What do you look for in a Home Power Amp , Specs , Aesthetics , Amp Class "A" or "A/B" or "D"
Trying to find out what most people are actually buying as far as just an Amplifier and what their criteria is for actually making the purchase.......trying to learn and help me to NOT make a mistake......
What Mistake are you going to make? I am Genuinely curious. It's not Like Pregnancy. You can take it back if you don't like it.
Dare I say this. But... This JiiPee is right about 50W being a good solid number as long as your speakers play nice and match up to your amp. Obviously you need more if you want to go into the Danger zone!
Unless You like Your amplifiers hot and heavy, I'd stay away from class A. Regarding specs, 50W per channel is easily enough for me, but everybody needs to find out themselves what's enough for their purposes. For power amps, I'd like SINAD to be at least 70dB in the 1W to 50W power range. (60dB could be enough, but I like to have some margin just to be sure).
Ideally, I'd like power amps to be integrated into speakers with DSPs to handle crossovers and equalizatios
Not to hot on the idea of speakers having all that gear inside of them. Fine for monitors. Might be fine for most folks. Not for me. I like to keep my parts serpreate. This becomes more of an issue with home theater installations. Going fully active with 14 speakers is possible. I just don't see it being practical. But that 50 Watts per SPEAKER seem perfect as not a ton of drivers out there take 50 watts so well without going above 1% distortion. Hence my love for Line arrays and multiple driver speakers.
In the end? As long as you don't get your Amp from from some dude that sells them from the back of his Honda Civic in the back of the Walmart parking lot? I think you'll be fine.
WORRY about your SPEAKERS and SPEND that money there! And I think this works for most people.
I may not be able to tell one amp from each other. But I can HEAR without a doubt in my mind a low quality speaker to a well designed one. even more so with drivers. Subwoofers are a Toss up at low volumes and below 60 Hz for me. Its when you get them moving and can hear something Other then the Bass notes is where I start bitching.
The thing is? You can get a $99 amp and be Just fine and dandy. Not so with a $99 speaker. Speakers are where every single bit of the Magic really happens. If you speakers suck? Who cares if your Amplifier has Good parts. You are never going to hear it if you speakers are just not up to the task. Let alone getting them set up right in your room.
Hence why there are so many people into headphones. Everyone can tell one set from another. They may not be able to tell you what brand it is. But they can tell they all sound different. Not so with Amplification or even DAC for most of the public.
Hell even power is not a problem anymore.
I don't know how they did it. But these days?
You can get 160,000 WATT AMPLIFIER for $680 bucks with a 95dB S/N ratio.
And look at it? THere is nothing in it!
Man.. I'm tempted to buy this and send it to AMIR. I'm sure he has a Outlet for 300VDC. Or can just hook it up to his electrical box with some Full bridge rectifiers. My point is? Amplification has been tackled. Worry about your DAC, your Source, and your speakers and your setup.
By the time you get all that right? Only then will you really be able to tell where your Amplification is weak at and spend money to suit.
I'd also caution about Used gear. That great amplifier from even 10 years ago may not sound all that sweet today. Caps and parts inside do age. I have heard it from my TEAC and Kenwood Home Receivers. If you like vintage? Plan on at least a Capacitor refresh. Same goes with Speakers that have electrolytics.
And this crap you can't hear a Capactor? BULLSHIT! I know what a Bad and worn one sounds like!
In fact, I'm pretty sure Danny makes a TON of business on this fact alone for speaker crossovers. The same thing that causes drift in Crosover parts also makes its ugly sound known in amps that may use this stuff in their output stage. Not so much of an issue in the power stage but its something to look for since you asked.
And while on the Subject? Do you really have your listening room perfect? I would wage a Bet that there are still things that you need to take care of there first before you make the final choice on amplification. Room treatments, Getting familiar with REW and a measurement microphone etc.
1. Price - if I can't afford it then it's not under consideration
2. Specs - it needs to have enough power for the job with low distortion etc.
3. Æsthetics - not a huge consideration but I would never buy anything as despicably ugly as McIntosh gear. Though that would probably get excluded by price anyway ...