2. amps-preamps
  3. 1370650847

Do amps have a sweet spot?

What I mean by this is do amps have an output range at which they sound better? The reason that I'm asking is that I'm now running some very small speakers (Minuet Supreme Plus) and they're probably the least demanding speakers I've had; but I've found that my setup sounds better when I have the volume turned up.

Out of curiosity, I took my Minuets to my local shop and hooked them up to an NAD C326BEE. I thought it sounded pretty darned good at "normal" listening levels. I almost bought it, but then I decided to start cranking it up to what I would call "rockin" levels and the amp started to clip. If it could have played louder, I would have bought it.

So...is it usual for an amp not to open up until you start pushing it?

My current amp is an Aragon 2004.
tonyangel
bombaywalla's avatar
bombaywalla
1,958 posts
 
remember that 100wpc will only get you an additional 3 decibels of volume over the 50 wpc
Runnin, just wanted to point out that 100WPC is 3dB more power (& not volume) over 50WPC.
How much more volume/SPL you will get with a 100WPC is really dependent on the 100WPC amp design - really it's power supply design & current handling capacity of its transformer.

IMHO the issue you are facing is the classic amplifier-speaker interface issue. You are having to turn up the volume to overcome the marginal amp-speaker interface by sheer grunt power from the amp.
We discussed this in quite a bit of details back in early May 2013. Lots of good info in that thread by some very knowledgable members. here is the link to that thread -
http://forum.audiogon.com/cgi-bin/fr.pl?aamps&1367644336&&&/Current-amp-vs-Voltage-amp

i know it's a lot to read but do take the time to read & digest the info.
csontos
1,311 posts
 
I have upwards of 25 amps and they all sound best when they're 'cookin'. Does that not make sense from an engineer's point of view? Or from the one buying the amp for that matter.
tonyangel OP
309 posts
 
Bombaywalla,

I'm going to read that thread, for sure. Thanks for the heads up.

Runnin,

Yeah, the Minuets are small, but they can eat some power. As mentioned above, I'm running an old Aragon 2004. It's a bit of a beast for what it is. It's rated at 100wpc at 8 ohms and 200 wpc at 4 ohms; and weighs right at 40lbs. My only problem with it is that I don't get that satisfying feeling from the music until I turn it up a bit until everything comes together.

My feeling was that maybe if I got into a smaller amp, I could get that satisfying sound at a lower volume. The NAD for me sounded good, but it didn't quite get it for me. It also didn't go quite loud enough for when I do want it loud.

I could have gone for one of the more powerful models, but at those prices, I'd have several options in terms of getting an amp.

Right now, for some reason, I really have a bug to get into a class D amp just to try it out, but that's a subject for another thread, which I'm gonna start right now.
ngjockey
1,042 posts
 
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fletcher%E2%80%93Munson_curves
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