AVR vs Stereo amp

[Dimitrov]

Hi guys,

I need help understanding something. I've had a lot of people tell me that stereo amps even with far less power on paper sound far more powerful than AVR's.

So I tested this out - I took a 50 watt Marantz stereo amp. Had a mid-range Marantz AVR 5013 (over 100 watts into 8 ohms, 2 channels) and a small twist of the volume control of the stereo amp made the music come alive, whereas the AVR I had to wind it up much much more, so the perception is that the AVR was less powerful.

I don't think the power in itself had anything to do with it. I think it had to do with the volume pot attenuation perhaps? The onset of volume, was much greater on the stereo amp whereas the volume was far more gradual on the AVR.

Can someone who is well versed in AVR and stereo amps please explain what I'm experiencing? If the difference in volume control/gain etc is the major difference then the stereo folks who claim AVR's are weak sounding compared to stereo amps would make sense to me.

 

[MZKM]

That’s a silly statement you were given. Of course not, clean watts are clean watts, 120W is louder than 60W, regardless of what type of amp is used.

Then their volume knobs up to max and see which is louder. Just kidding, unless you used like 100ft of 22awg speaker wire that could be dangerously loud.

I’ve had many people on home theater forums complain that “How come my receiver doesn’t get loud until 75%, whereas my tv gets loud at 10%?!”. The simple answer is different volume structures, the tv volume at 10/100 could already be 25% wattage, with 20/100 being 50%, and 100/100 being 100%. There is no correct way to do volume control in regards to what % on the volume scale corresponds to what % of wattage.

I believe for Denon/Marantz, 75/99 on the volume scale correlates to -25dB. I have a Denon and only use the Relative volume scale, which represents volume control in a decibel scale (0 being rated wattage, -3dB representing 1/2, -10dB representing 1/10, -20dB representing 1/100, etc.).