> What do amp channels mean,why the more the better.
Ouch. You ought to lurk around here more before spending your hard-earned money! To answer this though:
"Channels" are how many outputs there are on an amplifier. Each channel is meant to drive one speaker. So, a 2-channel amplifier will drive 2 speakers. 2-channel is also referred to equally as "stereo". With a 2-channel ("stereo") amplifier, and 2 speakers, you have a stereo setup.
A multi-channel amp is any amp that has more than 2 speaker outputs. For example, a 5-channel amp is a common amplifer configuration for home-theater that is used to hook up 5 speakers: 2 fronts, 2 rears, and 1 center channel. Amps with different numbers of channels (3, 4, 7 - and there are others!) exist to allow people to put their systems together in a variety of ways.
To bring another term in, a monoblock amp is an amp with one speaker output. Monoblocks are often sold in pairs to drive "stereo" speaker setups, but they are also often sold singly to allow you to put together multi-channel home-theater systems a-la-carte.
As far as "the more the better" ... that's neither true nor false. It all just depends on what you want to do. If you need that many channels to drive that many speakers (or to bi-amp fewer speakers... another topic, and way off-topic at that), a multi-channel amp will get you there with fewer "boxes" to buy and house in your listening room. On the other hand, the 2-channel and monoblock formats give designers more room to work with, and consequently are often made with higher sonic performance in mind (I'm not counting small home-theater targeted monoblocks, which aren't designed for the highest fidelity in most cases, rather just to provide amplification for the extra channels in home theater playback)
So, if you're going to listen to music mostly, start with the best 2-channel stereo setup (a 2-channel amp and 2 speakers) that you can afford. You can always add more channels later to do home theater (there will be other expenses to that, like more speakers, more cables to hook up the speakers and amps, and also a home-theater processor to decode the surround sound signals.)
Jeff, my head's spinning - I think I'm leading nowhere, too!
Lots of questions here - but be glad you asked, this site will fill in the blanks.
Mike
Ouch. You ought to lurk around here more before spending your hard-earned money! To answer this though:
"Channels" are how many outputs there are on an amplifier. Each channel is meant to drive one speaker. So, a 2-channel amplifier will drive 2 speakers. 2-channel is also referred to equally as "stereo". With a 2-channel ("stereo") amplifier, and 2 speakers, you have a stereo setup.
A multi-channel amp is any amp that has more than 2 speaker outputs. For example, a 5-channel amp is a common amplifer configuration for home-theater that is used to hook up 5 speakers: 2 fronts, 2 rears, and 1 center channel. Amps with different numbers of channels (3, 4, 7 - and there are others!) exist to allow people to put their systems together in a variety of ways.
To bring another term in, a monoblock amp is an amp with one speaker output. Monoblocks are often sold in pairs to drive "stereo" speaker setups, but they are also often sold singly to allow you to put together multi-channel home-theater systems a-la-carte.
As far as "the more the better" ... that's neither true nor false. It all just depends on what you want to do. If you need that many channels to drive that many speakers (or to bi-amp fewer speakers... another topic, and way off-topic at that), a multi-channel amp will get you there with fewer "boxes" to buy and house in your listening room. On the other hand, the 2-channel and monoblock formats give designers more room to work with, and consequently are often made with higher sonic performance in mind (I'm not counting small home-theater targeted monoblocks, which aren't designed for the highest fidelity in most cases, rather just to provide amplification for the extra channels in home theater playback)
So, if you're going to listen to music mostly, start with the best 2-channel stereo setup (a 2-channel amp and 2 speakers) that you can afford. You can always add more channels later to do home theater (there will be other expenses to that, like more speakers, more cables to hook up the speakers and amps, and also a home-theater processor to decode the surround sound signals.)
Jeff, my head's spinning - I think I'm leading nowhere, too!
Lots of questions here - but be glad you asked, this site will fill in the blanks.
Mike