Most powerful 5 channel amp

JDOGG

Take a look at this. What do you think about it.
http://store.yahoo.com/allhometheater/calaudlabclm.html

dorokusai

The link provided just gives a price and a brief description. I certainly would not buy it from them, based on that pathetic information. I thought they went out of business? There website is not the same as the old one.

There are much better choices CAL for that function, and cheaper IMO. That is a really small niche of people that buy monsters like that, just overkill and a waste of resources IMO. CAL is a company I wouldn't even consider IF I had the money.

Dr. Spec

Adcom - 5x300.

http://www.adcom.com/newproducts/gfa7805.htm

About $2500 street price. Gets you within 2 dB of the other amp (if you believe their specs), and Adcom amps are well known for quality, power, and high current capacity.

brettw22

Originally posted by dorokusai
I certainly would not buy it from them, based on that pathetic information.

What's wrong Doro...."500 X 5 Detail beyond belief!! Massive Power!!!" doesn't make ya wanna fork over $7k? sheesh..........;)

goingganzo

sunfire has a 400 by 7 at 8 ohms with bi amps for the mains. i would love to upgrade to that

dan t

They say that Adcom comes shipped in a crate it's so heavy. My GFA-7700 weighs in at scrawny 58 pounds.

Dan

nico

Try the EARTHQUAKE GRANDE CINENOVA 5X300, it too comes in a crate! It also comes with a 10 YEAR warranty!! If you're interested email me at boobooreef@aol.com and I will give you the name of the dealer that has it for a GREAT price.

NICO

dorokusai

Sunfire would be my choice in that high power bracket, good call Ganzo.

Adcom is an absolute mainstay of modern, solid state amplification.

dan t

The Sunfire was my second choice but went with the Adcom because I'm cheap.

goingganzo

also adcom and sunfire have a little bit of a digfferent sound the adcom is british and has a little more layed back sound where the the sunfire is prety nutral. the olny problem is not all have a 7 channel amp but have a 7.1 pre and some have their entry level olny in a 7 channel like anthem but the anthem still sounds great. it is all in your taste and the amount you can spend. and there is more to a amp than how much power it can delever.

dave shepard

Outlaw may be another one worth looking into and they have a no questions asked return policy.

Might be worth a look

Dave

Phil Dawson

Please remember that the sound of an amp is much more important than total powe output. It takes an increse of ten times (that is from 50 to 500 watts per channel to DOUBLE the toltal output of volume (an increase of 6dB)
Sound is more important than power. I have heard great sounding 50 wpc tube amps that were loud enough to cause hearing damage with efficent spekers.
Phil

Dr. Spec

It takes 10 times the power to give a 10 dB gain.

It takes twice the power to give a 3 dB gain.

A 3 dB gain is a doubling of the acoustic output.

The dB scale is log10.

HBombToo

Originally posted by dorokusai
The link provided just gives a price and a brief description. I certainly would not buy it from them, based on that pathetic information. I thought they went out of business? There website is not the same as the old one.

There are much better choices CAL for that function, and cheaper IMO. That is a really small niche of people that buy monsters like that, just overkill and a waste of resources IMO. CAL is a company I wouldn't even consider IF I had the money.

http://www.deregle.co.uk/pages/13c.htm

Cal most certainly is a product that I recomend and this link has a profile of almost all of their gear prior to being swallowed up by RIO. Unfortunatly Cal is no longer in the niche market.

HBomb

Manamp

Phil is correct, for perceived doubling of sound, 10db is needed however for amplifier power to double, 3db is needed.

BTW Dan, good choice on the Adcom, I once bought a Sunfire Signature (600w X2) took it back to the dealer the next day.

I have yet to hear a worse sounding amp, no kidding. Bob is deaf, he "voices" his own amps.... so he claims.

Got a Krell for the same money (KAV-250) didnt think it would sound good and looked kinda puny.... I still own it after 6 years,

No offense to the Carver lovers.... louvres and brown nosers.

Peace!

TroyD

Everyone hears things different, I suppose.

Lot's of Carver owners here, me included, would disagree with you, though.

BDT

Manamp

And I respect that. I would however "encourage" you to try out other gear and give them a chance if you havent already.

If you have, then I wish you many happy years listening to the Carvers!

DynamiteD

I vote for the the California Audio Labs CL-2500 MCA. My co-worker at the audio/video store I work for knows the guy who designed this amp. The amp is advertised at 5 x 500 but it can really do 1700 x 5. It's limited by the amount of power it is being fed. If it's hooked up to a proper power source it can do the 1700 x 5, but almost all household outlets wouldn't come near the power required.

Manamp

Whoa...... OK either your co-worker or the other dude is smoking something smelly.

To get 1700 at 8 ohms per channel (1700 X 5), the amp needs to deliver 117 volts AC meaning it has DC rails of +/-175vdc.

There are no known audio power transistors that can handle 350 volts across the rails at that wattage....

I hope it was a typo and you really meant 700 X 5

HBombToo

Originally posted by Manamp
Whoa...... OK either your co-worker or the other dude is smoking something smelly.

To get 1700 at 8 ohms per channel (1700 X 5), the amp needs to deliver 117 volts AC meaning it has DC rails of +/-175vdc.

There are no known audio power transistors that can handle 350 volts across the rails at that wattage....

I hope it was a typo and you really meant 700 X 5

I need to ask if you read the link Man??? I'm unsure exactly what you are referencing??? After a stint at trying to understand what switching power supplies do for a Laser the land of EE becomes very convulved.

I do not agree with the math you have have done in your rebuttle. Please help me understand.

