100% agreed. If one considers the difference between a DF of (say) 50 (i.e., a source Z of 16 milliohms) and one of 10,000 (source Z of, the actual effect is really small taking into account the voice coil resistance and the resistance of the cables. This is 0.8 milliohm.
(NB, the source impedance is not constant with frequency, but the rise happens in the treble with falling OL gain, not germane to the claimed bass differences)
Ya know, SY, that even though on paper the output Z seems to not be capable of making any difference, when you listen to these MacroTech amps, somehow they come off as "controlling" the speaker better. That's the impression.
Undoubtedly on a speaker that is already overdamped (low Qtc or Qts, whatever) that same "control" would likely come off as lacking bass, extension, or whatever subjective term might apply.
But per the earlier comments on drum kits recordings and the like, all of the "hit" is actually routed to the highs, not to the lows... the leading edges and the transients, the ringing on the skins, the sticks hitting, all not LF...
But starting with a DF of 10,000 (the MacroRef was higher still ,iirc, something stupid crazy like 40,000?) where does the HF DF end up? Still higher than most amps?
Undoubtedly on a speaker that is already overdamped (low Qtc or Qts, whatever) that same "control" would likely come off as lacking bass, extension, or whatever subjective term might apply.
But per the earlier comments on drum kits recordings and the like, all of the "hit" is actually routed to the highs, not to the lows... the leading edges and the transients, the ringing on the skins, the sticks hitting, all not LF...
But starting with a DF of 10,000 (the MacroRef was higher still ,iirc, something stupid crazy like 40,000?) where does the HF DF end up? Still higher than most amps?
Indeed. Most good solid state amps have low source Z at treble, just not as low as at bass and midrange. But low enough to be insignificant, even more so for the many (most) speakers with a rising impedance in the top octave.
"Impressions" is a reasonable term- massive amps prepare the mind wonderfully, as does the nameplate.
"Impressions" is a reasonable term- massive amps prepare the mind wonderfully, as does the nameplate.
It's just your imagination, bear. It is called BIAS. Mass hallucination. All amps sound the same.
Nah. Sorry.
If I was going to be impressed by heft and faceplates, I would have been a big Krell fan, or before that a Levinson fan. Nope. Not to mention the countless other amps that had massive heatsinks and fat thick, fancy front panels with handles fit for a king and able to lift heavy equipment. Let's not forget the McIntosh line with that fabulous blue green glow and major meters?
Maybe you, not me. Thanks much.
Hope ur being sarcastic and not being serious?
If I was going to be impressed by heft and faceplates, I would have been a big Krell fan, or before that a Levinson fan. Nope. Not to mention the countless other amps that had massive heatsinks and fat thick, fancy front panels with handles fit for a king and able to lift heavy equipment. Let's not forget the McIntosh line with that fabulous blue green glow and major meters?
Maybe you, not me. Thanks much.
Hope ur being sarcastic and not being serious?
Yes, the "unfortunate" reality is that all amps, and electronic gear involved in audio sound 'different', depending upon everything - because they have to live in the real world, not some cloistered environment where expensive test equipment vainly tries to pick up meaningful variations ...
So sorry I ever brought up the power supply, I thought for sure the macro-tech were some kind of switching-mode or PWM supply...my mistake. But I can confirm that roadies and techies LOVED the Macro-Tech VZ 5000vz and 5002vz. I had a bunch of the all-switching CE4000 which never won over the touring crowd despite much lighter weight.
All amps are not created equal. When an amp is pushing around heavy 15" or 18" pro drivers, starting and stopping that mass in perfect sync with the signal is no simple task. I'm no engineer but I would imagine that it is impossible for any amp to do that perfectly. And if there is no perfection then there is only varying degrees of imperfection. Maybe the Crown amps discussed here are simply less imperfect than most (or possibly all) other amps in regards to handling low frequencies due to superior engineering of their circuitry. Why should that concept be so hard to get on board with?
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"All amps sound the same"
All food tastes the same(if you have a zinc deficency), all women kiss the same(if you're a eunuch), VHS and Beta look the same(to Ray Charles and Stevie Wonder), and all amplifers sound the same(to the deaf old men at Stereo Review).
WHO?
Tell the deaf/dumb/blind kid to go play pinball.
All food tastes the same(if you have a zinc deficency), all women kiss the same(if you're a eunuch), VHS and Beta look the same(to Ray Charles and Stevie Wonder), and all amplifers sound the same(to the deaf old men at Stereo Review).
WHO?
Tell the deaf/dumb/blind kid to go play pinball.
Dead serious. We cannot control our biases, whether from size, nameplate, rep, whatever. It's a fact of being human whether we deny it or not. Find extra "slam" ears-only and that's a different matter. As it sits, the evidence for the claimed effect is of the fairies-in-the-garden level.
I'm dead serious about this too. You simply cannot listen objectively if you have any preconceptions about what you're listening to. I know I can't, I've proved it to myself by experiment. And there are any number of trials that show that highly respected audiophiles are vulnerable to these biases too.
Scopeboy, I know of no "high respected audiophiles"! Who are these mythic individuals? And at this trial, who was on the jury, who was the judge and the prosecutor, defense attorney?
Time for voir-dire, Lord SY! Present your evidence!!
En Garde!
Poor SY, sitting there with his only one perfectly good enough amp? Which one is it? Will you share the design and schematic with us please? Which shall it be, perhaps Self's blameless? Is that the one?
Well I guess we can all go home, sign out, log off.
