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RE: Lowest prices on amps with decent power supplies ?

Posted by John Elison (A) on December 2, 2024 at 16:06:21

In Reply to: Lowest prices on amps with decent power supplies ? posted by peppy m. on December 2, 2024 at 10:18:40:

It depends on what type of amplifier you're interested in and how much power you want. Recently, I switched to class-D amplifiers because the class-A/B amplifiers with decent power supplies have gotten too expensive for me, and the sound quality of class-D amplifiers has improved considerably.

For example, PS Audio has two new class-D monoblock amplifiers to which Stereophile gives an "A" rating in their Recommended Components. The first class-D amplifiers I bought were the PS Audio Stellar M1200 monoblocks, which I use to drive my Thiel CS3.7 speakers. Originally, these amplifiers cost $6,000 a pair, but they've now gone up to $7,000. However, they sound absolutely fantastic with my Thiel speakers, which require a lot of power to sound their best. These "A" rated class-D monoblocks deliver 600-watts into 8-ohms, 1200-watts into 4-ohms and they're stated to be stable into 2-ohms.

I needed some lower power amplifiers for my new Magnepan Mini Maggie speakers so I decided to take a chance on the Hypex Nilai 500 monoblock amplifiers, which cost $1990 a pair. These are rated at 260-watts into 8-ohms, 525-watts into 4-ohms and 500-watts into 2-ohms. They sound slightly better than my PS Audio Stellar M1200 monoblocks when driving my Mini Maggie speakers.

Any amplifier that delivers twice the power into 4-ohms that it delivers into 8-ohms must have decent power supplies. Therefore, if you want to save some money, check out some of the new class-D amplifiers. You can't go wrong with either of the ones I just mentioned.

Happy listening!
John Elison

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