D'AMORE E660.5 Car Amplifier Review

[amirm]

This is a review and detailed measurements of the D'Amore E660.5 5-channel automotive amplifier. It is on kind loan from a member and costs US $299.

The E660.5 seems well built and as you can see, is in a rather large enclosure. I suspect that will let it run cool. In testing it did not even get warm. Power terminals are designed well with angled hex screws that bite wires quite well.

Company designer used to be at Fostex and currently builds a line of test instruments for automotive amplifiers so I expect good performance.

Note that my instrumentation is limited to 2 channels and that is what I tested. Power source is a custom Lithium battery bank with 100 Ah capacity (instantaneous power of hundred of amps). I was charging the bank as I was testing the amp so you will see rising voltage notations in the testing (ranging from 13.4 to 13.8 volts).

Note 2: I thought the amp model number was E400.4 throughout the testing. I put in the right model name on the graphs but the audio precision cursors still say E400.4.

D'Amore E660.5 Amplifier Measurements
As usual we start with our dashboard of 5 watts into 4 ohm load:

Distortion is composed of broad set of spikes around -88 dB. Those combined with noise knock SINAD down good bit, placing the amplifier in "fair" category:

We see that reflected in noise performance:

Frequency response shows the expected load dependency for this class D amplifier:

Better run some sweeps and correct for that with EQ if you are sensitive to high frequencies.

Crosstalk is worse than average:

But good enough for the application.

Multitone test shows increased intermodulation distortion at both ends of the audio spectrum:

19 & 20 kHz focus at the upper end showing rather disappointing results:

Amplifier meets its specifications in power:

And at 2 ohm (one channel driven)

At 8 ohm, we have very little power:

Sweeping at other frequencies shows quite a bit of non-linearities at high frequencies but all calms down by 1 kHz:

Edit: forgot the warm up/idle current measurement:

Conclusions
Starting with good news, it is nice to see company meeting its power specifications. Likely had no choice as they make the so called "Amp Dyno" for measuring amplifier power. But since that instrument doesn't measure noise and distortion, these areas clearly have not had much attention although they are far from being terrible. I think the key reason to get this amplifier is for its overbuilt cooling and reliability that may bring. Audio performance is not where it is at.

I can't recommend the D'Amore E660.5 amplifier. Company needs to do better to get my attention.

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[amirm]

Manufacturer Specifications:

 

[Jimster480]

Nice review, although I wonder how much the poor performance will matter in a car. I suppose it will depend on the car itself as cars are generally noisy inside and that would ruin the noise floor that one would need in order to hear the small details Hi-Fi can bring out in music.

 

[amirm]

If you are stuck in traffic road noise is minimal to non-existent. And cars these days are remarkably quiet. People also want to use DSP/EQ with these things requiring much headroom.

 

[Jimster480]

If you are stuck in traffic road noise is minimal to non-existent. And cars these days are remarkably quiet. People also want to use DSP/EQ with these things requiring much headroom.

I didn't think about the DSP/EQ part.
As far as it being quiet inside... I guess it depends on the car... I've got Trucks & Sports cars. None of them are super quiet inside; not even my QX80... however that probably has a better stereo system out of the box than something like this can provide.

 

[Waxx]

Not very surprising on noise levels for a typical car amp. But i think these days it should be better on the other factors, with all the tech in class D amps that is availeble. But there is also far worse in that section.

 

[restorer-john]

Likely had no choice as they make the so called "Amp Dyno" for measuring amplifier power.

Nicely put Amir.

 

[martijn86]

Knowing car audio brands, the box probably says 300W Turbo BASS! Or did that trend die in the last decades? A 5 channel Topping PA5 II would be sick but then again, what's the noise floor in your car?

 

[JSmith]

There is certainly opportunity here for improvement. Overall not terrible I suppose.

I note this on their site;

CLEAN D = High efficiency Full Range Class D with filtering of all inputs and outputs for clean performance throughout the passband and all the way to clipping. CLEAN D design also protects the vehicle’s sensitive electronic systems from EMI, the typical cause of check engine lights and other random bad behavior that can be caused by installing a dirty or "noisy" Class D amplifier in a vehicle.

An interesting test review @amirm, cheers.

Pic's;

JSmith

 

[Michael Fidler]

Nothing is broken here, but I can't help feel that this could have been made to perform a lot better for very little cost.

