AVS › AVS Forum › Audio › Receivers, Amps, and Processors › Anybody listened to Crown Drivecore xls 2000 and 2500 amps for 2 channel main speaker listening,versus a so called high end home amp.
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Anybody listened to Crown Drivecore xls 2000 and 2500 amps for 2 channel main speaker...

post #1 of 18
2/27/13 at 4:39pm
Thread Starter 
Hi, I'm new to these forums ,so please have mercy on me. I have been listening to oldschool power amplifiers for many years,and really like the natural and powerfull sound that the Phase linear 700B, and the Soundcraftsman 5002 amplifiers produce. Both those amps to my ears seem to produce smooth sound quality,with good detail ,and good dynamics. I have no problem with the sound quality they produce. They stay clear right up to maximum volume, but I would still like it to be louder. I read a review by Andrew Robinson, on the crown xls 2000 amplifier.He said he was normally into home amplifiers for audiophille sound quality,but decided to try the crown drive core series amps.All said and done.At the end of the review.He said he was very impressed with the sound quality and dynamics the crown drivecore xls 2000 amp had.He said it was so good that he would be using it for his future referencing amp to measure other amplifiers against.I would like as much headroom as possible for dynamics ,etc.Plus my phase linear 700B is not loud enough ,so I thought I might as well spend the extra dollars ,and get the biggest crown drivecore amp. The drivecore xls 2500.My speakers are Yamaha ns1000 ,and are 8 ohm. My main concern ,since I have never heard any other power amps ,other than the two oldschool amplifiers I have listed is, Will I still get as good of sound quality out of the drivecore 2500 compared to the oldschool amps.By reading his review and a few others, it sounds like these crown amps even put most home audiophile amps to shame.Will they at least be as good as I have now for hiss free,high volume audiphile listening., and bring more headroom and dynamics to 2 channel listening,or is what I have already better. Any input would be greatly appreciated. Thanks
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post #2 of 18
3/1/13 at 9:49am
Thread Starter 
There must be some people on these forums that have opinions on these crown drivecore 2000 and 2500 amplifiers for listening to music in the home.
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post #3 of 18
3/2/13 at 9:40am
search, there was a thread on this within the last few weeks
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post #4 of 18
3/2/13 at 8:22pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by coomaster View Post

Hi, I'm new to these forums ,so please have mercy on me. I have been listening to oldschool power amplifiers for many years,and really like the natural and powerfull sound that the Phase linear 700B, and the Soundcraftsman 5002 amplifiers produce. Both those amps to my ears seem to produce smooth sound quality,with good detail ,and good dynamics. I have no problem with the sound quality they produce. They stay clear right up to maximum volume, but I would still like it to be louder. I read a review by Andrew Robinson, on the crown xls 2000 amplifier.He said he was normally into home amplifiers for audiophille sound quality,but decided to try the crown drive core series amps.All said and done.At the end of the review.He said he was very impressed with the sound quality and dynamics the crown drivecore xls 2000 amp had.He said it was so good that he would be using it for his future referencing amp to measure other amplifiers against.I would like as much headroom as possible for dynamics ,etc.Plus my phase linear 700B is not loud enough ,so I thought I might as well spend the extra dollars ,and get the biggest crown drivecore amp. The drivecore xls 2500.My speakers are Yamaha ns1000 ,and are 8 ohm. My main concern ,since I have never heard any other power amps ,other than the two oldschool amplifiers I have listed is, Will I still get as good of sound quality out of the drivecore 2500 compared to the oldschool amps.By reading his review and a few others, it sounds like these crown amps even put most home audiophile amps to shame.Will they at least be as good as I have now for hiss free,high volume audiphile listening., and bring more headroom and dynamics to 2 channel listening,or is what I have already better. Any input would be greatly appreciated. Thanks

 

Andrew's review was part of the reason I purchased my XLS 2500 and I have been extremely happy with it so far.

 

