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Fast amp?

prrar

prrar

Active Member
Hey,

A couple of friends, that know a lot about audio equipment, came to my place and tested the MC2205-C34v-MB50. Their opinion was that the MC2205 performs superbly with slower music, but it is not fast enough for music that demand more speed.

Do you guys feel the same way? Would a newer amp (MC352 or even a MA7900) be “faster”?

best!
 
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prrar said:
Hey,

A couple of friends, that think they know a lot about audio equipment, came to my place and tested the MC2205-C34v-MB50. Their opinion was that the MC2205 performs superbly with slower music, but it is not fast enough for music that demand more speed.

Do you guys feel the same way? Would a newer amp (MC352 or even a MA7900) be “faster”?

best!
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fixed
 
Speed = frequency, if it can reproduce 20khz, that's speed. Frequency plus amplitude = slew rate, more speed. Maybe I'm missing something here?

Slower music? Doesn't make sense to me but I'm willing to learn.
 
What they said, if that would help, is that it didn’t present clearly all the notes when the music was fast, when a lot of notes were to be reproduced in a short amount of time.

I’m just trying to figure it out here, with all the knowledge you guys have :)
 
prrar said:
What they said, if that would help, is that it didn’t present clearly all the notes when the music was fast, when a lot of notes were to be reproduced in a short amount of time.

I’m just trying to figure it out here, with all the knowledge you guys have :)
Click to expand...

They are busting your balls, hopefully someone who know these components will chime in.
 
There is an old argument about dampening rate. Some feel it matters a lot and some feel it doesn't. You have a choice IMHO, you can listen to music to critique gear or you can listen to and enjoy the music. The choice is yours. If it sounds like it was recorded, that is the best your system can do for you. If the music is poorly mixed, recorded or otherwise poorly done the fastest damping amp in the world cannot fix pee poor products but you can spend a lot of money chasing a fantasy.
 
Mike Gibson said:
There is an old argument about dampening rate. Some feel it matters a lot and some feel it doesn't. You have a choice IMHO, you can listen to music to critique gear or you can listen to and enjoy the music. The choice is yours. If it sounds like it was recorded, that is the best your system can do for you. If the music is poorly mixed, recorded or otherwise poorly done the fastest damping amp in the world cannot fix pee poor products but you can spend a lot of money chasing a fantasy.
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Thank you very munch for your answer. Could you explain a little bit more about this debate about dampening rate? And would newer McIntoshes still be considered “slow” by these terms?

I really liked your view on music x gear. Sometimes we can get carried away and lose sight of what is more important.

I’m really curious about the technical aspect of this discussion.

Best!

EDIT: The MC2205 has a damping factor of 16, lower than the 'usual recommended' 20. My speakers are DALI Opticon 8, by the way.
 
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Spend a couple weeks on a audio sales floor; any number of "experts" love to sound off, usually in front of the friends they came in with, to show off their "golden" ears.

Most time you find out their reference is not live un amplified music but some conjested high distortion pop drivel from a disco/club enviroment and at home an embarrassing collection of mass market heavily discounted to get it out of the storeroom "hardware".

And then you find out they read it in a magazine.......

There are any number of ways a audio designer can push a potential customer's buttons to close a sale......this most often happens in speaker design but does rarely happen in amp design.

And frankly, many amateur experts love to listen to distortion and use it as a reference........won't even step into musicians and their electric guitars.....
 
Damping factor is a number that correlates to the ability of the amplifier to "control" the woofer (woofer mainly) in a traditional cone-type speaker.

The speaker is a mechanical device, the faster it moves the more over-run it will have and the amplifier acts not only as the voltage to move the cone to a particular point corresponding to the voltage in the music output, but also as a brake to keep the speaker from continuing its travel beyond that point. Higher damping factor means better braking & control.

Some of the discussions and debate revolve around the fact that a length of speaker wire introduces a damping factor several times that of the amplifier, making the amplifier a smaller part of that equation, among other discussion. Really seems like a simple concept of more is better but in some cases more is too much, and other points are made about how there is a fairly low number that is actually significant above which the amplifier damping factor matters little (or not at all).

Direct-coupled solid-state amplifiers typically are better with damping factor (many have little inductors on the amp board to increase it) than anything autoformer out. FWIW.

A couple of researched viewpoints here: http://www.roger-russell.com/wire/wire.htm#damping
 
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What is the " speedy" music or "fast" notes they are busting you about?

Still would want to know what their reference is that handles "speedy, fast" music better than your choices.
 
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