Crown XLS 1502.... real life test.


I was at guitar center yesterday cruseing the used pedal case and noticed they had the XLS1502 was on sale. With there 45 day return policy, that i have used with great success in the past, i bought the amp.

  With my Logan’s the crown was very clear and full. 525 watts at hand per channel brought the speakers to life. I adjusted the input to around 3 o’clock seemed to be a good match. I went thru a few cd’s and they all sounded great with Steely Dan winning the show...

  I put the Mac back in the loop and noticed the soundstage was a bit bigger and a good amount more subdude.

This was my first foray in the class D world and I was surprised at how good it sounded. At 329.00 its kinda hard to beat. I have no idea what the current measurements are but the XLS made the Logan’s sing. If i read the article correctly, doesnt the JBL Everest’s come with XLS amps? That’s the way it read... please correct me.

Anyway, it was a fun afternoon and the Crown is going back today. I haven’t bought the 10t’s yet... prob June is when I can pick them up... I will buy another crown then to use when I send the 7100 to a mac repair center to get a checkup... I have a gut feeling something is amiss with her. All in all I really enjoyed the XLS and in a blind test i feel it would hold up to many good amps that cost $$$$$.

  I want a 300 watt Mac but at 3-4 thousand dollars that is a big stretch for this retired chef... lol

BTW... the XLS was DEAD silent ... nothing!
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@peter_s I use an XLS 2502 to drive a pair of Aerial SW-12 subs. When the plate amps failed on the subs (as they invariably do), rather than spend almost $2k on repairing I pulled the amps and bought a single 2502. I also bought a miniDsp 2x4 HD to provide some EQ.

This setup works great. The XLS has inbuilt hi/lo pass features so you can get away without the miniDSP if price is an issue.

I believe drivecore is a system on a chip crown developed that reduces part count and drives mosfets for class d. It can front end many of their products, so huge cost savings. I am quite happy with my 1502–Its smooth and has more slam and bass that my Bryson which is very good. I am no longer an audiophile as I don’t care about soundstage or the finer points of this and that. Just good clean fun for me now—it just sounded better to me. I like the balanced inputs and use a 30 foot cable from a bryston bp 25–its all very smooth.