DSJR
Major Contributor
I remember how the first Naim amps were put down at my employers as it was supposedly a glorified Sinclair kit amp run on the verge of ringing/oscillation - I had no idea about the Wireless World article about the RCA? design from many years earlier back then... A pal made a Z60 based Sinclair kit as a teenage fun project and it worked well for the couple of years he used it before moving onwards (and upwards?). He has a couple of now older Topping amps and likes them a lot - that's how I first got to know the name - and they (I think he uses one per channel) 'sounded' fine to me if not pushed too hard
I agree we're in a really good place where decent *cheap* amplifier performance is concerned, but the high end still seems stuck in the past and good bench performance as a basis still doesn't seem to matter to many manufacturers for one reason or another - maybe they want 'character' designed in to make their products subjectively stand out (clipping bahaviour is probably one of the key subjective things in a dem situation) and I can think of one niche maker in particular who actively scorned good measurements as promoted here for example. To them it appears, it's irrelevant to good sounding music reproduction...
I did look to see if the Ayima amp linked to above was available in the UK and it looks patchy right now (Brexit documentation and related taxes/duties again?). There's another similar looking one for less money but no idea if it's the Topping D10 inferior-'clone' situation again.
I agree we're in a really good place where decent *cheap* amplifier performance is concerned, but the high end still seems stuck in the past and good bench performance as a basis still doesn't seem to matter to many manufacturers for one reason or another - maybe they want 'character' designed in to make their products subjectively stand out (clipping bahaviour is probably one of the key subjective things in a dem situation) and I can think of one niche maker in particular who actively scorned good measurements as promoted here for example. To them it appears, it's irrelevant to good sounding music reproduction...
I did look to see if the Ayima amp linked to above was available in the UK and it looks patchy right now (Brexit documentation and related taxes/duties again?). There's another similar looking one for less money but no idea if it's the Topping D10 inferior-'clone' situation again.