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LSA Voyager GAN 350 Review (Stereo Amplifier)

Rate this amplifier:

  • 1. Poor (headless panther)

    Votes: 172 72.9%
  • 2. Not terrible (postman panther)

    Votes: 55 23.3%
  • 3. Fine (happy panther)

    Votes: 4 1.7%
  • 4. Great (golfing panther)

    Votes: 5 2.1%

  • Total voters
    236

sarumbear

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This had to be some high school kid's first electronics project. It's screams amateur. I mean, half of these amps are simply "assemblies" now, and they couldn't even get that right.
The manufacturer "admits" that they have a 3rd party to assembly them.
 

Odradek

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1. Price is not a factor. $3k is not $30k and we don't need a technical review to judge the price. The review should be on the merits.

I couldn't respectfully disagree more. How can price not be a factor? To me, it accounts for half of the rating: two components with the exact same measured performance can't be rated equal if one costs a fraction of the other.
 

Yevhen

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H-713

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The real thing that gets this a headless panther from me is that it doesn't bring anything new to the table in terms of performance, but it's also lazy. Putting a pair of Hypex modules in a box also would get a headless panther from me. It's lazy, and it shows me that they either do not have the skills, or simply cannot be bothered, to design their own amplifier. Nothing interesting about it.

The performance issues kind of make this point a bigger deal IMO.
 
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The real thing that gets this a headless panther from me is that it doesn't bring anything new to the table in terms of performance, but it's also lazy. Putting a pair of Hypex modules in a box also would get a headless panther from me. It's lazy, and it shows me that they either do not have the skills, or simply cannot be bothered, to design their own amplifier. Nothing interesting about it.

The performance issues kind of make this point a bigger deal IMO.


You can also extend the logic that amp designers just put X chips on a pcb, and plop common electronics in the box, so it's lazy or they cannot be bothered to design their own chips or electronics.

Hypex amps are end game power amps for just about every person looking for power and transparency in most home audio environments.

Exactly what do you want? What new things can be brought?
 

PJ2000

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Would you please describe in detail the method of your blind test - level matching and randomizing the order of amplifiers. Thank you.
Here you go:
 

LTig

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After reading this review, a friend of mine who ordered this amp and has yet to received it emailed LSA. Below is LSA's reply:

"[..]
We know about the other measurement issues they report but felt that like a lot of high end products it is the sound that counts. Our users seem to feel the same way and all love the amp. The GaN amp has amazing mids and highs that are extremely tube-like.

[..]
Walter"

The plot thickens... o_O :facepalm: :eek:
I get very suspicious if someone sells SS power amps sounding like tubes. The output transformer of tube amps is probably the weakest link and leads to much higher THD especially at the frequency extremes (not that I care much about THD above the 10 kHz fundamental).
 

jhaider

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I get very suspicious if someone sells SS power amps sounding like tubes.
They’re not wrong though. The biggest real sonic difference between “tube sound” and “no sound” is the speaker impedance based EQ. This one seems to do that too.
 

redjr

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If you want a truly exceptional sounding class D amp at a very reasonable price, check out LSA's offering of the Discovery Warp 1 amp. This is a very, very capable amp that has dynamics and articulation while at the same time, sounding smooth and full bodied. At the moment, it is the primary amp in my listening room and it pairs nicely with Elac speakers. In full disclosure, I have the DIY version of this amp with the exception of the PSU. The Warp 1 has a better spec'd one. Check out the full features of this amp on the LSA website. It's a nice deal at their introductory price of $1199.
 

H-713

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You can also extend the logic that amp designers just put X chips on a pcb, and plop common electronics in the box, so it's lazy or they cannot be bothered to design their own chips or electronics.

Hypex amps are end game power amps for just about every person looking for power and transparency in most home audio environments.

Exactly what do you want? What new things can be brought?

The Hypex boards themselves wouldn't be a headless panther. They are well-engineered and perform well.

You have to draw the line somewhere. Designing around chips is one thing (even if it's basically an amp on a chip), buying a module and putting it in a box is another. Using a hypex module in an integrated amp or an active monitor is a separate case in between.

At least, that's how I see it. Others may feel differently.
 

Xii-Nyth

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Indeed you are not educated in the subject. GaN transistors are used for diverse voltage levels.

Anker who became famous by offering iPhone chargers that charge faster use GaN transistors and fit a 30W PSU/charger inside the same size case as the 5W Apple PSU/charger. They are USB and output 5V.
Oh yeah I ended up talking to my dad about it later on, turns out I was thinking a of different one, GaN is actually very diverse in what it can do. So is SiC but it requires a very specific temperature range and is expensive. GaN now is still more expensive than silicon butmuch cheaper than the others since its used in a lot of leds. It used to be more expensive since it was only used in lasers, and GaAs used to be cheaper when people were making hybrid chips with it and silicon, and used to be the only option for stuff a long time ago because it was much faster than silicon on a low transistor count chip (200 GHz, but takes about 1mW per transistor (my dad was accessing memory from like 20 years ago so this info might be out of date))
 

mocenigo

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It was good, but it was not superior to where the market is. I get the impression we are trying to solve a problem that don't exist.

GaN’s place at the moment would be in the power supply, IMO.
 

James Romeyn

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Feb 5, 2019
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Insides + chassis + misc. parts look like $1750 to me, $2k tops, not $3k. Walter will be blowing out specials soon for $2k soon.

It's always awkward when the company that makes a product posts a lower "special" price next to the alleged "SRP."
 

georgehifi

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Sep 30, 2019
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Clearly companies are using GaN as a buzzword without fully taking advantage of what it can provide. Lots of money is left on the table here in many areas from frequency response load dependency to high amount of distortion.

And all they did was to use stock "Eval Boards" from EAS with a off the shelf SMPS.
Sad that they didn't jump on the new GaN technology and did something special with it of their own like others have, instead of using it like quick dollar maker.

Cheers George
 
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