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Digital Amps - Your opinions and why so few?

Hi, I'm in the market for new amps for Maggie 3.6r's and just wondered what your experiences/opinions are on digital amps.
The technology seems well developed, and the advantages seem very tangible 'on paper'. I spoke with a tech guy at Tact Audio concerning their S2150 amp, and the 'specs' are very impressive. They amps also provide the facility to replace the speaker x-over. In a 2-way speaker, you can use two digital amps and program each amp with the associated crossover parameters.
I also spoke yesterday with a real gentleman, Henry, the designer/founder of H2O digital amps. I found him by following a buzz on the apogee audio website, where people using the difficult to drive apogees are dumping off their big Krells and Pass amps, and getting in the queue for the H2O. The few people already using the H20's are raving about them.
Then of course there are the Spectron amps, though I read somewhere recently that they may be going out of business?

The point is, if this technology has matured, and these amps can compete with convential amps, and they are cheaper, lighter, give off less heat, generate higher watts from a smaller/lighter chasis, and.....wait for it....may actually sound better dollar for dollar, why don't we see more of them around?

Rooze
PS - I'm considering dropping big $$$$$ on a pair of new S2150 Tact digitals, please, please talk me out of it, and tell me these amps are crap....
128x128rooze

Showing 1 response by danlib1

danlib1
819 posts
 
Just my personal experience with a good digital amp:

I owned, for awhile, a Bel Canto EVO 200.2. It was an absolutely wonderful amp for the money, with firm bass control and an amazing degree of refinement versus the Musical Fidelity Amp I had before it (a bottom of the line MF piece, the A3.2 CR). The Bel Canto was easy on the power bill and ran incredibly cool. It also was very well built and kept a very low profile in my rack.

I decided to sell the Bel Canto and go in an entirely different direction. I bought a Pass Labs X-250.
Lots of heat, chews through electricity like a fiend, weighs 100 lbs, and fills a huge portion of my Particular Basis rack. The Pass however, has proven to be the best audio purchase I've ever made, and was a major improvement over the Bel Canto in every area EXCEPT energy efficiency.

In all fairness the Pass costs multiples of the Evo's cost, and in retrospect the Bel Canto Evo 200.2 still conjures up warm listening memories. It showed my ears that digital amps can sound very good.
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