My Parasound A21 review and VS Emotiva XPA

I had to laugh at people's criticism of auditioning systems at shows. Here's why: I was bouncing from room to room at a fairly good show. Stuck in traffic in range of a system I really had already heard far too much of - with an unmistakable muddy swamp water crossed with sewage vibe. Turned around to make a getaway,  but it was toooo late - stuck in traffic. The salesperson saw me. She gushed on through her presentation, making a big deal about the mystery speakers. When she ground to a halt with "I'll bet you can't guess what's behind the speaker screens!" Trapped. I managed to grind out:" They sound like Bose - something I'd never have in the house.". Undeterred: (lifting the screen) "You're right! Ta daa! It's our new line of 5.1 surround speakers" (My apologies to Bose fans.)

Here’s the thing about Emotiva. Just look at the situation with the XPR line. Any basic market research would raise red flags for a company trying to decide if they should manufacture an amp line weighing so much. Research would tell them that the logistics of shipping would be a nightmare. Damage during shipping would go way up. Shipping to other countries would be cost prohibitive.

There is a very good reason why no other amp manufacturer has amps with such high weight( maybe Mcintosh and one or two others). But Emotiva goes ahead and makes these amps and then has to cancel the line. Its just another of their bonehead moves. Nobody needs 600+ watts per channel in a home. Maybe .001% of audiophiles could actually make use of 600 watts.

Emotiva themselves recommended to customers that they use a cheater plug to connect these amps to power, because "you’ll never actually need 20 amps". My point when I heard this was if you’ll never need more than 15 amps, then you’ll never be using 600 watts, which is what they were telling you without admitting it.

If this design sounded so good, all they had to do was make it in a 250 - 400 wpc amp. When listening to music, if you are getting 95 decibels at your seating position(which is VERY loud) and your speakers are 89 db efficient(about average) then you are using maybe 10 watts, depending how far away you are from the speakers. With peaks of maybe 60 watts. Thats it folks. They made an amp that was purely for bragging rights.

brownsugar_ny - I had wanted and bought some gear from a smaller manufactured of audio gear from stellar word of mouth reputation. The gear turned out to be terrible and the owner was an awful guy to do business with. I now have a Parasound A21 that I think is great. I think John Curl gets much of the credit for being a good engineer/designer. What I learned from the long experience is this: "don’t believe all the hype about any brand or product". Often you get what you pay for and often people learn by buying much more gear than I could ever afford. I only will knock a brand if it has defects, made with inferior design or parts and sold as high-fidelity audio at high prices AND the brand owner lies about the product or does not stand behind the quality.

Auxinput is correct.....they were getting killed on shipping and when folks would sell them, they wouldn't ship them correctly and they would get damaged......

" Well that's great, except Emotiva did their usual behaviour and retired the XPR line some years ago now.  No one can buy them.  They've done this with line after line, amp after amp and product after product. "
You are so right! 

Well that's great, except Emotiva did their usual behaviour and retired the XPR line some years ago now.  No one can buy them.  They've done this with line after line, amp after amp and product after product.

Why would they retire the XPR line.  Any ideas?

Having owned both Parasound and currently owning Emotiva XPR-1s.....I am very satisfied in my decision to move there.   In fact, there is a very well known audio reviewer who swapped out his JC-1s to move to XPR-1s and said that for a fraction of the price he gets as good of sound compared to the $5k JC-1s at a price of $1750(XPR-1 new price).......

In going back and re-reading you comment, it is clear that whatever meaning you were trying to convey was muddled in regards to you "distributor" vs your "local A/V", but whatever.  Since you are hoping to become an Emotiva dealer, one must assume that you are a dealer/retailer or work for one. And you are excited about Emotiva.  Again, I hope you get a good margin out of them.

I'm still puzzled at your comments on how many different amps you own, or have owned?  I guess you were comparing the Emotiva to your old amps by memory?  Either way, good for you on finding something else that you like, as me I suspect you'll see that the emperor has no clothes within two years.  Unlike you I suppose, the Emotiva amp I purchased was my second audio amp ever.  It didn't sound any better than an entry level Adcom amp I had, but it went louder.

