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Emotiva vs. some bigger boys

I have just ordered a Emotiva 3 channel amp after testing it against a few better known models. Here's the short story...

My recent gear....Manley Stingray II, Def Tech BP7004 speakers for theater, Magnepan 1.6, Odyssey Stratos, Rogue Metis pre, Rotel 1090, MJ Acoustics Sub, SVS sub...and so on! I typically spend 7-10K on a system and I like to call that the low end of high end....

My buddy bought my latest set of Magnepans 1.6's which were modded with better stands (I'm waiting for my new Merlin TSM-XMr's to mate with my new Stingray II) and he also has the Odyssey/Rogue combo, which he bought after he heard mine. Other speakers in the room: Revel M20's and an old pair of Proac floor standers-not sure of the model.

The amps were the XPA-3 and the XPA-2. Most of the listening was done with the Metis by Rogue.

I'll cut right to it. Both Emotiva amps had less than 100 hours on them and both sounded better than the Rotel 1090 for dynamics, detail and soundstage. Bass was stronger on the Emotiva, but we also thought the Rotel's bass was a bit more true and quick. Space around single instruments was superior on the Emotiva XP3, open and very lifelike. But on some recordings the Emotiva was a tad too bright and in those cases I may have chosen the Rotel for extended listening. Still, with a fine recording, such Lyle Lovett Pontiac, we both agreed the Emotiva was superior to the Rotel.
Next up was the Odyssey, which matches beautifully with the Rogue pre. This was a MUCH closer contest. The Odyssey is well broken in and has a dry accurate bass response that is very hard to beat, better than on some FAR more expensive amps in fact. The Emotiva had a slight edge in the upper midrange, but the Odyssey seemed to offer a smidge more resolution/detail. It was very close. On the Proacs we couldn't even hear much of a difference, but the Magnepans exposed the character of both amps more.
Just to be "complete" we tried my new Manley Stingray II, which is not broken in at under 60 hours. The Stingray could not control dynamics as well as the big amps, but vocals and single instruments were far more "real" and "in the room" sounding. We still felt that the Emotiva would not make music lovers unhappy, especially if mated with a nice tube preamp.
Pitting the 3 channel XP3 against it's more powerful 2 channel sister, we noted very little difference. The 2 channel version MIGHT have created a deeper soundstage, but we were getting sleepy and running out of ear power!

Summary:
I was seeking a used amp in the 2000 dollar range to run my theater, but I have ordered a XPA-3 instead. I will most probably add the 2 channel or monoblocks from Emotiva next. For home theater these are VERY serious amps that give up nothing or very little against pricier stuff. The bonus is that they can be quite musical. With their higher power they even will eclipse some gear that costs more. For example, I've listened to a lot of Bryston gear and I think the Emotiva amps are more musical...and that was with a very low cost Rogue preamp.

So that's my review and opinion. I will post a follow up review when I have the Merlins. I'm very curious to see how the Emotiva will sound on them vs. the far more expensive Stingray. I don't expect the Emotiva to ever be as sweet sounding, but I suspect it will be more dynamic and fun for certain recordings.

Cheers,

Rob
robbob
paimei's avatar
paimei
52 posts
 
It is starting to seem that the Emotiva may be one of the best products at its price range. I am considering the processor and multi ch amp for my wife's home theater.

I have only heard a couple bad things when asking about Emotiva. One is the distance between speaker terminals on the Mono. What the heck were they thinking. 13 inches? I know people who pay over a grand for their speaker cables that are useless if they were to buy this amp. Emo really needs to resolve this.

The other bad thing. A reviewer stated that the LED sensitivy was very different on his two mono amps. Hopefully not a by product of the cheap chinese outsourcing but it probably is. The chinese have even knocked PSB down a peg. Shame.

The Emotiva speakers look very well built. I would like to hear more about them too.
robbob OP
273 posts
 
Emotiva has very little competition to deal with at their price point. It's products from Rotel, Parasound & Outlaw that they really compete with. As I've stated before, for home theater applications I find the Emotiva gear does very well against amps and processors costing 2-3 more. Placing them in higher end systems for music will reveal more limitations, but again this hinges heavily on associated gear. The differences in quality of musical presentation between the Emotiva XPA-2 and the Rotel 1090 was much smaller (with no clear winner) than with the tube powered Stingray.

Rob
jedinite24's avatar
jedinite24
1,503 posts
 
Hi Rob

I agree with what you say about Emotiva and competition at their price point. Very hard to beat. Also personally I think Emotiva competes well in the HT amplification category. I got a UPA-7 and love it. It is a lot better than the Sony STR-DG1000 receiver I had. For 2 channel amplification though I'm on the fence. I may have to listen to some more Emotiva 2 channel Amps and Monoblocks. One puzzling thing to me is that there always seems to be XPA-2s, UPA-2 or UPA-1 monoblocks for sale in general or on their forum. Seems like for a good amount of people they listen to it and move on quickly more so than other amps. Note this was just a quick observation. I did not dig deep an analyze the trends of other 2 channel amp makers.
hotmailjbc
571 posts
 
i suspect most people that buy then sell emotiva amps got a taste of what better is and went to better gear . not because the emotiva gear didn,t perform as advertised. i don,t know what i would change to from my xp2/mmgs combination for the money. 1300 dollars for the system? any suggestions?
robbob OP
273 posts
 
I get a lot of heat for making comments...like the one I'm about to make, but....

I've had some far more expensive SS gear in my systems and heard quite a bit of the megabuck stuff. My previous system was Odyssey Stratos, Rogue Pre and Magnepan 1.6. No other amp impressed me the way my new Manley Stingray amp does. It created a soundstage and sense of tonal reality that the SS gear could not manage.
By comparison the SS gear, ranging from 1500-5000 dollars had improvements that were hardly absolute. Yet the 20 watts coming from this set of tubes does things I would never have believed.
So I built two systems. The theater system runs on tons of power, 6 amps, multiple subs and SPL to make a clock run backwards. But it's the small amp mated to a pair of Merlin speakers that tends to impress people the most.
If you really want to take a musical step forward in your system, try tubes.

Rob
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