Recommended Modern Amps

Another vote for Yamaha AS501. I just bought one am quite surprised. I'm resisting getting another one to swap out my Yaqin in my main listening room.
 
Another vote for Yamaha AS501. I just bought one am quite surprised. I'm resisting getting another one to swap out my Yaqin in my main listening room.

Which Yaqin are you running? Have you tube rolled and replaced coupling caps and volume pot? A must to get the best from any Yaqin
 
I have a MC-10L with a pair of quad matched russian tubes. Sounds great. Lately is been problematic (static despite cleaning and having the tubes biased right), haven't had the time to troubleshoot it. I put it on my desk for now when I have time to deal with it later. But will loop around to it.
 
I have a MC-10L with a pair of quad matched russian tubes. Sounds great. Lately is been problematic (static despite cleaning and having the tubes biased right), haven't had the time to troubleshoot it. I put it on my desk for now when I have time to deal with it later. But will loop around to it.
Is it static when you touch the volume knob? I get it occasionally and fix by cleaning my tube pins with my MC10T
 
I am looking for an amp of equal performance to my Technics SU 8600 Amp. Does anybody have any recommendations? I would like to use my equalizer in this system also, 10 band BSR, florescent display.

My SU 8600 is just to dam old, cables falling off the PCB, traces lifting off the PCB, it's gonna give me a heart attack trying to fix it. Thanks!
 
My understanding is in this thread we post recommendations for "value" amps. That is, where you get "bang for the buck".

A month or so ago I purchased the Sherwood RX-5502 (see attached datasheet) for $160 delivered. Before I get too far let me state the amp was built in China, but designed in the US.

What I was originally looking for was an amp to power my AR's which are 4 ohm and somewhat "power hungry". I didn't find many "economical" amps capable of 4 ohm loads and was pleasantly surprised by this Sherwood. This unit as 4 full range amps each capable of 70 wpc at 8 ohms or 100 wpc at 4 ohms. That's right, these are NOT those little HT amps rated at 1000hz.

Sherwood advertises the unit as capable of driving 8 speakers in two separate rooms. That is, there are controls for main and room2.

That "feature" didn't interest me at all and I doubt it would interest anyone here. Like most I like my amps near my speakers.

What the amp does allow for, however, is passive horizontal bi-amping in the most economical form I've ever seen. Today I'm using the main amp to power the mids and tweeters of my AR's and the room2 amp to drive the woofers. (Using just the 3 terminals AR provided. I've posted this in the speaker forum, but wanted to share here as well.)

My main interest in passive bi-amping is to get total control over the speaker's voice. Many companies, AR included, put controls (attenuators) on their speakers so that the consumer had some control over voice. That control, however, is limited! In the attached graph you'll see the response curve on my AR's with those controls at max. (This response was AR's intent, because at that time record companies were emphasizing high frequencies to compensate for the poor playback devices prevalent at that time.)

So what if you want "bright" or West Coast sounding speakers? Well, that's where bi-amping comes into play. You simply apply more power to the mid/tweeters and presto - you can make your speakers sound like anything you want with clicks of the remote control.

So, far I am very happy with this Sherwood unit.

Regards,
Jerry
 

Attachments

  • Sherwood-RX-5502-datasheet.pdf
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  • AR-3a-graph.jpg
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  • TSW-3rd_terminal.jpg
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My understanding is in this thread we post recommendations for "value" amps. That is, where you get "bang for the buck".

A month or so ago I purchased the Sherwood RX-5502 (see attached datasheet) for $160 delivered. Before I get too far let me state the amp was built in China, but designed in the US.

What I was originally looking for was an amp to power my AR's which are 4 ohm and somewhat "power hungry". I didn't find many "economical" amps capable of 4 ohm loads and was pleasantly surprised by this Sherwood. This unit as 4 full range amps each capable of 70 wpc at 8 ohms or 100 wpc at 4 ohms. That's right, these are NOT those little HT amps rated at 1000hz.

Sherwood advertises the unit as capable of driving 8 speakers in two separate rooms. That is, there are controls for main and room2.