No runnin, I am not an Emotiva dealer, how you come to that conclusion after I told you our distributor does not carry Emotiva, not yet anyway but we are hoping to become an Emotiva dealer for their fine products.  I see you all over the forums sharing your dislike for Emotiva but I for one do not see it the way you do.  Sorry your experience has been different than my own. It's great you have found the equipment that works for you!  Enjoy!

Okay, that explains it, you are a dealer hyping Emotiva.   Well, I hope you get a good profit margin out of them.

That is what's great about different choices, we pick what sound best to our ears.  It's great you found the sound you like.

I am hoping soon that our distributor will carry Emotiva, as one local A/V a few blocks from us now carries Emotiva.  The distributor tells us they will soon and our plan is to set up Emotiva among the rest of our amps and let our customers hear for their own ears and decide.  This will be fun.

We are about to see great things for Emotiva's future! 

Well, you're all over the board and appear to have at least 10 amps, unless you are incorrectly pluralizing the word amp.  At any rate all one can do is listen to their system and pick the one that sounds better to them.

And to me, in the exact same room, with the same system, the same music, the exact same volume level, the same cables and the same $6000 speakers, the A21 was clearly superior to the Emotiva amp.  I would have sent back the A21 had I not been satisfied, why spend a big chunk of money for no improvement?  

And when one realizes that Emotiva is way over hyping their products and being dishonest to say the least, I can certainly understand why some criticize them.  

It's amazing to read some reviews of people going back and froths when one owns both Parasound and Emotiva. I own many speaker types and amps, so I easily get the different types of signature sounds from different manufacturers. I do own quite a few different amps and speaker brands. I have Parasound A21 amps, Rotel RB-1090 amps, Parasound JC-1 amps, Emotiva XPA-1 amps and Emotiva XPR-1 amps that I use in my home theater room for music and movies. In my 2-Channel room upstairs in the living room I use Emotiva XPA-1 amps for music.

I've been amazed at the performance and price of the Emotiva gear. Most people do not know it but Emotiva makes many brands out there under their OEM/ODM. The list would surprise you who they make amps for, this includes Parasound. The Parasound are bias more towards warm side as the Emotiva's are more towards neutral. Both does a fine job of detail and sound quality. The internal Emotiva builds are built quite well and a little more so than the Parasound for equivalent model. I find that I listen to my Emotiva XPA-1 more than I do my Parasound A-21, the A-21 is a little warmer sounding but I like the XPA-1 that it's neutral and the little extra resolution it gives to detail. I also like my Emotiva XPR-1 more than my Parasound JC-1. The build quality on the Emotiva XPR-1 certainly out does the Parasound JC-1 by far and sounds outstanding in all areas that meet or surpass the Parasound JC-1 for far less the price, that is always a great achievement.

We live in an era of today's times that many manufacturer far exceed asking price than what is fair. Many people just don't get this. We no longer live in era that you get what you pay for, now days it's for highest possible profits at the lowest cost, this mean over-charging the end user. I once brought this up to the attention of a well known brand that we were doing some consulting work with and I asked the owner why he changed many times more than even the build quality of his amps, they were cheap compared to the prices they charged. He turned red and told me it doesn't matter what they charge, they can charge what ever they want and breaking no laws and they offer utmost customer service, two days later he had me fired off the team.

Emotiva offers some great equipment and especially for the price. I think it's great in an era where it's the opposite and many people are far over-paying for what they really get. We all should be applauding Emotiva for this!!!

There is not a night and day difference or knock your socks-off in Emotiva vs. Parasound like some folks post. To me it's being overly dramatic of some sort. They are near the same league but I would give the nod more towards Emotiva because I like the more neutral side to sound than Parasound's warmer side but both sound very nice. My Parasound JC-1 have been repaired twice so are from problems.... yes Parasound was great about fixing them and addressed the problems they had along the way but seems to have fixed them now. I haven't had any problems with my Emotiva equipment yet so far but I hear Emotiva has been great as well taking care of it's customers. Emotiva is now being made here in the USA and I think it's great how Emotiva is giving quality at a fair price and jobs back to the USA.

