 

Likewise, QC isn’t an issue. We are obviously discussing amps that are in working order, not broken amps.

 

Amps are amps these days. Welcome that fact and save some $$$.

Yes, in the case of an apparently flat line.

 

Can you show me a couple of examples?  One with the resolution as posted above, showing an 'apparently flat' line and another with the resolution you recommend that shows the difference?

FWIW, the Sterophile tests show amp FR with 0.25 dB divisions, and you can occasionally see a little narrow deviation (maybe 0.01 dB?) somewhere in the FR, and not uncommonly up to half a dB down at 20KHZ. And tests into their simulated speaker load will pretty often show quarter-decibel (ish) deviations . . .

 

But in essence, they are flat?  0.01dB deviation being in my personal definition of 'flat' ;)