Relatively New Audio Company in Amps?

Ender

http://www.audio-gd.com/enweb/Pricelist.htm

Check out their power amp section.

Their DACs are already known to be pretty amazing and I believe the preamps are starting to get some notice, but I don't know many who have purchased the power amps. What do you guys think of them? The head guy (King-Wa) posts the specs and circuit diagrams and everything. He's a super cool guy who loves audio as much as his consumers and will answer (almost) any question you throw at him. Only beware of his English. Lol. But most of his sentences are comprehensible.

Also, his customer service is probably THE best I have ever encountered (even better than HT Omega who have pretty amazing customer service). If there are any legitimate concerns or questions, he addresses them as soon as he can (currently, he is swamped with Compass orders so he might be slow at times, but before then, he would be amazingly prompt with replies to emails and such).

F1nut

The C1 amp looks interesting.

Sherardp

F1nut wrote: »

The C1 amp looks interesting.

I was just about to say the same thing. Dual chasis too, nice craftsmanship for sure.

Face

That is a sh*tload of caps!

Systems

Humm ,not to say it isn't good sounding stuff but kinda looks like a Chi Fi cloner.

heiney9

GV#27 wrote: »

Humm ,not to say it isn't good sounding stuff but kinda looks like a Chi Fi cloner.

It most certainly is and depending on price point might not be too bad. I have been researching inexpensive Chinese sourced tube gear and for the $$$ some of it seems alright for an entry level tuber.

But I think there is more junk than diamonds so tread carefully. I'd love to audition a piece or two just to see what it's all about.

Personally, I feel tube gear is easier to make cheaply (because the circuits are much simpler) and still sound acceptable. SS gear is very easy to get wrong when trying to make it cheaply.

But no one will know for sure w/o an audition. Let us know if you get some of this stuff and what your impression is.

H9

Ricardo

Specs data is very poor (missing lots of info). I wouldn't buy from them, though the gear does look pretty nice.

heiney9

One of the problem with buying things in/from China is they have so many "fake" parts. China is the king of copying and even though the sticker on the volume control says "Alps" I'm not sure how often those are just fakes w/a label. That's what concerns me about gear sourced from these chinese companies. Same goes for resistors, tubes, caps and most notably transistors. The Chinese have been flooding the market in the past 5 years or so with fake really junky transistors and selling them with competent company logo's.

So as always BUYER BEWARE.

cnh

heiney9 is right about China in general, they have neither the manpower nor the 'desire' to crack down on all the piracy and faux products being manufactured all over the place there. Most recently, as you know, its gotten into the food chain itself?

cnh

Ender

Ricardo wrote: »

Specs data is very poor (missing lots of info). I wouldn't buy from them, though the gear does look pretty nice.

As I said, King-Wa will most likely be more than happy to answer any questions you have. And other components from them are well-recorded to be excellent.

I was more curious about their power amps because I don't know many who have used any (except a few have tried the Panther and say it works well). I was hoping someone who is familiar with circuit diagrams to chime in on the designs and such, not get various negative answers about China and whether you would buy or not.

Systems

heiney9 wrote: »

The Chinese have been flooding the market in the past 5 years or so with fake really junky transistors and selling them with competent company logo's.

So as always BUYER BEWARE.

Yes they certainly have been,so its a crap shoot buying parts or complete products from unknown Chinese companies.Aswell they think nothing of copying proprietary circuits from true Hi End companies.

heiney9

Ender wrote: »

I was hoping someone who is familiar with circuit diagrams to chime in on the designs and such, not get various negative answers about China and whether you would buy or not.

So finally your true question comes out. Just relaying my opinion about Chinese wares. You're first post sounds like you work for the company. If he is so accomidating as you say then he won;t mind if you have one for a trial and I'm sure he'll gladly take it back if you don;t like it.

