The Best Amp for the Price of Dirt

Based on my experience with Behinger DEQ2496, I can believe you. Like the Sonic Impact T amp, maybe someone will stuff it into a fancy box, and sell it for two grand!

I checked the website for a description. Just Google "Behringer".

My personal experience with the DEQ2496 (I have three of them) is great...no problems. I have heard of other people who got very good support from Behringer. I suspect that the bad-mouthing comes from people who use other brands, and feel threatened by the incredible value of Behringer products. And anyway, you could buy another one for less than the cost of repairing your typical high end product!

Zaike...Portable? Not that I know of. But the Behringer a 500 mentioned by the thread starter would compete on price. I have a Panasonic multichannel receiver SA XR-70 that I use for TV and DVD viewing, which includes five amps comparable to the Sonic Impact (but more powerful) that I picked up at Best Buy for 200 and change. It drives three Dynaudio monitors, very well I might add. There is a big difference between $30 and $159.

Zaikesman...The original Sonic Impact T-Amp came in a simple plastic case which mostly housed eight AA batteries. It cost (if I remember correctly) about $30. Recognizing that its sonic character was excellent enterprising audiophiles began to offer upgraded versions, with better connectors and volume control in a nice enclosure. Sonic Impact came out with their own "Audiophile" edition costing around $150. When Stereophile mag reviewed the Sonic Impact T-Amp, they chose to go with the Audiophile version. They thought it was "good" at the price, but if they had stuck with the unadorned original version they would have to say "fantastic".

Zaike....Yes I have heard about the "many parts upgrades and modifications to the IC" but no one has actually described them. Extruded aluminum enclosure, decent connectors, a new pot, and a separate power switch strike me as mostly cosmetics. I doubt that the tripath chip is modified. "hyperbolic"...isn't that how audio stuff is priced?

The "owners manual" (and I use the term loosely) talks about 12 volt and 14 volt wall warts. I presume the 14 volt one is better.

Zaike...I checked the website and since I last looked at it they have added the comparative pictures of the circuit boards. They are certainly giving you a lot more capacitors. Interestingly the specs are about the same, eg: THD+D 0.04% at 9 watts into 4 ohms.

My take is that for $30 it's worth trying just out of curiosity, but at $160 or thereabouts there are many alternatives.

Zaike...$159 is the price on the website. I think that Parts Express price is the same. But I'll go with $129 if you accept that the original model has been sold for $19.95.
The darned thing is so lightweight that it's hard to find a way to "install" it in a system. One idea that would work would be to remove the tiny circuit board from the plastic enclosure and build it into some speaker wires as a bulge. Now that would truly be "magic" speaker wires. Connect your preamp directly to speakers.

Rodman99999...Agreed that the Behringer DEQ2496 RTA is nice. I bought my first one for the RTA feature, intending to use another analog equalizer in the signal path. However, the overall effect of the DEQ2496 equalization was so good that I scrapped the analog equalizer, and have subsequently bought three more DEQ2496. Three are in my multichannel system, and the other in a secondary stereo system. They are all in the signal path, and three of them have been for several years. How long do I have until they all blow up and destroy thousands of dollars of associated equipment?

R: I guess you are an eqaphobiac. Do you play your LPs with a flat microphone preamp so as to avoid that nasty RIAA equalization? (By the way you might try it. Seriously, you might find the result interesting). And how do you identify recordings that have not been equalized during production?

And now for your button...Bose, Bose, Bose :-)
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Rodman99999...The deal with the flat mic amp acting as a phono preamp is that for the tweeter/midrange all you need to do is roll off the boosted highs of the raw signal. Why boost the low end, only to cut it later in a crossover. Of course the woofer signal must have the regular RIAA boost, so you end up with a biamplification preamp. The whole system needs to be coordinated with the speaker design, and other sources, like Tuner, need special provisions. A can of worms, no doubt, but, for Phono, the resulting clarity of the highs is interesting.