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Why Levinson 333 sounds brighter than Krell KSA200s on the same speaker?

MasterApex

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I was experimenting with various legacy amplifiers on with my newly acquired B&W 802 D3, 802D3 measurement spec is https://www.stereophile.com/content/bowers-wilkins-802-d3-diamond-loudspeaker-measurements.

I observed significant different in sound EQ (high / low tonal balance) between Levinson 333 vs Krell KSA200s.
The Krell sounds darker, the high frequency seems roll off compare to levinsion 333.
Their spec are comparable in term of frequency response 20Hz–20kHz ±0.05dB and both are doubling down in power at 8/4/2 ohm.

Which of the Amplifier measurement can explain why Krell sounds darker than levinson 333 , (output impedance? slew rate? damping factor)

https://www.stereophile.com/content/mark-levinson-no333-power-amplifier-measurements

https://www.stereophile.com/content/krell-ksa-200s-power-amplifier-measurements

Thanks
 

blueone

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Your imagination?

Stereophile's reviews of the old Krell amps often spoke of more powerful bass than comparable amplifiers. It is possible you have expectation bias?
 
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MasterApex

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ha ha that is funny.
But seriously the tonal balance is very different and obvious...there were 3 of us confirming what I said.
 

Blumlein 88

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One might suspect the low impedance 100 hz to 1khz in the speaker combined with the 333 maybe not staying so clean into such a load, but that is a stretch really.

Might be a good time to do REW sweeps and see if anything is different at the speaker.
 

spacevector

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Frequency response should set tonality and indeed looks like the ML amp has high frequency peaking whereas the other amp is flat...
 

polmuaddib

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Can you make a measurement with REW? If there is obvious change in FR, it will show up in the measurement. It would be valuable information, because it would be objective proof.
 

polmuaddib

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JR 102 vs JR 112.jpg

I was so sure, couple of months ago, that one amplifier (the red line) which was 100w@8ohm D class had significantly more bass then 150w@8ohm AB class model from the same manufacuterer. It was so obvious to my ears, that i wanted to measure and show the difference.
Turns out, that there was no difference in measurement. After seeing the measurement, I couldn't hear the difference in bass anymore.
Slight differencies in FR are insignificant. They might occur from sweep to sweep.
 

Blumlein 88

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https://www.roomeqwizard.com/

Very useful for a variety of measurements, but most often used to take measurements in room of your speaker using a calibrated microphone. See post above this one. Software is free.
 
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MasterApex

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View attachment 129127
I was so sure, couple of months ago, that one amplifier (the red line) which was 100w@8ohm D class had significantly more bass then 150w@8ohm AB class model from the same manufacuterer. It was so obvious to my ears, that i wanted to measure and show the difference.
Turns out, that there was no difference in measurement. After seeing the measurement, I couldn't hear the difference in bass anymore.
Slight differencies in FR are insignificant. They might occur from sweep to sweep.

So this is an exercise of sweeping the frequency , one frequency at a time. It seems to validate the frequency response of the amplifier. May not necessarily tell how the amp reacts to complex waveforms of mixed frequency interaction with speaker load but I will try to do this once I figure out how. Thanks
 

Pdxwayne

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MasterApex

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That *might* be an issue if they attempted to level-match with high precision. But did they level-match at all?

We used Anthem AVM50v as pre-amp.
We tried to level match by running internal level calibration (white noise) so the output measured by SPL is about 82dBA.
We noticed that volume setting is higher with Krell to achieve the same SPL level.

We were very curious so also try to run each speaker in mono, each one is driven by respective amp but with the same mono source.
The EQ / tonal balance difference is very obvious.
The Krell sounds more "darker" , it is as if there were equalizer filter where the treble setting on Krell was negative.
On its own each amp sound fine, but in comparison the Levinson sounds more "revealing" .

We also run with PS Audio Class D amp, which has similar tonal balance as levinson.
So we think the levinson sounds more natural (?) but curios what aspect of the Krell KSA200s makes it sounds darker.
 
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MasterApex

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If the online information is correct, the damping factor of levinson 333 is over 800, and the damping factor of Krell is 80.

Assuming using 10' of 10awg cable, between ~90hz to 900 Hz, Krell will have about 0.25db lower output than Levinson. Thus, likely sound a little darker.

Excel worksheet available from
https://benchmarkmedia.com/blogs/ap...KwHM2ZqkqRlb7LVNrQNXnHOC2-OKx3nRoCMagQAvD_BwE

Thank YOU...I think this must be the technical explanation for our observation.
 

Blumlein 88

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We used Anthem AVM50v as pre-amp.
We tried to level match by running internal level calibration (white noise) so the output measured by SPL is about 82dBA.
We noticed that volume setting is higher with Krell to achieve the same SPL level.

We were very curious so also try to run each speaker in mono, each one is driven by respective amp but with the same mono source.
The EQ / tonal balance difference is very obvious.
The Krell sounds more "darker" , it is as if there were equalizer filter where the treble setting on Krell was negative.
On its own each amp sound fine, but in comparison the Levinson sounds more "revealing" .

We also run with PS Audio Class D amp, which has similar tonal balance as levinson.
So we think the levinson sounds more natural (?) but curios what aspect of the Krell KSA200s makes it sounds darker.
Try running a 1khz tone and measuring voltage at the speaker leads. You can match more precisely that way.
 

mallikreddyk

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We used Anthem AVM50v as pre-amp.
We tried to level match by running internal level calibration (white noise) so the output measured by SPL is about 82dBA.
We noticed that volume setting is higher with Krell to achieve the same SPL level.

We were very curious so also try to run each speaker in mono, each one is driven by respective amp but with the same mono source.
The EQ / tonal balance difference is very obvious.
The Krell sounds more "darker" , it is as if there were equalizer filter where the treble setting on Krell was negative.
On its own each amp sound fine, but in comparison the Levinson sounds more "revealing" .

We also run with PS Audio Class D amp, which has similar tonal balance as levinson.
So we think the levinson sounds more natural (?) but curios what aspect of the Krell KSA200s makes it sounds darker.

The Gain on different amplifiers is different. seen them range from 20-30db . so it is to be expected that different amps will need higher/lower level of output from same preamp to match speaker output level.
 

AdamG

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The Gain on different amplifiers is different. seen them range from 20-30db . so it is to be expected that different amps will need higher/lower level of output from same preamp to match speaker output level.
Welcome Aboard @mallikreddyk.
 

Wes

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I was experimenting with various legacy amplifiers on with my newly acquired B&W 802 D3, 802D3 measurement spec is https://www.stereophile.com/content/bowers-wilkins-802-d3-diamond-loudspeaker-measurements.

I observed significant different in sound EQ (high / low tonal balance) between Levinson 333 vs Krell KSA200s.
The Krell sounds darker, the high frequency seems roll off compare to levinsion 333.
Their spec are comparable in term of frequency response 20Hz–20kHz ±0.05dB and both are doubling down in power at 8/4/2 ohm.

Which of the Amplifier measurement can explain why Krell sounds darker than levinson 333 , (output impedance? slew rate? damping factor)

https://www.stereophile.com/content/mark-levinson-no333-power-amplifier-measurements

https://www.stereophile.com/content/krell-ksa-200s-power-amplifier-measurements

Thanks


what methodology did you use?
 
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