That "feature" didn't interest me at all and I doubt it would interest anyone here. Like most I like my amps near my speakers.

What the amp does allow for, however, is passive horizontal bi-amping in the most economical form I've ever seen. Today I'm using the main amp to power the mids and tweeters of my AR's and the room2 amp to drive the woofers. (Using just the 3 terminals AR provided. I've posted this in the speaker forum, but wanted to share here as well.)

My main interest in passive bi-amping is to get total control over the speaker's voice. Many companies, AR included, put controls (attenuators) on their speakers so that the consumer had some control over voice. That control is limited! In the attached graph you'll see the response curve on my AR's with those controls at max. (This response was AR's intent, because at that time record companies were emphasizing high frequencies to compensate for the poor playback devices prevalent at that time.)

So what if you want "bright" or West Coast sounding speakers? Well, that's where bi-amping comes into play. You simply apply more power to the mid/tweeters and presto - you can make your speakers sound like anything you want with clicks of the remote control.

So, far I am very happy with this Sherwood unit.

Regards,
Jerry


Nice review. I am familiar with some of the Sherwood modern receivers. They are good performers and built pretty well.
 
A few years ago I took a chance on some Bryston gear and I haven't been disappointed. 4BSST2 power amp and BP6 preamp. The 4BSST2 has now been replaced by the 4BSST3, so you can find the 4BSST2 units for sale at good prices. People upgrading, I guess. And the preamp, the BP6, does an excellent job if you're looking for a no-frills preamp.
 
i'm liking the new Sony TA-A1ES.

80 wpc drives the Spendors just fine in my apartment. It has one set of balanced inputs to connect to Sony's matching player HAP-Z1ES - at least that's what I intend to do with it, as soon as the player arrives.

One shortcoming is no phono stage. It does put out some heat so the claim that it mostly runs Class A is believable.

DSC_1167.JPG
 
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Hegel H80. Paired with my Dynaudio X32s, it's a fantastic combination. They're not the most efficient speaker around and it handles them just fine!

Second on the Hegel H 80 integrated amp. I have mine powering a pair of Totem Rainmakers and am really happy with this set up.
 
I recommend the anthem 225 . i was looking for an amp that was of a more pure analog design like the amps from the 70s and had top quality components. the anthem has six output divices per channel with massive heatsinks and plenty of room on the chassis to facilitate max cooling. the amp is still in break-in mode and i am very satisfied with its performance. the remote has been upgraded and works fine.
 
The purpose of this thread is to allow people to post reviews or recommendations of the modern gear they have or have used. Again, first person experience only.
For the purposes of this thread, "Modern" shall mean anything in current production, or the previous model. For instance, both the Rega Brio and Brio-R would eligible.
If you disagree with a persons recommendation, please take that to a separate thread.

Again, this is something new we are trying, so we can tweak and fine tune as we go.

Please post any comments in this thread:
http://www.audiokarma.org/forums/showthread.php?t=441123
 
I recommend the anthem 225 . i was looking for an amp that was of a more pure analog design like the amps from the 70s and had top quality components. the anthem has six output divices per channel with massive heatsinks and plenty of room on the chassis to facilitate max cooling. the amp is still in break-in mode and i am very satisfied with its performance. the remote has been upgraded and works fine.

Second it.
I've owned plenty of amps since the 90s. The big name Brit stalwarts: Naim, Arcam, Creek, MF. Some D-amps from Nuforce, Chinese jobbies etc.

But my go-to amps nowadays are :

1) Anthem 225 Integrated (USD1500)
Honest, transparent, wide soundstage, lots of grunt, moffat bass.

2) Rega Brio-R (USD900)
Great midrange & timing. It simply plays music.
 
Not sure I've done this before or not, but I'll put in a vote for any Carver A-series (I owned the M-mag amps as well), or any Sunfire. Civilized to Brutal in zero seconds flat. 16 International Rectifier Hexfets per channel in the Sunfire Sig.....a beast's beast. When I bought them they weren't vintage.....yet......
 
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