Twin

DynamiteD

I'm not an electrical engineer so I don't know the technicalities behind the amp's engineering. The information I related is what it is. The co-worker is my boss and he's in Las Vegas for the CES so I'll have to wait to get more details from him. As for the wattage that is what he told me. I thought he meant bridged but he claimed 1700 per channel if properly fed the power. He knows the engineer who designed the amp, I know this as a fact so I place a little more weight on his wattage claims. As with all things, I could be wrong about the amp. Enough said.

I have seen this amp, it's been in our showroom for a few weeks and it is very large. I'd say 30"L x 12"H X 18"W. Just a guess on its size.

HBombToo

Originally posted by DynamiteD
I thought he meant bridged but he claimed 1700 per channel if properly fed the power.

I'm not claiming to be an expert. The reason for my post is was based on a claim that its impossible which I fully disagree with. All I want to say is with switching power supplies coupled with audio needs 1700 is not an impossibility. a digital power supply drives lasers so its way cool when they are applied to audio but audio is more rms than peak. If your friend was talking these type of levels i'm assuming they are peak. That said, 350 as a max??? pffffffft! Wrong!, and my proof is in current solid state radar systems deployed by the faa.

twin

frank joe

ati makes amps for several major compaines. i purchased thie r own ati 2505 on a close out. it pumps 250 by 5 at 8@ it weighs 105 lbs built like a tank and i have cranked it load and it never gets hot. check out their web site they are awsome . http://www.ati-amp.com/index.html also i bought it from onecall.com frank

Manamp

HBombtoo,

1700 watts into 8 ohms means about 117 volts and 14.5 amperes.

It is well known that (depending on topologies) assuming a class-AB output, you would need DC rails of +/- 166 (117/ 0.70707) for RMS to peak conversion. And because the rails will sag under load, you'd want and extra 15-20% so that pushes it to close to 200 volts per rail or 400volts DC for both rails.

This means that you'd need (assuming BJT's are used) a device with VCE parameters of over 400 volts. The highest rated BJT's for audio I know were the Motorola MJ15025/MJ2119X series which tops out at 250 volts. On semi has just released a new device that has unheard of Vce rating of 350 volts but that is not available in the market yet. So regardless of topology, you would be hard-pressed to get 1700 watts at 8 ohms using conventional output stages... that’s where I think (and DynamiteD confirms) that this may be a bridged figure of 1700 watts.

In that case it is VERY possible to get 1700 watts as each channel would only need to develop 58.5 volts (117/2) which is about 427 watts per channel into 8 ohms. To get 427 watts, you need rails of approximately +/- 100 or 200. This is very “doable” and I suspect CAL would be using the On Semi devices in 2119X series either in TO-3 or flatpak.

I hope I was less confusing this time.

Peace to all.

Airplay355

ill re read this post after college and see if i understand any more of it...until then its cool that u guys know all of this lol

dorokusai

I feel your pain Airplay, it sounds like the Peanuts' teacher talking when I read that to myself.

I wouldn't be interested in the CAL if it had a hole in the front for my...tape measure. I have read nice things about CAL, but really could care less, its not a brand I would consider in that bracket.

Airplay355

waaa waaa waaa waaa waaa waaa waaa

Manamp

My apologies gentlemen.... but we are in the "Advanced technical issues" section of the Forum.

DynamiteD

My interest is peaked on this amp. I'm going to have to hit up my boss with more info to clarify exactly what this amp is capable of, unfortunately CES intrudes so I'll have to wait.

TroyD

Originally posted by Manamp
Phil is correct, for perceived doubling of sound, 10db is needed however for amplifier power to double, 3db is needed.

BTW Dan, good choice on the Adcom, I once bought a Sunfire Signature (600w X2) took it back to the dealer the next day.

I have yet to hear a worse sounding amp, no kidding. Bob is deaf, he "voices" his own amps.... so he claims.

Got a Krell for the same money (KAV-250) didnt think it would sound good and looked kinda puny.... I still own it after 6 years,

No offense to the Carver lovers.... louvres and brown nosers.

Peace!

Hmmmm....well, lemme first start by saying that how do you KNOW what amps I've listened to and owned? Pretty presumptuous of you. Wonder why you rub people the wrong way?

Now, far as carver goes, if he designs the amp, who the hell SHOULD voice it? He 'voiced' the Carver Silver Seven tube monoblocs, which, memory serves, Harry Pearson called the amp of the decade.

Now, if memory serves, he voiced the m1.0t in such a way that the folks at Stereophile couldn't tell it from the CJ Premiere 5 mono amps. He voiced the m1.5t to be indistinguishable from the Mark Levinson (before he sold out) ML-2 amps in both subjective listening and objective null testing as reported in The Audio Critic.

Now, maybe you don't like the sound of Carver amps, and that's cool. However, to dismiss him completely, well, you gotta ask yourself, who is more successful at building and selling amps?

BDT

Manamp

TroyD,

As I said, I wish you many years of happy listening to Carver amps. You have every right to like them or dislike them as do I.

However let me first put my thoughts about Bob in perspective.

Bob has been a fascination in the industry, I have a lot of respect for his innovation and designs. He has put a breath of fresh air into the industry with his radical designs. He is a genius when it comes to innovating, but I still think he is deaf and I don't like the sound of his amps. To me he is the Bose of the power-amp industry.

Those expoits you talk about were rip-offs of other designs (i.e. the "t" series). And the reason they sounded good was that he copied the transfer function of those amps, a technique he developed (another innovation) not by using his own ears to voice them.

I would be among the first to go up and read his latest design, I am fascinated by his technical prowess, but I still think he is deaf.

I am honored that you even attempt to compare a humble enthausiast as myself with the great Bob Carver... but thats a gross insult to him. He has achieved things in life most of us would dream of, but I still think he is deaf.

Apologies in advance if you are related to him in some way.:D