Who No Crown Equipment?

[bowtie427ss]

Crown made a great series of hifi gear including a very good tuner, the "straight line" series. These were not cheap when new, and still command over the top prices IMO.

Also IMO, the great sonics that the vintage Crown name was associated with pretty much went out the window when Crown sold out to Harman International. My history with Harman/Crown gear is not good, sonically fair at best(the "K" and "reference" amps are exceptions), many key components have had their ID's removed to make them proprietary causing service issues, and with the larger macro tech amplifiers, failures when they occur, are usually catostrophic involving burnt PC boards that render repair cost prohibitive.

I've heard good things about the new XTI series, but previous history and so many other fine sounding and dependable amplifiers from other makers will keep me from ever knowing personally.

Just my .02 y'all understand...........................

 

[whoaru99]

So if the amps are such well-regarded gear, how come we don't see much traffic about them on AK?

Don't take this the wrong way...

Y'all are too busy looking to score vintage Marantz, Pioneer, or Sansui at garage sales and thrift stores. Good pro audio gear doesn't show up too often at garage sales or thrift stores and the stuff that shows up in pawn shops typically looks like it's been dragged behind a truck.

Also, there seems to be a stigma that pro audio amps just can't sound as good as "home" gear, which is not true, IMO.

 

[70salesguy]

Don't take this the wrong way...

Y'all are too busy looking to score vintage Marantz, Pioneer, or Sansui at garage sales and thrift stores. Good pro audio gear doesn't show up too often at garage sales or thrift stores and the stuff that shows up in pawn shops typically looks like it's been dragged behind a truck.

Also, there seems to be a stigma that pro audio amps just can't sound as good as "home" gear, which is not true, IMO.

Amen brother, preach on ! :thmbsp:

I agree. You won't often see a Crown preamp, tuner or power amp at a yard sale or GW. All Crown poweramps are still supported by Crown. There isn't going to be a situation where it's not viable. :nono:

I would invite those who are curious to check out Crowns website at www.crownaudio.com and check spec sheets under "Discontinued Products"

The PSL-2 preamp has a THD of .009%. :yes:

The PS-400 power amplifier has a THD of .05% at 165 w/pch

I have attached a photo of one of my Crown setups. It is a PSL-2, PFM-3 and a PS-400.

 

[bowtie427ss]

I have attached a photo of one of my Crown setups. It is a PSL-2, PFM-3 and a PS-400.

Very very nice!

Did they make a PS-200, seems i remember the silver faced "straight line" system i was familiar with having a power amp about half that height, the pre and tuner look very familiar but for the black faces. It's been a while and my memory is not always known for it's accuracy.

 

[70salesguy]

Very very nice!

Did they make a PS-200, seems i remember the silver faced "straight line" system i was familiar with having a power amp about half that height, the pre and tuner look very familiar but for the black faces. It's been a while and my memory is not always known for it's accuracy.

Yes, they did make a PS-200 as well. I have one of those also. The SL-2 (Straight Line Two) was made in a silver finish as well.

Of interest is the fact that the SL-2 was made in silver or black and the nomenclature PSL-2 indicates the last series made, which was only made in black. The PSL-2 has one of its auxiliary inputs designated as "CD".

The PS-400 produces 190 wpc and the PS-200 100 wpc. No fans here!

 

[ValvTubeHead]

...Check out these two sites :

www.crownaudio.com/history.htm
www.crownaudio.com/crntime.htm

neighbors?
:stupid:

 

[Clmrt]

Crown started off by making RTR machines. I own a D-75, like it a lot.

http://www.crownaudio.com/crntime.htm

 

[Scorpion8]

I own a D-75, like it a lot.

Can you post a nice front pic of that?

 

[70salesguy]

Crown started off by making RTR machines. I own a D-75, like it a lot.

http://www.crownaudio.com/crntime.htm

I have a D-75A. I have a PSL-2, a PFM-3 and a D75A in a 3 space Crown wood cabinet to make a "Crown Receiver" for one of my systems.

 

[PhasedOut]

Back in the day, (early seventies, late sixties) all of the high end audio shops in the area I used to live in (eastcoast) were selling Phase Linear and Crown gear as "the best" you could buy. Whether this is true or not is irrelevant but I remember hearing some Crown gear and being very impressed. Seems to have gathered a reputation for being less musical these days for some reason though. Just my impression, I could be wrong.:yes:

 

[70salesguy]

I think that happened because Crown got out of the high end home market and decided to focus on the professional market.

When you talk about usng a Crown poweramp for home use, a lot of people are thinking the current product offerings which are built for pro use and may not be as well suited to home use because of cooling fans and such.

Crown also produced the Studio Reference series that had exceptional specs and performance.

The Phase Linear of the day competed with Crown and BITD, there was a lot of competition between Crown and Mac.

Check out the PS series, the Studio Reference series and the Power Lineseries in the discontinued products section on Crowns website.

www.crownaudio.com

A Power line Four has THD of .05% at 165 wpc 8 oms both channels driven 20-20K.

I think they just went where the largest market share was.

 

[tfarney]

Imagine a SS Mac suspended inside an armored case. Crown. Not really meant for your living room. The fans are louder than the noise coming off your computer's soundcard. But they're built like tanks and are meant to be used in quantity, like potato chips...heavy metal racksfull of the things, humming away, sending thousands of really clean watts to stacks of efficient PA speakers a half a block away, filling huge room with huge sound. Trust me, in their native environment, the fans in your Crowns will not be heard.

And by comparison, our vintage SS recievers and integrateds are toys. Fragile little transistor radios. SMC (silver metallic crap ).

I think Crown still makes some really good pro microphones, too.

Tim

 

[70salesguy]

The Crown amps built for home use have no fans, just really large heatsinks!!!

 

[avionic]

My local pawn shop has a Crown CD player. Looks decent. IIRC from my early 80's, Crown was pretty well regarded and expensive gear. Yet you never see any here, or very little. Why no love for Crown? What ever happened to them?

I no Crown(forklifts):lmao:

 

[6thumbs]

I use a Crown DC 300A series 11 as my main amp at 175 per channel @8ohms its more than ample ,,,but you can definitly drop a nut schlepping it around

 

[RaymondLeggs]

I got a new avatar seince my old one scared people Into thinking I was Obsessed with Soundesign... so I went with a Yamaha PSS-170 keyboard which I own...

 

[Aage]

For me, Crown's hallmark was the DC300. To my mind, it was the first "brute force" SS power amp (although there well may have been other 150wpc pieces out there already) and it reminds me of the '70s Muscle cars.

All about performance, and a reasonable amp money-wise too. IIRC.

 

[Clmrt]

As requested -

Do a search and you'll find a naked photo as well...

 

[similost]

So if the amps are such well-regarded gear, how come we don't see much traffic about them on AK?

Guess you just don't look around much... I've got a Crown D-150 on it's way to me right now from a member here.. I get in on Crown discussions fairly often around here..

As far as all the discussions about pro amps not good for home use.. I completely disagree.. I'm using nothing but pro gear, and it sound far better than any consumer grade gear I've ever had, and I've had a lot of high end gear... you also can't beat the amount of power you can get for your money.. they don't call it pro just because it's used to make money with.. They also call it pro because it the stuff does put out very high quality sound..

 

[Fast_Eddie]

Crown amps were the standard in edit rooms at TV stations before it all went to computers. I always thought they sounded outstanding. I'd love to have one at the house but they cost quite a bit, even used. They're tanks though. Can't kill one.