This is a review and detailed measurements of the Ashly NE8250 professional 8-channel networked power amplifier. It is on kind loan from a member and costs US $2,386.
The look and controls are fine. It is going in a rack after all. Note that back connections are all phoenix blocks:
You can make your own cables or buy adapters (I made mine). There is a nice network UI interface and app.
Ashly NE8250 Measurements
All measurements are from channels 3 and 4. Let's start with our dashboard:
That is huge amount of harmonic distortion, placing the amp almost at the bottom of our SINAD list:
Strangely, in a good way, noise floor is low:
Frequency response droops at either end but surprisingly it is not load dependent despite being Class D design:
Crosstalk is fine:
Multitone shows poor performance that we would expect:
You buy these amps for power so let's see how it does at 4 ohm:
Ouch! That distortion curve is crazy. It almost act like a tube amp or something! Distortion is so high when it clips that when we measure at 1%, we actually get less power:
Switching to 8 ohm doesn't help:
Sweeping the frequencies we see this pronounced hump:
So my guess is that it is a class G design but company says Class D.
Conclusions
The distortion in this amplifier is just out of control. It is also not every powerful on a per channel basis. So I don't see it having a good application for home use in either main or sub amplifier. It is also expensive so I don't see the value in it either. Then again the owner said they come up much cheaper on ebay so maybe that would be some motivation to buy it.
I can't recommend the Ashly NE8250. Your ears deserve better!
Edit: video review posted:
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As always, questions, comments, recommendations, etc. are welcome.
Any donations are much appreciated using: https://www.audiosciencereview.com/forum/index.php?threads/how-to-support-audio-science-review.8150/
The look and controls are fine. It is going in a rack after all. Note that back connections are all phoenix blocks:
You can make your own cables or buy adapters (I made mine). There is a nice network UI interface and app.
Ashly NE8250 Measurements
All measurements are from channels 3 and 4. Let's start with our dashboard:
That is huge amount of harmonic distortion, placing the amp almost at the bottom of our SINAD list:
Strangely, in a good way, noise floor is low:
Frequency response droops at either end but surprisingly it is not load dependent despite being Class D design:
Crosstalk is fine:
Multitone shows poor performance that we would expect:
You buy these amps for power so let's see how it does at 4 ohm:
Ouch! That distortion curve is crazy. It almost act like a tube amp or something! Distortion is so high when it clips that when we measure at 1%, we actually get less power:
Switching to 8 ohm doesn't help:
Sweeping the frequencies we see this pronounced hump:
So my guess is that it is a class G design but company says Class D.
Conclusions
The distortion in this amplifier is just out of control. It is also not every powerful on a per channel basis. So I don't see it having a good application for home use in either main or sub amplifier. It is also expensive so I don't see the value in it either. Then again the owner said they come up much cheaper on ebay so maybe that would be some motivation to buy it.
I can't recommend the Ashly NE8250. Your ears deserve better!
Edit: video review posted:
As always, questions, comments, recommendations, etc. are welcome.
Any donations are much appreciated using: https://www.audiosciencereview.com/forum/index.php?threads/how-to-support-audio-science-review.8150/
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