Pro audio power amps

That was the one you picked up for a $100? Man just the transformer alone is probably worth that.

 

yup. currently have it hooked up. so far it sounds very nice. i don't hear any grain from it and is very clean sounding amp. i heard some people say these are grainy amps but, i don't hear it personally and i had some receivers and amps that were grainy in the top end before and i got rid of them. don't hear it with the crown. i think people just assume cause crown claims a 1000 damping factor at 10hz to 400hz i believe. it does have a very low source impedance and does show on graph that impedance rises as frequency rises to 20khz at 8/4/2ohm.

haven't tested it on subs yet but, seriously do not feel like pulling the sucker out and was pain in ass to take bottom cover off to switch input senstivity...i am not doing it again to put a jumper in for bridge-mono mode...too much damn work. i like simple button and switch my other amps have... the micro-tech is a big a-hole just for that but, other than that, really love it so far. fan is not loud as expected either. it is on 24/7 when on but, i barely even hear it from listening position and not as bad as my air conditioner or other fans in the house defiantly. after i fine a usb cable for my phone i'll upload a couple photos....stupid room is mess from working it.

 

the big iron with the rest of the group...

 

Three fuses?

 

i forgot what but, have to read manual... there is three transformers in there. just can't see in the photo so....i did not pay attention to be honest when i looked at the fuses... just made sure everything was clean,no gunk or anything wrong. was just a very quick look inside.

 

i tested the carver earlier just messing with and listening to usual music casually...compared to the crown with the pm 600. it was hard to match up but, got to it where it was reasonable for me. to me they sound very similar to each other. just the crown seems have tad bit more but not much, omph in the low-end punch. might be due to larger transformers and being a dual-mono design... the crown does not sound grainy at all either i actually think it sounds bit softer up top than tha carver a bit but, it just might be in my head. who knows.

but, despite very tiny, tiny difference, they most likely sound overall the same which is surprising cause carver is known for messing up the input signal on purpose to give his a amps a ''unique'' sound of it's own... i love the crown though even though it's beat up a bit... probably best 100 bucks i ever spent...seriously. in the past i never deals like this, ever. guess just got lucky. though one day i'll upgrade and replace those large red bull size power filter caps inside. think about using nichon 200v 10,000uf caps since they measure the closest to the originals even though originals are 125v each which is not big deal really...bu, the caps costing 60 bucks a piece is gonna wait. didn't know caps went up that much in price...i mean holy pooper haha....

but, i found some locals with macro 1200's and micro 1200's.... gonna give a text/call and see if either rather trade instead of cash compensation. really love the little micro tech and love to keep my set-up all crown,jbl and altec haha.....i know, stupid but, that's me but, i do love trying new things and do actually really like the carvers. fantastic amps. hopefully can get something out of them since carver does still have a secret underground following among the audiophile crowds...

 

@Rex Aeterna This might be worth looking at: http://www.ebay.com/itm/crown-k1-/331973130727?hash=item4d4b23f9e7:g:4ZcAAOSwvzRX0N5r

I'd be super tempted to bite on that if it didn't cost a crapton to bring across the border.

 

Keep your eyes peeled for a Crown K1 or K2 I've seen go for cheap on occasion, good sounding fanless fairly modern crown.

EDIT: I see Armaegis is on point and beat me to it.

 

yea. i had some locals pop up before before for k2's but over 500 bucks. my local guitar center had one as well but, missing a input knob and wanted over 600 for it....i won't be doing much audio gear searching for about a year due to my medical condition i'm going through. so i'm gonna be ultra slow and might not be even online for months at a time. just letting people know since this besides speaker section and music section am most active in .. i already told marv about couple weeks to a month ago so he knows.

 

I got a an old Lab Gruppen 300 today. Some previous owner had disabled the pots not only by bridging some pins inside, but actually cutting the traces on the pcb. Ugh, really obvious once I saw it and only a 5 minute fix, but it took me a while wondering why the heck there was no sound once I removed the solder blob bridge.

Initial listen is positive. Sound is punchy. Seems a touch on the aggressive side, but I've been stressed out lately so that could just be me.