I'll never understand how some like to condemn a great company like Emotiva who is just trying to offer fair prices with great quality products like it used to be before the now mass majority over charges for quality audio products.
Great job Emotiva, keep the great work up!!! Emotiva is now sold in brick and mortar local stores in your area.

I'm very happy with Emotiva compared to my Parasound!!!

Ok,guys this is what me and a freind did for a week end. We swapped power amps,his Parasound a21 and my Emotiva xpa - 2 gen1. He has a pair of dq30i's and I have a pair of Dq20's. When I hooked up the a21 to my system it was sounding like the music was coming out of a big pipe. It only got a small amount better over the weekend. The Emotiva xpa - 2 gen1 on his system was impressive sounding. We both have the same cables in are systems. He was using a nad m51 dac And a music fidelity m1cdt transport. Myself I'm using a Emotiva dc -1 dac and a Marantz cd600 cdp. The Emotiva xpa - 2 gen1 power amp sounds great b on my system and sounded near even sounding on his system. Basically it's a $800 amp putting out nearly  $2,500 worth of sound.

I've had the same impressions of the Emotiva pieces I've owned, and sold off the lot of them over a year ago now. The cd player might have been the best of theirs I had sonically, but the clunky cd handling, and random freeze ups weren't worth the trouble. Their DAC had bad design, when I tried to get my iphone to play through it with a Pure i20, it was badly schrill, and the DAC was bright overall. The XPA amp was okay for $700, but I learned that what you get with 600 watts at that price point has easily identifiable limitations. Sonically, a little better than a mid range AVR, with of course more power than the AVR.

I"ve now got Parasound P7, and an A21. An Oppo 95 on music duties and Paradigm Signatures S6. Beautiful soundstage. Imaging , air, and all frequencies are just gorgeous. Special note for the vocal range, a real treat!

For a first foray into separates, Emotiva would make an upgrade, as long as your speakers aren't forward or bright sounding(Find out where your speakers are in the spectrum between bright and warm). But if you really have an ear for music or quality audio, you won't stay with Emotiva. Which makes starting out with better brands than Emotiva a smart buy in the long run since you're not buying twice.

I've owned a lot of Emotiva gear over the years.
Good starting point, but I've learned it has a lot to do with your ears, and how you interpret the sound.
Recently I've started to phase out my Emotiva gear, with vast improvement after each piece was replaced.
With that came a vast increase in money spent.

Settled now on Ps Audio front end and Pass Labs Amplification
YMMV...

A method to my madness .

This hobbie had me at age 14 with my first system and the tweeking started .

Many moons and systems later I finally have started to build my first real system . Speakers having the most impact on sound took Priority "Tyler D1x speakers "
Large floor standing full range speakers with looks to die for and hand built by one of the best guys in audio .Done.
You don't get this soundstage with small speakers. I can go on but enough on the speakers .

Having a great speaker lets you hear different signitures in sound that amplifiers have . As I stated in an earlier post , this has led me on a journey that unless your an audio nut most will not understand .Making them sound the way you want with what you listen too and at a volume that is to your preference .

I have tried many amps from tubes to solid state .
Crown xl 2000 were run as mono blocks and were ok but not what I wanted just to cover the previous suggestion .
Cary , Threshold , Rotel and many others were on the hot seat. All of the amps have pros and cons . Then I tried the XPR 2 . Bass that felt like my subs were on but faster and punchy . Highs and mids did take a long time to settle down . About four months of a lot of play time from casual listening to rock concert levels .I cant say the number of hours . I will say if they did not , this amp would be for sale also .