Anybody can put diagrams of resistors, caps, transistors, diodes, heat sinks, etc and state it's Class A, but that doesn't give you any insight into the build quaility, execution or parts used. I could take his exact diagrram and build two identical looking amps with different parts and specs and they would both sound different.

What I'm trying to say is if you can at all, try one in your listening area, with your speakers and other gear to see how it sounds.

Good luck

H9

Systems

Ender wrote: »

I was hoping someone who is familiar with circuit diagrams to chime in on the designs and such, not get various negative answers about China and whether you would buy or not.

I tried to look at the schematic of the model 8 pre but the page was blank.Was it one of the DAC's you were interested in? if the schem is there I will gladly take a look.

heiney9

Please don't take this as an insult because it's not intended that way. Those amps look unecessarily complicated with all kinds of parts, it reminds of Emotiva amps. Lots of show/bling etc. Again not trying to start a depricating thread. Just an observation.

Ender

Ah, I didn't know that. I really need to put some time into learning more technical information. Lol. As for the DACs of interest, I am looking to purchase the Compass and/or Reference 1 in the future.

Observations are fine. I appreciate all of yours.

Systems

Unfortunately there is no schematic for the Ref One DAC but from the pic's and description it certainly looks interesting.( though unfortunately much of it is hidden under the metal covers).Keeping in mind that its just on paper there are some nice features.For instance it uses a custom DSP digital filter,the analog stage is fully balanced and appears to use discrete transistors throughout(no IC' op-amps).There are completely separate supplies for each channels analog stage and another for the digital section.However using 8(4 per channel) DAC chips is IMO serious overkill.

Again on paper it seems good but that tells you absolutely nothing about how it will actually sound.How those discrete transistors have been implemented in the analog stage,parts quality,the skill with which the PC boards have been laidout for lowest noise etc. will all play a part.

danz1906

Thats a pretty good looking Amp!

cnh

I would just like to add that we're not China bashing here. China is my area of specialization, I'll be spending the entire year there starting this fall. However, even the Chinese Gov't would admit there are quality issues with many companies on its soil. So it is good to check it out first. I've seen Chinese customers check out items they were ready to purchase right in the store to make sure things were good!

It is also quite true that more and more very good electronics are being produced or outsourced to China.

cnh

sucks2beme

It's a crap shoot. Some of the stuff is ok, some poor, and some great.
Little Dot tube stuff started out pretty cheap( all around) but price,
quality and design picked up to the point it's not a bad buy now.
There's a lot of DACS coming out of there now, too. Same applies.
The real problem is what to do when the box arrives on your doorstep
sounding like a box of baby rattles. You're gonna hate trying
to get that mess sorted out. Eating shipping costs and trying to
converse with a guy that doesn't speak much english is tough.

pearsall001

Wouldn't touch it with Ted's or Jesse's money!

BlueFox

cnh wrote: »

It is also quite true that more and more very good electronics are being produced or outsourced to China.

True. If something doesn't change soon we are going to be so far in debt to China they will not need to use military force to take over.

sucks2beme

They're planning to buy California next month. :eek:

Chinese makers are starting to get the whole quality thing.
The whole concept was totaly alien to them for years.
But in order to move past being the low cost guys to being
solid suppliers, all they have to do is turn to the model Japan used.
Remember when they made cheap junk?

Ender

Actually, the "whole quality thing" was relatively new to business in general (only about 20 years): http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Six_Sigma

That is, if you're referring to defective products and such. That's probably what you mean about Japan making cheap junk... the pre-Six Sigma era...

Now Six Sigma is pretty much the cornerstone to anyone learning business administration. But it wasn't before the 90's.

Ender

Zero wrote: »

Ender - If there's a lesson to be learned, its to never ever post anything new here if you expect genuinely curious reception. Out of the many forums I've been to, this one is most prone to 'shooting down' something prior to actually trying it. Not that everyone is this way, of course, but as a whole - we'll man, you know the deal.

Comes with the territory of being an audiophile, neh?