Probably good enough for most car audio systems, but the channel mismatch and high distortion are off-putting.

 

[Waxx]

The thing with car audio is that they need to withstand a lot of abuse. I know people in the custom car bussiness down here that tried to implement Hypex boards in their builds, but the big temp difference inside a car (can go from -20°C to +70°C) and the vibrations of driving (especially with the notorious bad roads in Belgium) killed those boards very fast. So they went back to proven durable amp systems that are less in audio quality, but survive those conditions.

 

[AdamG]

Seems like we are giving this a pass because it’s automotive industry. I wonder at what point does this noise and distortion become a problem in a Silent Electric Car that has been well road noise treated. Hard to give this a pass when the overall performance is so wanting. Back in the day with open windows, roaring engine and exhaust sound and little to zero Road/traffic noise abatement. We didn’t care so much because you could barely hear the radio anyway and we were using FM or cassette/8 track tape. Noise was part of the atmosphere. Their might just be a pretty big market for someone to step in and produce SOTA Automotive Audio Kit.

As it sits you jump in your car with all your CD quality and above download music and that quality is all lost on the subpar Amplifier in your car. Just my ramblings.

Thanks for the work evaluating this Amp for us Road Ragers Boss!

 

[Ajax]

Thanks for the review Amir.

I live in rural Australia (Byron Bay) and spend a lot of time in my cars (2012 GMH utility, 2014 BMW X3, 1973 350SL Mercedes) so I really value good sounding audio for autos and encourage members to send their gear into Amir for testing.

 

[renaudrenaud]

I don't have any car since more than 10 years, I use bicycles. So I encourage @amirm to test IEMs.

 

[restorer-john]

Much as Elon Musk can be annoying, Tesla's push for 48V standard vehicle voltages is nothing, if not sensible. Nobody is talking about the benefits for car audio are they? Most other modern systems will work better and will significantly less losses at a higher voltage- think ABS, brushless cooling motors, A/C, even display technologies and lighting.

Can you imagine the audio improvements we could expect? No more insane inverter supplies with ridiculous current draws at 12V. No enormous voltage drops with huge amplifiers needing auxilliary batteries and localized capacitors. Way less copper needed, less weight and greater efficiency. I say bring it on.

 

[tomtoo]

Much as Elon Musk can be annoying, Tesla's push for 48V standard vehicle voltages is nothing, if not sensible. Nobody is talking about the benefits for car audio are they? Most other modern systems will work better and will significantly less losses at a higher voltage- think ABS, brushless cooling motors, A/C, even display technologies and lighting.

Can you imagine the audio improvements we could expect? No more insane inverter supplies with ridiculous current draws at 12V. No enormous voltage drops with huge amplifiers needing auxilliary batteries and localized capacitors. Way less copper needed, less weight and greater efficiency. I say bring it on.

Yes 48V are great!

 

[uwotm8]

Looks terrible even for cheap D-class

 

[Koeitje]

Seems like we are giving this a pass because it’s automotive industry. I wonder at what point does this noise and distortion become a problem in a Silent Electric Car that has been well road noise treated. Hard to give this a pass when the overall performance is so wanting. Back in the day with open windows, roaring engine and exhaust sound and little to zero Road/traffic noise abatement. We didn’t care so much because you could barely hear the radio anyway and we were using FM or cassette/8 track tape. Noise was part of the atmosphere. Their might just be a pretty big market for someone to step in and produce SOTA Automotive Audio Kit.

As it sits you jump in your car with all your CD quality and above download music and that quality is all lost on the subpar Amplifier in your car. Just my ramblings.

Thanks for the work evaluating this Amp for us Road Ragers Boss!

When actually driving at a consistent speed the noise difference between an ICE and EV is like 1-2dB.

 

[AdamG]

When actually driving at a consistent speed the noise difference between an ICE and EV is like 1-2dB.

I was thinking about Noise Canceling Car Audio. Like IPod Pro earbuds but with internal cabin active noise cancellation. If it’s not common now it will be at some point. Apparently I left this part out in my above comment . That’s what I get for not proofreading my post.

 

[KaMiKaZeCATS]

IMO this is terrible performance for the price... Measure Helix or Eton Amps/DSP or even Alpine high end amps outperform this at half the price....

Car audio SNIAD should be at a MIN of 80db