I am a hands on type of guy and have to try it for myself to feel comfortable . I felt comfortable and bought a second XPR 2 to run in a vertical Bi Amp set up .Yes another long break in process for the second amp but it is worth it . Now 2 Great looking amps with power and finesse sitting on what else , Tyler Acoustics amp stands .

To be fair in my assessment, I did not consider the Parasound A 21 amp with only 250 watts per channel .The JC1 mono block amps would be a closer match at 400 per side but I do not have a dealer within the area to allow me to try them out for 30 days . I will not give an assessment of a product if I actually did not hear it in my system . I am quite sure they are a quality product . Will these be my final amps that I buy . Hell no , I found out I like tubes and will be setting up a small tube based system on much smaller efficient speakers .

I do not mean to sound condescending . I know there a many great systems and amps to choose from but with my budget this was right for me . I loved the process and really enjoy audio .I have two friends that love this as much as I do .My other friends and family think I im crazy but love listening to my system .( Go figure ) We are all hear for the same reason , the love of audio . Keep it lite

Lambeau

I've used the cheaper Crown PA amps at shows (part of a house system) and they simply are not very good...loud maybe, but the sound quality was worse than some other QSC, Crest, and older Mackie amps I was using at the time. Pro PA amps of any sort generally don't display the tonal refinement of amps designed for home hifi, although some can come close. You get what you pay for as the more costly Crowns really do sound better.

I don't get why people buy $6000 speakers at all. But if they do, why use a bargain brand amp? Those Tyler Acoustics go for over 7000. Why don't you save some REAL coin and buy some Crown pro amps for 500-600 a piece. What's the point? If you want to save money on the amps and got Emotiva, you should have saved money on the speakers in the first place.

XPR amps require 20A line for optimum performance

George,
This should be a generic statement and not just for Emotiva. Emotiva's target audience is different.

Lambeau
Nice,I am doing the very same with my two XPR-2.
Vertical bi-amp into JBL L7 , th XPR amps require 20A line for optimum performance.
George

The truth will set you free!!!

Trying to power Tyler Acoustic's D1x speakers has led me through quite a journey with amps .Although they are 90 db efficient , to get the bass drivers to move they need power .I have tried many ss amps straight wired and bi amped also and have fianally settled on an XPR 2. This amp takes control of those 4 nine inch drivers per channel and makes me think my subs are on .Mind you that it takes along time for this amp to settle down and not sound to bright . I liked it well enough to order another XPR 2 and verticly Bi Amp my speakers .

Lambeau

Emotiva is trying to brainwash potential buyers into believing nothing is better

Not only that, but the same people who criticize high end companies for overpricing and slick marketing have succumbed to the same marketing(minus the high prices to be fair) ploys via Emotiva.

Definitely a case of the pot calling the kettle black.

Even though this is another thread for another time, most real and true high companies don't overmarket or slap their logo on everything that doesn't have to do with audio. The money they make goes to r&d and engineering in general.

I'm just glad to see someone using the word "eschews."

emotiva AMPS are priced EXACTLY where they should be. If they sounded close to, or "99% as good as" a parasound a21, Emotiva would raise the price. You get what you pay for.

I feel so naive. For a while, I thought that Emotiva's amps were essentially just as good as the others. They look impressive. They are heavy. They're well made. They have TONS of power.

The parasound advantage is its grace and nuance. It has clarity beyond Emotiva's wildest dreams, but expresses feeling. It does more than hit a bass note. It convinces you that someone's thumb just plucked a string, and makes you lean back in your chair as you feel the sound. You don't hear a snare drum. You visualize the technique that the drummer is using. I looked around for someone to brag to when Norah Jones was IN my living room--singing to me about lost love.

I wish so badly that Emotiva amps were good enough. The last thing I wanted to do was spend this much money on an amplifier. But to say that the two amplifiers are close in performance is to say that they are both, indeed, amplifiers.

like i said before you can't get the performances of a mercedes benz AMG 63 with a toyota corolla LOL

NAD/Onkyo and Yamaha have recently made products of exceptional price/performance ratio but have NEVER claimed SOTA performance. Emotiva is trying to brainwash potential buyers into believing nothing is better which is the same SNAKE OIL many Emotiva buyers fear(lol)!

