any hear dared or ming da amps?


any reviews?
uncertainsmile

Showing 4 responses by s23chang

I heard both. They were the worst sounding amp I've ever heard. Even worst sounding than the vintage Heathkit SA-2 EL84 Push Pull I have. What a disappointment. Lack of high and low frequency extension. Overall, lack of transparency. They all share the same characteristic -- nice and warm sound. However, it is very flat and boring sound. Smooth alright. Like listening through tripple layers of bed sheets in front of your speakers.
The only thing going for them is the looks. Sure they look very appealing. Much nicer than the vintage gears I own.

If you compared them to the Home theater amps then it is better. If you like to buy new gear and this is only thing within your budget then it is okay to blow few hundred away for owning a nice looking decor. Watch out for fire hazard on some of their high voltage model. If you're using them for pure music pleasure and want something affordable then I suggest you look else where for some US made vintage gears.

Just my 2 cents with my personal experience.
9 of 10 of these chinese amp owners I know arond me sold them within 2 month and took the lost.
Some lost thousands the the Antique Sound Lab high end gear, and some took small lost on the Ming Da and the Dare stuff. The Bez model is cheaper and offer the same or better quality of Ming Da, Jolida and Dare I've listen to.
If Chinese Amp is what you want then I would suggest you take a look at Bez.
David99, As far as preamp goes, it doesn't require good output transformer and the current and voltage requirement are less limited factor by its power transformer. Therefore, preamp is a very different story. As long as you have the proper design then it will sound decent. Not sure what class B preamp you have but most of the tube preamp will sound better than its solid state counterpart in the same price or higher price range. Since we're not talking about preamp, we can have this discussion else where.
Maxx make a great point "Just make sure you are no a tube amp novice."
While Ming Da might not be the worst Chinese amp, it is still have very high failure rate like other Chinese amps. They discontinue their "bad" model so fast that new model come out every year or so. A friend of my call up the dealer from Hong Kong regarding to the Ming Da amp he bought from them one month ago (as a latest model) and he was told that model already discontinued due to high failure rate. Obviously the amp left his house to some "novice" buyer the following week.
I always suggest my buddies to get a chinese amp for dirt cheap and throw away its transformers, caps, resistors and pots and replace it with the proven circuit and audio grade parts. This way you can have the best of the both world. You get your nice appearance with real audio grade parts.