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AUDIOPHONICS MPA-S250NC Amp Review
- Thread starter amirm
- Start date
Maybe it's my ears' i don't know
Corvuscorone
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No. It's dead silent.
Fahzz
Addicted to Fun and Learning
Glad you were able to fix it.I am sorry to hear that. I recently bought it and my left and right channels where reversed. Audiophinics did not help me at all and actually told me to open it up myself and switch the connectors inside. It is actually going against pretty much every regulation you can go against. I hope my unit will last longer, but I am never doing business with them again.
Posted about this issue here:
AUDIOPHONICS MPA-S250NC left and right channel reversed
So I just got this and to make left and right separation I actually have to put the left hand speakers into the right hand output of the amp. I am guessing this is not normal behavior and that my amp must be faulty right? Already tried another preamp to see if the fault was there but same result.
Yes but there is still that buzzing sound though...
Rotgrunblau
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I’m using the XLR version to power an open baffle dipole sub by Siegfried Linkwitz (LXSub4).
This amp works perfectly, initially I planned using a Topping PA5 II but had no chance driving the speakers.
This amp works perfectly, initially I planned using a Topping PA5 II but had no chance driving the speakers.
jeffaegrim
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- Aug 24, 2023
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I bought this amp in a slightly bigger case (AP300-S250NC) and would like to report my experience after a month of real world use.
Speakers are 8 Ohm 95db(!) sensitivity, upwards from the amp there is a balanced minidsp Flex. If I push my ear deep into the horn, I can hear the slightest hiss from either the amp or the dac - difficult to tell. The amp is incredibly clean, and we aren’t even talking about one of the top shelf class D designs. It replaced a pair of VTL monoblocks and while I will have to overlay the measurements to check for any objective differences, subjectively my speakers now clearly sound better than before. Seems plausible to me, seeing how the measurements for the VTLs could only have been subpar.
Glad I didn’t go with the Purifi amp after all. Even with full output at 30-40hz and several db of boosts I am struggling to exceed 10-15W peaks on my Technics SH-9020 meter for loud listening sessions. During/after those the amp mostly remains completely cool - I don’t think I’ve ever noticed it getting warm at all. The Flex is much warmer in comparison.
There is a faintest hiss coming from the amp itself. You really have to press your ear against it from above to hear it, but it exists.
The on/off light isn‘t very intrusive on my unit, but I’m not the biggest fan of it either - might disconnect it at some point.
I paid 550€ for it and am overall so far completely satisfied. It’s an amp alright
Speakers are 8 Ohm 95db(!) sensitivity, upwards from the amp there is a balanced minidsp Flex. If I push my ear deep into the horn, I can hear the slightest hiss from either the amp or the dac - difficult to tell. The amp is incredibly clean, and we aren’t even talking about one of the top shelf class D designs. It replaced a pair of VTL monoblocks and while I will have to overlay the measurements to check for any objective differences, subjectively my speakers now clearly sound better than before. Seems plausible to me, seeing how the measurements for the VTLs could only have been subpar.
Glad I didn’t go with the Purifi amp after all. Even with full output at 30-40hz and several db of boosts I am struggling to exceed 10-15W peaks on my Technics SH-9020 meter for loud listening sessions. During/after those the amp mostly remains completely cool - I don’t think I’ve ever noticed it getting warm at all. The Flex is much warmer in comparison.
There is a faintest hiss coming from the amp itself. You really have to press your ear against it from above to hear it, but it exists.
The on/off light isn‘t very intrusive on my unit, but I’m not the biggest fan of it either - might disconnect it at some point.
I paid 550€ for it and am overall so far completely satisfied. It’s an amp alright
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Is this easy to do? I *hate* LED lights on equipment.
Is this easy to do? Unplugging the LED light, I mean.
Also, the review mentions a pop when turning this on. Is it loud or simply audible?
jeffaegrim
Active Member
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From what I understand, pop or absence thereof depends entirely on your individual setup. I don’t experience any with this amp.
I mean. It’s easy to disconnect the whole power on switch, not sure about being able to disconnect just the light itself. Once it’s disconnected, one can use trigger or a master/slave socket to power the amp on I guess
Yeah, I just bought it with a trigger cable. But it's the LED once it's on that I hate. I will heavily cover it with Light Dims.
There's an on/off switch on the back, the front switch is for on/standby.
Besides the obviously unreachable switch in the back if it's sitting in a cabinet or something, and it physically switching mains power to the device:
The front switch determines trigger behaviour. If switch is off, the trigger input can be used to switch the amplifier on. If switch is on, the trigger becomes an output and can be used to remotely switch on other ampfiliers.
I am going to install it tomorrow. So let me be sure I understand.
To have the AVR turn on the amplifier via trigger cable I have to have the switch on the back set as on amd the switch on the front set as off? Do I have it right?
I ask because even the front switch seems a physical switch to me, so I don’t understand how the trigger cable could work if the front switch is in the off position (pushed out, basically).
Yes, you got that right. The front switch is a "soft" power switch that uses the Hypex module's "enable" functionality. For that it needs mains power via the back switch for its cute smol standby power supply, which is seperate from the main supply, and also handles the trigger input.
So, in short, as long as the back switch is on, the amp can be switched from standby to idle either using the front switch, or the trigger input.
On *and* off through trigger cable? Correct?
Sorry for the stupid question but it's the first time I use a trigger cable in my life.
Does it ease your conscience to know I've never once used a trigger cable in my life? Outside modular synthesizers for music production, that is. Certainly not for hifi equipment.
I'm lucky to have experience and formal education in electronics. Something the average customer doesn't have. Infact it strikes me as odd that I had to look this trigger behaviour up on the @Audiophonics website, for answering your question - because there's no manual whatsoever for these amplifiers. Not supplied on purchase in print, nor available as PDF download or whatever.
Audiophonics has many strengths, first of all offering well made products for competitive prices, but these "soft skills" like manuals are severely lacking. You need to be half an engineer to figure things out from nothing; average laymen can very well be lost, and nobody could blame them. A thing to be improved, for sure.
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