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I had a question related to Class D

Hello all, I 'm testing TDA7498 100 watt class D amplifier. I had a question that relates to Class D. I'm thinking about buying a Class D solid state guitar amplifier, but I heard that Class D amps lose a lot of their power (more than Class A or A/B amps do) when they drive speakers above 4 ohms, and my speaker happens to be 8 ohms. Is this so? If it is, the high watts the amp manufacturer claims for the amp don't seem as impressive.

bryant11
russ69's avatar
russ69
3,520 posts
 

Specs say 80 watts into 8ohms at 10% distortion. Just guessing but the 1% distortion level will be quite a bit lower so it's not a real powerhouse.

helomech
1,702 posts
 

My experience is that in practice, class D amps generally sound about half as powerful as an AB counterpart of the same power rating. This isn’t to say that will be the case with any class D amp, but it’s a pattern that was prominent in the early 2000s and seems to persist today. It seems as though many class D designs struggle with full bandwidth power, at least that’s how they usually sound to me — a prevalence of sounding thin in the two lowest octaves.

The only class D amps I’d ever consider are those anchored by the Purifi modules and possibly some Bel Canto models.

mapman's avatar
mapman
22,311 posts
 

That is not my experience. My 500 w/ch Class D amp never runs out of gas and never even breaks a sweat even at very high spl with average efficiency speakers. My 40 watt Class D amp that’s the size of a pack of cigarettes (Fosi, see system pics) drives kef ls50s no problem which is beyond what I expected.

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