Oops - sorry for posting twice. |
Eldartford - I'm not sure if Icepower is sensitive to speaker impedance. By numbers it has even higher damping factor than UCD. Opinion might be just carried over from Tripath where output of the filter wasn't in the feedback loop. Somebody mentioned that Hypex sounds like very good class AB amp while Icepower sounds a little more like good tube amp. It might have something to do with output configuration (full bridge vs. half bridge) but I'm not sure. |
"You will be surpised to find out that SPL at your ear varies from zero to about 115 dB"
Yes, but recorded music is compressed - tailored for average audio system. |
Eldartford - I think we're mixing sound level and dynamic range. Dynamics are very limited by recording and media while loudness is also a function of listening distance. Sitting twice further in large room requires 4x more power to obtain same loudness. There is nothing wrong with 7" woofers if they can provide sufficient sound level. I don't like very loud music and don't mind that orchestra's forte is not 120dB loud in my room. I will settle for 80% of that - it cuts power requirement in half. For you to listen 20% louder (I sense you need more power) means 6 15" subwoofers plus 6 12" subwoofers. Not my cup of tea. |
Eldartford - I think we're mixing sound level and dynamic range. Dynamics are very limited by recording and media while loudness is also a function of listening distance. Sitting twice further in large room requires 4x more power to obtain same loudness. There is nothing wrong with 7" woofers if they can provide sufficient sound level. I don't like very loud music and don't mind that orchestra's forte is not 120dB loud in my room. I will settle for 80% of that - it cuts power requirement in half. For you to listen 20% louder (I sense you need more power) means 6 15" subwoofers plus 6 12" subwoofers. Not my cup of tea. |
Eldartford - I've been (long, long time ago) at some very loud rock concerts. At one of them my lungs were vibrating when I opened my mouth. I don't have any desire for that now (other than cleaning lungs - quit 6 years ago). In scale of things only some musical pieces require extremely high sound level but all of them benefit from better quality. I would rather spend money to improve my system's sound at the expense of peak power.
One have to be grateful for good things in life. I'm particularly grateful for not being your neighbor. |
Eldartford - Not only that small portion of classical requires high SPL but there are other genres like Blues, Jazz, Folk, World, R&B, Soul, Pop, Indian Classical, Reggae, Alternative & Punk, Latin etc. where very high SPL is not desired. I listen to all of the above and high SPL music is perhaps less than 1% of total. Sure it is nice to be ready but I have other constrains (like neighbors). My new speakers, larger and more expensive than previous, have similar bass extension but much greater midbass energy and very real bass attack and decay. Designer most likely tuned them for the lowest distortion and not the extension. Bass guitar players often use bass enclosures with a lot of 10" woofers instead of 15' or 18" to achieve better definition of the bass (18" sounds "wooly") - similar principle in DALI Megaline.
Now comes the room. When I play louder imaging is getting worse. It is because my room is less than perfect and at high sound levels many more reflections are still audible. My room is unfortunately not dedicated to music alone and fixing the problem becomes very difficult (especially at lower frequencies).
As for "deepest bass organ pipes are felt in your stomach" - it would give me stomach ache, I'm sure (and wife would leave me).
I'm surprised that Maggies 1.6 can keep up with your 6 subwoofers. |
Dob - If you refer to my comment about "fraction of time" - it wasn't about that. It was about whole musical pieces containing peaks vs. rest of the music.
I've never said that it is not worth to invest in truthful reproduction of peaks but rather that money can be invested better in the system (timbre, microdynamics, imaging etc.) unless you listen to this type (orchestral classical?) of music often. If you listen for instance to Indian Classical music you won't find any strong peaks or desire to listen loud.
You wrote: "So, unless you in flute music or country music or pop and wish to avoid listener fatigue - you better pay more attention to peaks"
That is great simplification because most of music and instruments don't contain strong peaks. I would add to mentioned flute hundreds of other instruments (vocal, guitar, lute, violin, cello, charpsichord, all woodwinds etc.) and few centuries of music as well as many genres including Jazz, Blues, Folk, Latin, Reggae, World etc.
(I just listen to Cecilia's Bartolli "Opera Prohibita" and cannot really find any strong peaks - still beautiful music) |
"do they have the depth, warmth, flow, naturalness, transparency, and beauty of live acoustic music?"
Yes they do. I'm just guessing you've never heard one? |
Dob - AFAIK none of Icepower modules can drive below 2ohm and none of the H2O product either. They might be able to drive 1 ohm but are specified at 2ohm min. At 2 ohm min strongest Icepower module 1000ASP used in highly regarded Bel Canto REF1000 mkII can drive 2ohm with 40A peak delivering 3200W. In addition supply voltage doesn't drop since it is regulated (SMPS).
In reality, if you think how linear power supply operates - it is SMPS operating at 120Hz that requires huge transformer because of low frequency. Toroidal transformer at 100kHz that carries the same power can be 10x smaller.
SMPS high frequency, is easy to filter while 120Hz is not. For this reason Jeff Rowland uses SMPS in Capri preamp. |
Muralman1 - I'm not sure what statements you're talking about. Please read again second sentence of my post.
Again - Icepower modules are not rated for 1ohm (min load 2 ohm) nor H2O amps are. If they work fine - all the better. I just stated specifications. |
Weseixas - "Henry has a 1 ohm scinnie , so i can see the amplifier being tailored for such a load."
If that's the case the why his products are specified 2ohm minimum load. Am I missing something? |
Weseixas - So I understand that in general case manufacturer of the module and maker of the amplifier says that this amplifier is not guaranteed to perform with less than 2 ohm and we know that some speakers are exception.
Manufacturer does not recommend using amp for load impedances lower than 2ohm. We could keep guessing why (damage to amp, damage to speakers, not holding other spects etc.) but to me 2ohm is min. I also understand that Muralman has limited choice of amps capable of driving 1 ohm speakers so he tried Icepower and as I understand was very successful. |
Jult52 - About 1% of carrier frequency (roughly 0.5MHz)appears on the speaker cable. To be 1/4 wave antenna, cable at this frequency would have to be over 300ft long. Below 1/10 of wavelength antenna becomes practically ineffective AFAIK. Switching power supply operates at 10x lower frequency. Good shielding of the system (especially Interconnects) protects from capacitive coupling.
There is also worry of non-linearities (hence modulation) induced by carrier in the tweeter. Tweeter cannot be non-linear if its membrane doesn't move - not likely at 500kHz.
Non-class D amps also produce EMI/RF since linear power supply current is delivered in narrow spikes of current (practically switching power supply at 120Hz). |
