This is a review and detailed measurements of the Denon PMA-600NE integrated amplifier with Bluetooth support and DAC. It is on kind loan from a member and costs US $499.
I like the look of the unit especially for the price. Somewhat dismayed though that the input selector is not lined up with the labels. Inclusion of tone and balance controls is a touch tough these days the latter being needed (see testing below). Back panel shows good capability including subwoofer out:
Yes, it harkens to the old days of captive AC cables so go ahead and cancel that order for $200 aftermarket cable. It even has IR control for automation.
Denon PMA-600NE DAC Measurements
Since there are pre-outs we can measure the performance of the internal DACs. I chose to use Source Direct to give it a chance to produce its best performance:
Shame we have high enough distortion that we can't even clear the noise floor of CD (-93 to -96 dB). That places the DAC in the "poor" category of all DACs tested:
Zooming in:
It is just a couple of steps above my old HP laptop! Fortunately noise floor is better:
Although not good enough to make a showing in IMD distortion+noise:
I think this is good enough to know the story of the DAC, allowing us to move the amplifier section.
Denon PMA-600NE Amplifier Measurement
Whenever an amp has volume control, I adjust it for 29 dB and then measure, in this case using CD input and source direct:
This is middling performance:
Turning off Source Direct makes things a bit worse:
The power supply used in the tone control seems to be bleeding a lot of noise. But since distortion is even higher, it didn't impact SINAD a lot.
Let's test with digital input:
It is more or less the same since the DAC SINAD is much better than the amp. But the bit of distortion it has bled into the amp. Note that this means that using an external DAC won't improve things either. The amp is the bottleneck.
Noise performance at 5 watts is not great but gets better at full power:
Frequency response is good enough:
Multitone performance is good:
As is 19+20 kHz tone pair:
Crosstalk was surprisingly poor:
I repeated the test with Toslink and it was just as bad (not shown). These are the kind of basics that companies need to get right.
There is decent amount of power but the curve flattens early meaning distortion takes over noise:
I don't know what is going on with the second channel. Fortunately it doesn't show up with 8 ohm load:
Allowing 1% THD and testing for continuous vs burst gives us more than specified power which is good:
I wonder if the power supply comes from the higher up in the model range and hence the extra headroom.
Changing frequencies shows what we expect in class AB amps which is a predictable curve:
Notice that as usual you get less power at 20 Hz.
Finally, here is the on off pop noise:
It is kind of typical but I wish it was better.
Denon PMA-600NE Phono Stage Measurement
I made a couple of quick measurements of the phono stage starting with our dashboard:
The 35 dB gain (fixed in Source Direct) is kind of low which may have helped it keep distortion at bay. Overall this is about average:
RIAA equalization has a bit of error but again, not bad:
Conclusions
We always wish to find a hidden gem in audio products we test. The PMA-600NE could have been it but it is not. It has very good set of functionality but none of the measurements rise up to above average and some even miss that mark. For the cost, I think you are getting what you paid for but no more.
I can't get excited over this level of performance so can't recommend Denon PMA-600NE. You may think otherwise so vote above.
------------
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/
I like the look of the unit especially for the price. Somewhat dismayed though that the input selector is not lined up with the labels. Inclusion of tone and balance controls is a touch tough these days the latter being needed (see testing below). Back panel shows good capability including subwoofer out:
Yes, it harkens to the old days of captive AC cables so go ahead and cancel that order for $200 aftermarket cable. It even has IR control for automation.
Denon PMA-600NE DAC Measurements
Since there are pre-outs we can measure the performance of the internal DACs. I chose to use Source Direct to give it a chance to produce its best performance:
Shame we have high enough distortion that we can't even clear the noise floor of CD (-93 to -96 dB). That places the DAC in the "poor" category of all DACs tested:
Zooming in:
It is just a couple of steps above my old HP laptop! Fortunately noise floor is better:
Although not good enough to make a showing in IMD distortion+noise:
I think this is good enough to know the story of the DAC, allowing us to move the amplifier section.
Denon PMA-600NE Amplifier Measurement
Whenever an amp has volume control, I adjust it for 29 dB and then measure, in this case using CD input and source direct:
This is middling performance:
Turning off Source Direct makes things a bit worse:
The power supply used in the tone control seems to be bleeding a lot of noise. But since distortion is even higher, it didn't impact SINAD a lot.
Let's test with digital input:
It is more or less the same since the DAC SINAD is much better than the amp. But the bit of distortion it has bled into the amp. Note that this means that using an external DAC won't improve things either. The amp is the bottleneck.
Noise performance at 5 watts is not great but gets better at full power:
Frequency response is good enough:
Multitone performance is good:
As is 19+20 kHz tone pair:
Crosstalk was surprisingly poor:
I repeated the test with Toslink and it was just as bad (not shown). These are the kind of basics that companies need to get right.
There is decent amount of power but the curve flattens early meaning distortion takes over noise:
I don't know what is going on with the second channel. Fortunately it doesn't show up with 8 ohm load:
Allowing 1% THD and testing for continuous vs burst gives us more than specified power which is good:
I wonder if the power supply comes from the higher up in the model range and hence the extra headroom.
Changing frequencies shows what we expect in class AB amps which is a predictable curve:
Notice that as usual you get less power at 20 Hz.
Finally, here is the on off pop noise:
It is kind of typical but I wish it was better.
Denon PMA-600NE Phono Stage Measurement
I made a couple of quick measurements of the phono stage starting with our dashboard:
The 35 dB gain (fixed in Source Direct) is kind of low which may have helped it keep distortion at bay. Overall this is about average:
RIAA equalization has a bit of error but again, not bad:
Conclusions
We always wish to find a hidden gem in audio products we test. The PMA-600NE could have been it but it is not. It has very good set of functionality but none of the measurements rise up to above average and some even miss that mark. For the cost, I think you are getting what you paid for but no more.
I can't get excited over this level of performance so can't recommend Denon PMA-600NE. You may think otherwise so vote above.
------------
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/