Emotiva makes very good products for the buck, they have a great value, but they are not exceptional in performance as they claim to be, they are not bad for audiophile beginners who are starting their journey in this expensive hobby.

If you want the best performance out of you speakers
Emotiva is not the way to go, I'm sorry but it's what its.

Peace

Chill out guys its not a big deal

There's an overall sense in audiophile circles that to be a truly "high end" products it must be expensive and made by a small, discreet manufacturer who eschews mass-market sales or promotion. Consequently, I think there's a lot of reflexive bashing of manufacturers (e.g. Polk, Yamaha) who sell a lot of gear and/or price or position their stuff for mass consumption. I suspect if Emotiva weren't as popular or aggressive in its marketing, we wouldn't see as many derisive comments; on its own terms it's very good bang-for-the-buck.

Emotiva makes wild claims and their fanboys make wild claims.

Ain't that the truth...

Runnin,in regards to your comment pulling a muscle lifting the XPR-2 , don,t you worry.
After over 22 years in the gym lifting weights,I can sure lift an amp at 100 lbs.
As the matter of fact I just returned back from my gym routine,tonight was chest routine.
My biggest effort was when a few years ago I moved up three flights of stairs my Rogue Zeus,that bad boy weights 220 lbs.
If you search my posts it is there posted somewhere.
Best
George

Mitch, you still seem to be missing the point. Emotiva makes wild claims and their fanboys make wild claims. I am simply holding them to account. The XPR line may be the equal of the Halo series, but based on the build quality of the XPA line and every Emotiva product I have owned, I have my doubts.

I was where Brownsugar was when I started out in Audio, but I wish I would have made the switch to Parasound much sooner. I am satisfied at this level of refinement. With good speakers and cables, it's really quite impressive, but it's like Ricred1 said, there is better than Parasound Halo. I'm not interested in spending to get there though.

.
Hk, Brownsugar's enthusiasm is one thing, but to bash another manufacturer in an unequal comparison is clearly another thing.

Neither does the hobby need hobbyists unfairly bashing manufacturers.
.

I know I'm in the minority here, but I like Brownsugar's enthusiasm. We were ALL here at one point... believing we had a great system only to hear a new component which made us re-evaluate what was possible, and what we considered "great".

Browbeating him for sharing his enthusiasm is not at all what this hobby needs.

.
Runnin & Brownsugar, your Parasound 2 channel amp sells for $2500. You compared it against an Emotiva $679 home theater amp and you show up here thumping your chest.

Why don't you compare your amp to the $1600 Emotiva XPR stereo amp? It is still nearly $1k less than what you paid. I'd like to see the results of that comparison.

Or, you could get real and test it against a $3k pair of Emotiva XPR monoblocs and compare them against your $2500 Parasound...that's more of a fair dollar per dollar comparison.

Get real. Do a real dollar per dollar comparison. Comparing your amp to one that costs one third the price is empty, ridiculous and holds no water.
.

I own a Parasound A21 and I submit it's very good, not great. It does very little wrong and is on the dark side of neutral to "my ears." There are better/different amps that many may prefer over the Parasound A21. I purchased the A21 because it was within my budget and I like what it does for the money.

It would help to know what the rest of Brownsugar's system is composed of. What's his preamp and sources, along with cabling? Also, what music he auditions equipment with.

Also, I'm not clear from his review if the Parasound is the second amp he has ever owned. If so, how is this any different than his first rave review of the Emotiva?

Statements like this don't help - "you can get a better performance of what the halo does with other amps, but you would have to spent 10,000 to 12,000 dollars to just get 2 or 5% gain in performance"

Labtec, Emotiva IS snake oil.

