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Review and Measurements of Benchmark AHB2 Amp

RichB

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What song should I play first? What song did you play first? This will be the biggest advancement I will probably ever hear in my lifetime.
My system wide SINBAD limitation is 70-75dB if I were to guess. My current amp. My DAC is 118. So once I get the amp I'll have a system wide limitation of 113 of the amp/ahb2. I'm glad I got the DAC first in preparation.

I bought a few DVD-Audio's & Pure Audio BD's.
Will Smith, in I Am Legend boasted that Bob Marley is the greatest album ever made. I never heard Hollywood endorse an album before?
So I am thinking of the Legend Pure Audio BD with the 96khz PCM tracks.
I also found quite a few 48/24 DVD with music videos. Mostly 80's. So those will probably go second.

What movie should I play first? Not a lot of uncompressed 48/24 BD's. Most uncompressed are 48/16. Box office wise the top ones are:
Pirates Of The Caribbean & Pearl Harbor.
Although with DD/DTS lossless compression it should not make a difference. So maybe this is wrong way to choose. I started comparing dynamic range of lossless/LPCM vs DD/DTS using the TC electronics' DR meter hardware. Sometimes LPCM is better sometimes it is same.

There are very few 96khz BD's. Asia has these 96khz upsampling BD's. So I bought 96khz upsampled Honest Thief. Native 96khz nothing great. I bought them, but only because it is 96khz.

Play Ratatouille but you'll need a good subwoofer :)
Bass EQ for Filtered Movies | Page 473 | AVS Forum

- Rich
 

Dacapalooza

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Play Ratatouille but you'll need a good subwoofer :)
Bass EQ for Filtered Movies | Page 473 | AVS Forum

- Rich
I have SVS Ultra 16. 5K Watts & 16". Sounds wonderful. For movies anyway. Did not compare for music. I actually compared subs at my dealer. It blew everything else he had away.
You are implying I should look for loud movies. Loud usually means Dynamic Range suffers. My understanding is better the DR, better the sound.
I could run Ratatouille in my DR meter to verify. But anyway it is cartoon.

Also the sub has it's own amp. So it will not benefit from the AHB2. So increase of sub usage does not take advantage of the AHB2 in anyway.
I betchya the avg sub amp is probably 70-75 SINBAD.

Speaking of which, I am thinking of getting a Bag End sub with a bridged AHB2. But a better speaker with a bad amp will sound better than a bad speaker with good amp. So we need measurements. I am thinking of buying/sending the host a Bag End sub with a bridged AHB2 to measure.

I betchya a 400 watt sub is fine for my small room
 
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RichB

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You are implying I should look for loud movies. Loud usually means Dynamic Range suffers. My understanding is better the DR, better the sound.
I could run Ratatouille in my DR meter to verify. But anyway it is cartoon.

Also the sub has it's own amp. So it will not benefit from the AHB2. So increase of sub usage does not take advantage of the AHB2 in anyway.

Speaking of which, I am thinking of getting a Bag End sub with a bridged AHB2. But a better speaker with a bad amp will sound better than a bad speaker with good amp. So we need measurements. I am thinking of buying/sending the host a Bag End sub with a bridged AHB2 to measure.

I betchya a 400 watt sub is fine for my small room

Both the movie and soundtrack are animated. :p

- Rich
 

RichB

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Will this amplifier be able to drive B&W 800Diamond?

Yes, but they are reasonably efficient but have some high phase angles and drop close to 3.15 Ohms:
B&W 800 Diamond loudspeaker Measurements | Stereophile.com

. My estimate of the B&W's sensitivity was 90.2dB(B)/2.83V/m, which is within experimental error of the specified 90dB. This is higher than average, but is offset by the fact that the speaker's impedance drops below 4 ohms for most of the midrange and some of the bass (fig.1). There are minima of 3.15 ohms at 91Hz, 3.1 ohms at 620Hz, and 3.67 ohms at 21kHz. Given that there are current-hungry combinations of 4 ohms and –52° electrical phase angle at 62Hz and 5.3 ohms and –39° phase angle at 8.6kHz, I believe this speaker should be rated as a 4 ohm load rather than the specified 8 ohms.

BW800d.jpg

- Rich
 
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Coach_Kaarlo

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Will this amplifier be able to drive B&W 800Diamond?

Will it make some noise come out - sure.

Will it reproduce original content through those power hungry speakers - maybe in bridged mono?

When time permits I will upload some recordings I made in free-field the other day - mono v stereo with my F208's (also a sub 4 ohm speaker). Blind test result was 10 from 10. It makes a difference in real world dynamics with low impedance loudspeakers. Not so much on the test bench with test tones......
 

pogo

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pogo is not asking if we should be concerned about heat, rather how do the measurements suffer. To back pogo up, he has good reason to ask.