I generally just run my towers now when listening to music. It sounds great and puts out a ton of power.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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post #5 of 18
3/8/13 at 11:18am
Thread Starter 
Hi,I haven't been back to the forums for awile to check the thread.That write up from Adrew made the Crown Drivecore 2000 and 2500 sound very promising for audiophille sound. So you are driving just the two tower speakers off of the crown drivecore 2500?What brand are your tower speakers.Mine as stated earlier are oldschool Yamaha Ns 1000 speaker which are 8 ohm and seem to gooble up all my power I have from my soundcraftsman MA5002 and Phase linear 700B amp. Are your towers 8 ohm?Now a little bit about how the crown Drivecore 2500 is in the sound quality department.Do you think this amp is in the high end audiophille catagory like Andrew stated that this amplifier will be his new bench mark amp to compare all other home amplifers SQ against.Will it play the quiet ,detailed passages in music when turned up pretty loud,while not hearing any hiss.Is there a thump on and off that goes through your speakers when turning the crown amp on and off.Do you think it puts out a full sound or does it seem thin sounding.I can only imagine that it would be full sounding and detailed with that kind of extra power on tap.Please tell me your listening impressions with different types of music playing through it .Did you need any special things like the samson s convert box or anything to hook it up to match or boost the signal.Sorry for all the questions,Nothing beats talking with someone that has person experience with listening to this amplifier with just two home speakers like I am after. Any information on these questions would be greatly appreciated. Thanks
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post #6 of 18
3/17/13 at 11:14am
Thread Starter 
To the last poster to my thread,Can you please give me some of your opinions regarding my last post. I am very interested in hearing your personal opinions and listening expieriences with the drivecore 2500 amplifiers. Anybody else that wants to chime in on listening impressions on this amp is free to do so. Thanks
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post #7 of 18
3/17/13 at 11:43am
Excellent amplifiers, reliability & sonic-wise..
If using in a home system, keep in mind @ certain times the fans if triggered ON, may be audible..

Just my $0.02.. wink.gif
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post #8 of 18
3/17/13 at 4:07pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by coomaster View Post

To the last poster to my thread,Can you please give me some of your opinions regarding my last post. I am very interested in hearing your personal opinions and listening expieriences with the drivecore 2500 amplifiers. Anybody else that wants to chime in on listening impressions on this amp is free to do so. Thank

 

I will try to answer your questions the best I can.

 

Presently I am using an Onkyo TX NR-709 avr, Onkyo C-7030 cd player( analog to the avr) and Polk RTi12 towers(they are 8 ohm). The avr's main L and R preamp outputs run by rca to the crowns rca inputs. As far as hiss, with the avr's volume at minimum you can hear hiss if your about 10 inches or closer to the tweeter. Once any volume is produced you don't hear it. There is NO turn on or off thump and the fan is very quiet.

 

I have never heard an audiophile amplifier so I can't honestly compare the crown to one but as far as being thin sounding, absolutely not.  What I can say is I love this amplifier. I was skeptical at first as I have never owned a "Pro Audio" amp before but Andrews review and a couple threads on here convinced me to buy one.

 

I listen to everything from classical to metal and I have been extremely pleased with the results. Hope this helps................

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post #9 of 18
3/27/13 at 12:08pm
Thread Starter 
Thanks for the update on your system,I don't think the fan will be an issue with me,since there are work arounds for that.I am in the same boat as you were.Being that I have never heard an actual power amp like these being used in home audio 2 channel listening. There is lots of talk of them using them for subwoofers,and for movie listening.But info is hard to come by for power amps and 2 channel high fidelity listening. I think after talking to you and reading more I will take the plunge and buy one of the crown drive core 2500 amplifiers. I guess when you think about it,I have proven myself that power amplifiers can sound very good for 2 channel listening,since even though the soundcraftsmen 5002 and phase linear 700B are home amplifiers.They are really poweramps,and I really enjoy the sound quality they produce.If they produce the same sound quality as those amps or better,I will be very happy. My only question is,I don't run a preamp to my amplifier.I just hook the cd player rca to the rca on the amplifier since the cd player has its own volume control.Am I losing out on the full power of the power amp by not using a preamp. One person said I would be freeing up power since I had nothing else in the signal chain.Thanks for all the help so far.
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post #10 of 18
3/27/13 at 12:11pm
There's a lot of stuff in here: http://forums.audioholics.com/forums/amps-pre-pros-receivers/79978-crown-xls-drivecore-thread.html
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post #11 of 18
3/27/13 at 5:05pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by M Code View Post

Excellent amplifiers, reliability & sonic-wise..
If using in a home system, keep in mind @ certain times the fans if triggered ON, may be audible..

Just my $0.02.. wink.gif

Do you know anything about the DriveCore amps' output filter?

I'm curious how much their FR varies with impedance up top. but I've never seen measurements and the Crown people don't seem to care to answer questions about it on their forum.