Audioholic's owner has admitted that he's friends with Dan Laufman. I mean, whatever, but the thing is, Audioholics has NEVER had a critical review of an Emotiva product, even the piece of crap UMC-1, when a large percentage of owners of the UMC were having major problems with it. The last Emotiva sub Audioholics reviewed started dropping below 50 Hz. Audioholics called it a best buy when they were critical of the HSU Research sub, VTF-15H, which outperforms the Emo sub in every category. They lost me after that review.

I have a Parasound A21 2 channel amp and compared it side by side with an Emotiva XPA-3 amp. The A21 is in another class, but hey, there's no free lunch.

I can't believe people are still wasting time bad mouthing under $1k amps compared with all the snake oil and over-priced products in this hobby.

XPA amps were measured by a third party who does this for a living and doesn't live in the snake oil delusional world that many do. Here is just one of their measurements - http://www.audioholics.com/amplifier-reviews/emotiva-xpa-2/xpa-2-measurements

Like I said before, I use them as low frequency amps on my Wisdom speakers and surrounds in my HT. I can easily afford much more expensive amps, but they measure perfectly fine for these applications and would be more than suitable for any budget audiophile system.

In fact, I could spend $5k on most any tube amp and it would do a worse job controlling the low frequencies.

Of course, I'm sure there will be 1,000 excuses for ignoring measurements and more wasted time claiming that this $800 amp isn't worthy of comparison to $5k amps.

What's worse?

1. A company using normal fluff marketing to hail their products as competitors with more expensive options?

2. A company charging much more for essentially no better product.

I see tons of people bashing Emotiva, but how often do you see anyone bashing this $9500 CDP with the same parts as a $100 CDP - http://homepage1.nifty.com/iberia/column_audio_goldmund-e.htm

What's even more criminal are speakers costing the same as a car, yet not even giving you an active crossover (which is superior to a passive in every way)!

I seriously question the motives of this criticism. Emotiva creates products for almost any budget, with no distributor and dealer markup. They give you a liberal return policy, yet people on hear still like to bash them.

And again for the record, Parasound is another quality company with great value for the money, but, in most cases, it is more than double the cost of Emotiva equivalents.

Yioyos, you state that it is not fair to compare the Emotiva amps with brands costing several times the cost. But then your supporting argument seems to support the idea that it IS fair to compare. Perhaps I am missing something?

At any rate, I agree with the idea that since Emotiva themselves state that their gear is as good as the much more expensive stuff, that it is fair to compare. And Emotiva's gear does not measure up. Their processors have been buggy, clunky and several years behind the feature set of a $600-700 receiver. The first 2 generations of their DAC and CD player units had various weaknesses and bugs/issues that would have made a third generation off the table had it been any other manufacturer.

Their attempts at subwoofers were likewise weak offerings. Frequency response that starts dropping below 50 Hz? My HSU sub is flat down to 20 Hz. Their UPA and XPA amps have smallish power supplies and capacitor banks. They rate these amps at 1% or .1% at rated power. That means they are already climbing into distortion and have less usable headroom than an amp achieving rated power at .01%. My point here is, it's much cheaper to make an amp with the above specifications as Emotiva does. And it shows up in sound quality.

The XPR amps may be better, that is true. The XPR weighs 102 lbs and has 600 wpc. 99.5% of people don't need 600 watts or even have speakers that can handle 600 watts. But if one does, Emotiva is the only game in town. Just don't pull a muscle trying to get that boat anchor into place!

Brownsugar
I guess my point didnt come through with you.I am saying that it is not fair to compare the Emotiva gear with other brands that cost 3-4-6 and 10 times the cost.
For the money the Emotiva holds very well.
If you look at the internals of a Bryston 14b-sst and XPR-2 you will notice they are very similar.
The Bryston is over 10000 dollars and the Emotiva is 1700 dollars.
I do own Mark Levinson now and had Krells before and still own some Krell gear and Bryston. I have been in the audio for many many many years.
The XPR-2 (actually I own two) are in a secondary system for parties where high wattage is desirable.
For critical listening I use different pedigree,
Emotiva is a counter balance to all other high dollar brands and offers quality sound to more people,its a good thing.
I wish them many years of success.