That's correct.
With such objective data, you can better understand the behavior of the AHB2 in the real world. So far I have still not received an answer to my questions via email to the manufacturer:(
 
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RichB

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That' correct.
With such objective data, you can better understand the behavior of the AHB2 in the real world. So far I have still not received an answer to my questions via email to the manufacturer:(

What subjective data? Furthermore, what is subjective data? :p

- Rich
 

ChMaKi

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Hello all, I am new to the forum and a newbie/wanna be audiophile. I would very much like to be in the camp that measurements matter most and that anything that measures well will sound great. However, I don’t know what I don’t know. Do I just buy a Benchmark amp and call it a day or is there something else that would sound better to my ears. I see people selling used benchmarks occasionally and that makes me wonder why? Are they the type of people that are never satisfied or did they find something better. If so, what is it and what makes it better? Any thoughts are appreciated.
 

RichB

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Hello all, I am new to the forum and a newbie/wanna be audiophile. I would very much like to be in the camp that measurements matter most and that anything that measures well will sound great. However, I don’t know what I don’t know. Do I just buy a Benchmark amp and call it a day or is there something else that would sound better to my ears. I see people selling used benchmarks occasionally and that makes me wonder why? Are they the type of people that are never satisfied or did they find something better. If so, what is it and what makes it better? Any thoughts are appreciated.

First off, do not aspire to be an audiophile, it will damage your wallet and sanity :p

You cannot go wrong buying an AHB2 if it has sufficient power, and it does for my Salon2s and another user reports a single AHB2 has no issues driving the Revel 328Bes and other challenging speakers.

I don't know why folks sell AHB2s but it could be that audiophile thing, where your hobby ceases to be listening to your system and becomes upgrading your system.

The AHB2 has the lowest noise floor and distortion of just about any amplifier out there. They are extremely well engineered with clip and distortion indicators and will shutdown before damaging your speakers. Other advantages are, small, light, and have no audio noise at your speakers or mechanically.

- Rich
 
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RobS

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Hello all, I am new to the forum and a newbie/wanna be audiophile. I would very much like to be in the camp that measurements matter most and that anything that measures well will sound great. However, I don’t know what I don’t know. Do I just buy a Benchmark amp and call it a day or is there something else that would sound better to my ears. I see people selling used benchmarks occasionally and that makes me wonder why? Are they the type of people that are never satisfied or did they find something better. If so, what is it and what makes it better? Any thoughts are appreciated.

Are you going to be using speakers or headphones? What speakers/headphones? How loud do you listen? What's your room size?

One AHB2 should be enough for most people but it depends on what your setup is.

I would never consider selling my AHB2. I've been on the solid state amp carousel for a long time, dissatisfied with a bunch of stuff I've tried. The AHB2 makes it so I have no yearning to upgrade or consider anything else. I honestly consider the AHB2 a bargain for $3k.

Why do people sell? Maybe they want to add more pleasing distortion or warmth to their music. Or boredom. Or they run into financial problems. Who knows.

I wouldn't look at the used market as indicative of the performance, or lack thereof, of a particular amp. The only thing you should consider is if the amp will work for you and if you like it. Who cares what other people do. I would only be concerned if it was a new product and then you see a flood of them immediately on the used market.
 

pma

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Why do people sell? Maybe they want to add more pleasing distortion or warmth to their music. Or boredom.

Why that irony? They may simple need more power. Benchmark, regardless its excellent distortion numbers, is still not any powerhouse.
 

RobS

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I was being mildly flippant lol.

Yes it isn't a powerhouse. Honestly if you need more power than the 100W into 8r, I would look at getting a different amp entirely. I'm not a fan of bridging stereo amps into mono.
 

RichB

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I bought the silver AHB2, but now I want the black :(
You could send it to Benchmark to get it blackened :)
They wont let you do it at home.

- Rich
 

Dvass13

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You could send it to Benchmark to get it blackened :)
They wont let you do it at home.

- Rich
I was quoted $300+ for the swap, so not really worth it for me. I'll just have to deal with the bright/harsh sound of the silver AHB2 over the dark/warm sound and black background of the black AHB2. /s
 

RichB

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I was quoted $300+ for the swap, so not really worth it for me. I'll just have to deal with the bright/harsh sound of the silver AHB2 over the dark/warm sound and black background of the black AHB2. /s
That's pretty high, I would contact them again and see if they will let you replace the faceplate.

- Rich
 
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