@speakermaster, I have many of those amps you speak of. I want to try Class D, and judge for myself.
High end Class D amps?
Just an observation and a question. Are there 'high end' Class D amps out there that are just as good as Class A, A/B amps? I realize that's a sensitive question to some and I mean no disrespect---but whenever I see others' hifi systems on social media, all of the amps are A or A/B. There's always Pass, McIntosh, Moon, Luxman, Accuphase, etc. Where are the Class Ds? For folks out there that want more power for less efficient speakers and can't afford the uber expensive Class As, A/Bs, what is there to choose from that's close to those brands? Thanks
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Danish Lyngdorf TDAi3400 is right up there with Hegel 390 in my book. Of course the former is class D. Their room perfect is actually quite stunning and it has Spotify Connect, Tidal Connect and Roon. Absolutely perfect device for folks who still want an amp and passive speakers in this day and age. (Dynaudio Focus XD powered speakers are my reference now.) |
@mrdecibel What a class D amp potentially brings to the table is the ability to be neutral in a way that most solid state amps of traditional design cannot: they can be designed to lack brightness and harshness. For this reason alone they can work quite well on horns. We are still in a period of the Wild West; there are a lot of different approaches to class D implementation and they sound different, so you have to be patient. |
OK, so in the world of Purifi, alongside Apollon (Austria) https://www.apollonaudio.com/ or March (Australia) https://www.marchaudio.net.au/ or Nord (G.B.) https://www.nordacoustics.co.uk/ you're also got ATM Audio (Spain) https://atm-audio.com/ Audiophonics (France) https://www.audiophonics.fr/en/ Rouge (Italy) https://en.rougeaudiodesign.com/ and Vera (Norway) https://www.vera-audio.com/ among others. In the US you've got VTV, so beloved of a certain member of Audiogon https://vtvamplifier.com/ and at a very different price point LKV https://sites.google.com/view/lkvresearch/home A lot of these produces share the same or similar input buffers and power supplies, as well as the Purifi module, though it isn't always clear on the websites exactly what goes into each unit. Some differences are attributable to the quality and cleanness of the construction, some (perhaps) to design, unique components, and topology. GaN is already here with Orchard, AGD and others, while the much-delayed and much-anticipated LSA Voyager is reportedly coming soon (perhaps). |
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