Cheers
George

Yioryos excuse me i'm not taking anything away from Emotiva, like everybody here in this Threads has mentioned, why emotiva claims to be high end when they are not, but emotiva does a pretty decent JOB for the money, but just don't compare emotiva with high end Gear and a pair of JC1 will blow away you XPR, no question about it, and we not talking about how the amp look inside, we talking about sound quality performance, i'm sure even my A21 will blow away the XPR 2.

it's what it's, emotiva is good but not so good, i don't think is a good buy at all, i will never buy emotiva again for me it's a waste of money, but probably in the future i will get Krell or Mark Levinson.

Peace

Happy listening

Brownsugar
In your recent post among other things you mention the rock and electronic music.What is wrong with rock music,95 per cent of people listen to rock.Jazz is good to go to sleep and classical is bowring.
Get your facts straight,also I got the XPR-2 and under the hood is same or equivalent to Mcintosh at 1/10th the cost.
I haven,t heard the JC1 but I assure you they look very mediocre and low fi at least the XPR line looks the business .
Best
George

I've had the same experience with Emotiva. I wanted to like them - tried their XPA-5, 2, and 1 monos and then the XPR-2. ALL of these amps had a upper-mid/high frequency glare to their sound, although less noticeable with the XPR-2. The XPR-2 was significantly better than the XPA line (Gen 1), with a wider deeper soundstage and lower noise floor. Still, I couldn't live with it, and sent it back before the end of the trial period.

Hello guys

Please chill out, it's not a big deal! I'm a former owner of the Emotiva XPA-2 Gen2 and XPA-5 Gen2, I have compared both with the Halo A21 and the halo blew them away in every single area PERIOD! it doesn't really matter xpa2 or 5 the XPA line sounds pretty much the same, I wrote this review because emotiva claims to be HIGH END with the famous Motto Rethink high end, so I was completely disappointed when I found out what emotiva is all about, to me emotiva is a good entry level product for those peoples who like ROCK and electronic music to go extremely loud and crank their speakers and make a lot of noise, but if you want real detail and exceptional sound quality emotiva is not for you, but emotiva offer a good bang for your buck but it doesn't sound high end at all.

thank you guys for all your comments and thoughts, like I always say everybody is entitled to their own opinion and mi opinion is that emotiva is not even close to high end performance.

Peace and Keep listening

Enjoy.

Everything has it's own place in life. I absolutely love my A21. But is that the best? I am sure it is not. But for me , in my situation right now, it is the best bang for buck and every time I listen to my music I am amazed how my system plays the music. For me the amps in $10-$15k range are a bit too much for their asking price - TODAY. But if my financial situation changes, I will definitely not think twice about spending that much on a pair of amps. So, I believe Emotiva and Parasound have their own place in this audio food chain. Chill out guys!

Why can't Emotiva owners(fanboys) accept the limitations of that gear. They will never have the detail/resolution/speed of Spectral or the 3D presentation of VAC/VTL/Lamm regardless of what is spewed in that rat infested lounge! If you want an affordable "mainstream" product, purchase a Marantz PM-11/1/2/3 and start your way into the HEA journey and kick Emotiva to the curb!!!

No doubt there are some Emo bashers out there.

You asked if the Emo (XPA-3) amp I had was the same price as the A21? But that's my point, Emotiva claims their products are the equal of much more expensive brands, but they aren't. True, I haven't tested other brands claims, only the components I buy. The XPA's used to be measured by Emotiva at .1% THD to get to rated power. Most other amp companies are at .0-something when reaching rated power. That means they have more useful headroom, because they're not already rising. Emo also has smallish power supplies and caps for rated output. They save a lot by doing this.

I've looked under the hood of many amps. I put Emotiva on par with Adcom build quality, the Halo products are in another class altogether. Mind you, I've never owned any XPR amps from Emotiva, they could be better. But the 5 or 600 watt per channel output is really overkill for me. I've never seen under the hood of anything more expensive than Halo except online.