That's the one (legitimate) knock on many Class D amps, though it is solvable as demonstrated by the Hypex modules and more-or-less by the Icepower ASX2 modules.
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post #12 of 18
3/30/13 at 8:39pm
I'm using XLS 2500 right now in 2-channel audio system. I had been using it in my video system for the past year. In the audio system, I drive it using a Benchmark DAC-1 using the DAC-1s balanced outputs. Speakers are 98 dB sensitive Klipsch Forte II. Room is 11 x 17 x 8. Slight hiss within 12 inches from tweeter before music starts but who sits that close? Hiss doesn't go up if I turn the volume control of the DAC-1 up. No fan noise noticed yet in either the video system or the audio system. I leave it on 24/7 except when away on vacation. Good warranty. Cheap price per watt. One of the best buys I have ever had in 35 years in audio hobby. I still like to have a few amps around to play with including tube amps but this one holds its own.
Edited by noway1 - 4/16/13 at 5:18am
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post #13 of 18
3/31/13 at 11:10am
Thread Starter 
Happy Easter everyone.With these crown xls drivecore amps.Is it as simple as pluging your cd player or preamp into the rca,s that are supplied on the back of the amp.,to get the very best sound quality out of these crown drivecore amps, or is the sound quality better by getting an adaptor,and hooking it up like the ones without the rca outputs. Also when using these amps for 2 channel stereo listening,since my cd player with volume control will be directly hooked into the amp with no preamp used,will I just turn the two volume controls on the crown amp close to full ,while dialing up the volume on my cd player control .Thats what I do with my phase linear and soundcraftsmen amps ,or are they meant to be set on a certain volume level for best sound quality. Thanks
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post #14 of 18
3/31/13 at 12:48pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by coomaster View Post

...Is it as simple as pluging your cd player or preamp into the rca,s that are supplied on the back of the amp.,to get the very best sound quality out of these crown drivecore amps, or is the sound quality better by getting an adaptor,and hooking it up like the ones without the rca outputs.

If your CD player or preamp has only RCA outputs, use the RCA inputs on the Crown.


Quote:
Originally Posted by coomaster View Post

...Also when using these amps for 2 channel stereo listening,since my cd player with volume control will be directly hooked into the amp with no preamp used,will I just turn the two volume controls on the crown amp close to full ,while dialing up the volume on my cd player control .Thats what I do with my phase linear and soundcraftsmen amps ,or are they meant to be set on a certain volume level for best sound quality. Thanks

I keep the Crown gain controls at 1/2 (12:00 position) That way I get to use much more of the rotation of my preamp's volume control + many volume controls (like the one on my preamp) have best channel balance at 12:00. I hate reaching maximum volume while only turning the volume control a little bit. Ideally, you would want to use the full range of the preamp's volume control rotation.
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post #15 of 18
4/1/13 at 11:51am
Thread Starter 
Hi, I will not be using a preamp with a volume control,Only a cd player with volume control on it.Won,t I half to turn the volume knobs on the crown drivecore amp to full or close to full to get the maximum power out of it.Since I will have dialed the db settings down to a low volume before pressing play on the cd player.That way I can dial up and down the volume on the couch with the cd player remote.That is the way I do it with the Phase linear 700B amp that I have it hooked up to now.I keep it at 3/4 volume on the amp just in case there is distortion in the last 1/4 of the volume Aka full volume.Will this be fine to do.I solely listen to the amp for just 2 channel listening through the cd player,and it will never be used for anything but that.
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post #16 of 18
4/1/13 at 12:16pm
That'll work fine. You might even find that you don't need to turn up the gain controls on the Crown all the way to get the volume you need.
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post #17 of 18
4/1/13 at 1:24pm
I've got a Crown XLS 1500 which IMO sounds so good that it replaced my class A Threshold amplifier. Its so even and flat sounding and has the ability to resolve every little thing that goes on. Love the amp. In my experience though, the bass is rolled off below 20Hz ... at least compared to my other home amps.
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post #18 of 18
4/2/13 at 10:11am
Thread Starter 
Hi, When you say the bass is rolled off below 20 hz, What does that mean. My yamaha ns 1000 speakers don't put out the greatest amount of bass but are very detailed. Does rolling off below 20hz mean it just puts out a little less bass or does it mean something different.Sounds like these crown drivecore amps are what I am looking for,for accurate,detailed,full sounding music reproduction. Its very different to me the drown drivecore amplifiers.Usually you can not have a good amplifier,that sounds good if it doesn't weight a ton.The phase linear 700B amp weighs anywhere from 60-70 lbs. Not that I'm moving the amp around much at all. But usally light means cheap quality and underpowered. Boy have amps changed,or is it just the crown drivecore amps and pro series amps that can be so light and sound so good. Even the new emotiva mono block amps are suposed to weigh a ton.Hopefully these will sound even better than the emotiva mono blocks ,since that was what I was going to purchase before reading up on what the crown drivecore amps can do. I know class A amps ,and they are pretty hard amps to beat in terms of sound quality. Would the users of the crown drivecore amplifiers describe them as tube like sound and warm sounding. Thats what I am used to with my other amps and really like that about them. Thanks for all the replies so far. These forums are a wealth of knowledge and have great people that really know their stuff. Thanks
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AVS › AVS Forum › Audio › Receivers, Amps, and Processors › Anybody listened to Crown Drivecore xls 2000 and 2500 amps for 2 channel main speaker listening,versus a so called high end home amp.