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I went from Class D to Luxman A/AB - And most of what you think is wrong

Hi everyone,

As most of you know, I’m a fan of Class D. I have lived with ICEPower 250AS based amps for a couple of years. Before that I lived with a pair of Parasound A21s (for HT) and now I’m listening to a Luxman 507ux.


I have some thoughts after long term listening:
  • The tropes of Class D having particularly bad, noticeable Class D qualities are all wrong and have been for years.
  • No one has ever heard my Class D amps and gone: "Oh, wow, Class D, that’s why I hate it."
  • The Luxman is a better amp than my ICEPower modules, which are already pretty old.

I found the Class D a touch warm, powerful, noise free. Blindfolded I cannot tell them apart from the Parasound A21s which are completely linear, and run a touch warm due to high Class A operation, and VERY similar in power output.


The Luxman 507 beats them both, but no amp stands out as nasty sounding or lacking in the ability to be musical and involving.


What the Luxman 507 does better is in the midrange and ends of the spectrum. It is less dark, sweeter in the midrange, and sounds more powerful, almost "louder" in the sense of having more treble and bass. It IS a better amplifier than I had before. Imaging is about the same.


There was one significant operational difference, which others have confirmed. I don't know why this is true, but the Class D amps needed 2-4 days to warm up. The Luxman needs no time at all. I have no rational, engineering explanation for this. After leaving the ICEPower amps off for a weekend, they sounded pretty low fi. Took 2 days to come back. I can come home after work and turn the Luxman on and it sounds great from the first moment.


Please keep this in mind when evaluating.


Best,

E
erik_squires
noble100's avatar
noble100
2,419 posts
 
Erik:"To repeat, the point of this thread is not "my amp sounds better than yours." It is that we need to stop using 1990's Class D sound to describe modern Class D. Treat modern Class D amps as you would any other amp and decide what to buy or not based on your own ears."

Amen! 
     I switched from good class AB amps (McCormack, Adcom and Aragon) to my first class D amp(a ClassD Audio SDS-440-CS stereo amp) about 12 yrs ago.  I was so impressed I replaced all my class AB amps in my combo 2-ch music and 5.4 HT surround system with class D amps soon after(an Emerald Physics EP-100.2EP for my center and a pair of D-Sonic M3-600-M mono-blocks for my mains).
    I perceive my class D amps main characteristics as having a very high Signal/Noise ratio resulting in a dead-quiet background noise level and a high level of detail, very good dynamics, extremely low distortion levels, especially good bass response with a detailed but very smooth midrange and treble and overall a very neutral presentation with nothing seemingly added or subtracted from the inputted signals, like the audio ideal of a 'straight wire with gain'.
     Class D amps also have significant and numerous non-audio benefits such as small size, light weight, relative affordability, cool to tepid operating temps and  high electrical efficiency both during use and at idle.
      I understand the appeal of all the various amp types and know excellent sound quality can be attained using any of them.  Of course, we should all just use the amp we like best.  I choose to use class D amps in my system due to a combination of sound quality and non-audio benefits.


Tim
analogluvr
859 posts
 
@georgehifi wow that’s pretty crazy, looks virtually identical!
georgehifi's avatar
georgehifi
10,312 posts
 
@georgehifi wow that’s pretty crazy, looks virtually identical!


yep! try to pick the odd man out.

It all comes from the same factory  in China.

Cheers George
tweak1
3,736 posts
 
ERIC, my bugaboo is with certain review entities, specifically Srajan. As I no longer have an interest in non class D amps, and a keen interest in new class D, I suggested that in his Archives he put class D in it's own amp category. He basically told me to pound sand 
mijostyn's avatar
mijostyn
8,570 posts
 
Mola Mola? That is some name for an electronics manufacturer. The problem with class D amplification is that there is a very broad range of quality. It can be a very cheap way to build an amplifier of mediocre quality with a high school electronics degree and make a lot of profit.
Then there are the good ones like the Rowlands that are faster and have high quality power supplies. I had a pair of TACT amps that were sort of class D. They were pulse width modulated sampling at 90 meg. They sounded very nice. I used them to biamp my Divas. Unfortunately they struggled to drive my Acoustats and would keep tripping their protection circuits so I moved on. I think Lyngdorf still uses the design. I have not had the opportunity to listen to a lot of class D amps so my opinion lacks for sample size but I have not yet heard one that sounds as good as a Class A amp. Hopefully some day that will change as I see no great advantage in all that heat and high electrical bills not to mention that big heat sinks are expensive.   
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