 

don't know why some people would do something like that and what goes through there head when they do it haha. glad you finally got to try one out. it's an older class a/b model right? so, how it sound now? still on aggressive side? one day i dab into lab's stuff but, they're very expensive and don't know if the hype in the brand itself is worth the extreme prices they go for, even at used prices. i planned on getting into live sound myself but, current condition not allowed to work for a whole year due to my treatments i'm going through so, i'm stuck being stationary till i get better. i finally got to listen to my system after about 2 months being out of commission for while till getting better and realized what i was missing. still into the pro stuff and love it but, slowed down a lot lately due to issues. i planned on before looking at some RCF scd 6000 rare studio monitors at my friends since he has 2 pairs and was gonna see if he wanna trade something for them since he works with me all the time but, ended up sick so, it'll be away before dabbing into running around looking for more stuff for me. glad you finally got a lab though and hope you enjoy it and it'll keep going for years to come.

 

The one I have is actually a Bruel & Kjaer Type 2716 (simply a rebadged Lab 300), so I think it was used in lab applications. The stupid part though is I'm sure cutting the traces on the pcb was unnecessary, since bridging the pins on the pot would have been enough.

Yes it's an old class a/b, no fan, and runs very cool. I thought it would be similar to my Bryston 2B, but it puts out nowhere near the heat. The manual even says you can stack them directly in a rack without spacing. I'm still feeling the punchy and aggressive sound (on headphones). Maybe I just miss that nice class A goodness, although the Lab has more power on tap so it's a trade off. If I were to bi-amp a cab I'd feel like putting the Bryston on the tops and Lab on the bottom (and leave sub duties to the heavyweights), but I still need to run it through it's paces with speakers first and maybe my tune will change.

Aw that sucks about being sick. Hope things perk up for you soon.

Here's some other options for you to look at though:
http://www.ebay.com/itm/ON-SALE-Apo...816137?hash=item27f61cf009:g:zPIAAOSwWKtUrT-2
http://www.ebay.com/itm/Powersoft-D...269684?hash=item25c49ace74:g:mTEAAOSwxcRW9ZSD

 

Some pictures of Schiit's Vidar were posted on HF today in their chapter...

Exterior looks very Pass Labs like. I'm looking at trading in my Hegel h360 for a pass labs int-60 but I gotta admit Schiit has me quite curious what they're going to churn out.

The Hegel is a wonderful unit for anyone looking!

 

Are pro amps mainly for live sound reproduction? Or do they get used in the studio too?

 

I scored a crown XLS 2502 bnib for $350 and I must say.. class D isn't half bad out of my event 20/20's. My other option was restore my Carver m200t. Kills that amp, also overtakes my friends loaner QSC GX3 in SQ. Glad I went the pro amp route, though TBH the Vidar was my main choice.. then again, now I've got 775W per channel into 4 ohm future upgradability

 

Pro amps can be used in both live and studio applications, but you've also got a very wide span of amps from class A/B to G/H to D, convective and passive cooled, etc. You won't typically find the kilowatt amps in a studio since they are unnecessary and the fans for those run pretty hard (thus loud). Studios these days also lean quite heavily towards active monitors.

 

The main reason I asked. I thought the pro side used active monitors exclusively so I wondered where they used stand alone power amps. It makes sense that a lot of them use a cooling fan too since you’ll never here it in a loud concert venue.

 

There are still a many good passive options. ATC's are the first that come to mind, and the venerable Yamaha NS10 and subsequent iterations.

Non-fan amps are less common in the pro world these days, but many will have multi-speed fans which can be quite quiet on their low settings. I have a trio of Yamaha P7000s that are very quiet and even then the fans only kick in when I'm using them outdoors in the summer.

 

Class-D PA amps rarely heat up in home conditions enough to warrant audible fan work. I've run my subs at 115dB musical output and sub-bass peaks in most music aren't enough to heat the amp up.

Most of time lazy power management is what makes pro amps noisy.

 

I read through this whole thread and is anyone really using a Pro amp for home use?

This is not counting Bryston and Hafler.

I would love to try a Crown DC300 or D150 in my home setup. Many studio's I saw an Hafler amp running a pair of Yamaha NS-10's and then later in the 90's you could find Alesis amps driving them. I would think that high damping amps would be pretty great at home with clean specs. It is just amazing to me on the used market you can pick up an Adcom-555 for $300 or 565 for even more, but then pick up a D150 or D300 for closer to half that .

I hear of guys running Crown XLS amps at home, but that to me is a bit overkill. Besides, it should be about quality not quantity.