Slam? Dunno about this slam business. Slam ears? <POWWW> <WACK>
Visual bias? If there was ever one not good looking, bordering on ugly amp, it's the MacroTech series. The MicroTech mabye was worse, if that is possible. So we could do a test with a bevy of shiny sleek amps vs.an ugly MicroTech amp? And, so the visual bias will make people believe that ugly = slam??
Maybe we could lie and play the wrong amp when saying the Crown was running? Prove the bias was visual?
Burn the strawman!
Burn the amps!
Join me fellow DiyAudio-ers, it has come time to BURN THE AMPS!!
LET US RALLY TO THIS GREAT CAUSE TODAY!
Time for voir-dire, Lord SY! Present your evidence!!
En Garde!
Poor SY, sitting there with his only one perfectly good enough amp? Which one is it? Will you share the design and schematic with us please? Which shall it be, perhaps Self's blameless? Is that the one?
Well I guess we can all go home, sign out, log off.
Slam? Dunno about this slam business. Slam ears? <POWWW> <WACK>
Visual bias? If there was ever one not good looking, bordering on ugly amp, it's the MacroTech series. The MicroTech mabye was worse, if that is possible. So we could do a test with a bevy of shiny sleek amps vs.an ugly MicroTech amp? And, so the visual bias will make people believe that ugly = slam??
Maybe we could lie and play the wrong amp when saying the Crown was running? Prove the bias was visual?
Burn the strawman!
Burn the amps!
Join me fellow DiyAudio-ers, it has come time to BURN THE AMPS!!
LET US RALLY TO THIS GREAT CAUSE TODAY!
You can fool a handful of audiophiles to buy something given enough marketing hype. Fooling an entire industry (or large portion thereof) is a little harder to do. If a significant number of people who have used them professionally agree that the macrotechs do a better job of driving subwoofers in a large PA setting compared to other amps they have used you can probably beleive it. If these lead-brick-heavy amps were no better than the competition they would have been abandoned in very short order. They weren't, at least not immediately.
If you want to find out why they sound the way they do you'll have to reverse engineer it. Or otherwise have enough experience building amps to come to the same conclusions you would if you did.
I'm not the one making the remarkable claim. The measurements for the Crown have been published- they indicate low distortion, flat frequency response, high power, low noise, low source impedance. All the things that people can actually detect ears-only. If you believe that it will sound any different than any other good solid state amp with these characteristics (e.g., Bryston, Parasound, Adcom...), let's see your ears-only evidence. That's what it takes. https://yourlogicalfallacyis.com/burden-of-proof
Otherwise, it's the same marketing-driven handwaving that's been going on since the last remaining engineering issues in power amplification were nailed down many decades ago and removed the audible performance differentiators. That may be significant to those who make money building and selling amps, but irrelevant to technical understanding.
That said, a Crown (or, for that matter, a Blameless) WILL sound different than an amp with high source impedance, high distortion, poor overload characteristics, and non-flat frequency response, i.e., an effects box.
Speculating on the cause of an attribute not actually shown to be real may be fun for some, but given the extraordinary nature of the claim and the total absence of evidence, it's Make Believe Time. If that dose of reality offends people, well, that's really not my worry.
Power delivery is a prime consideration in that application. That's very different than home audio. The Crowns undoubtedly do very well there. I don't have market data, but I'd suspect that in the pro applications, the class D stuff from Crown, Powersoft. Ashly, and the like are becoming dominant (or already are).
Note that more people believe in astrology than in speciation by natural selection. https://yourlogicalfallacyis.com/bandwagon
IME the PA mob are a very cautious bunch, as their jobs depend on things working. If a particular amp pumps out 1KW continuously, night after night, month after month without failing, then people will keep using it and tell all their mates. Weight is a concern, but burly roadies are cheap.
So you end up with a well-engineered product with a cast iron reputation in the industry. like the old saying ' no one got fired for buying IBM' which is of course no longer true.
As for the 'SLAM', the balance of probabilities says that enough people said that these amps had 'slam' for everyone to believe it (bar the stereophile reviewers who couldn't believe something so utilitarian could sound better than the hewn from granite mcbling they used). Roadies are good at getting things into folklore.
Either that or the designers know something no one else does about power amps.
Oh and I want one. An Amp that you can hook up to a sine wave on one end and a kettle on the other and make a cup of tea is a necessary part of any man den.
This has actually been done many times in the history of hifi, and the results were exactly as you would expect if the bias was in fact visual. For example, Floyd Toole wrote about the loudspeaker testing he did at Harman: if the panel of judges was allowed to see the speakers, the more impressive looking ones scored higher on sound quality. When the speakers were hidden from view by an acoustically transparent curtain, the results were completely different.
(Yeah, I know, Harman and their brands are not "High Respected Audiophiles", but there are many other examples...)
Ha ha ha!
I say burn the amps first, ask questions later!!
The "burden of proof"?
Prove this, prove that.
Let's avoid the mid-fi tests of Toole, etc... not that there is nothing to be learned at all. Just that these "tests" yield little in terms of peeling back the onion. There is little dispositive in said "tests".
Dear SY, dost thou belivest truly? Sayeth thou that "...any other good solid state amp with these characteristics (e.g., Bryston, Parasound, Adcom...)..." do truly sound the same? They sound the same as any better than good amp of the solid state persuasion? And, what - I must go forth and prove your assertion to be false?
I think John Curl would tell you that his amp (Parasound) does sound better than the others aforementioned. But he would only say that because he designed them... <sigh> He is biased in this regard.
Well, my personal view is that if you can not (you your physical and metaphysical self) discern clearly audible differences between amps of the quality aforementioned and better (better technically speaking) then there is nothing to discuss, as one is truly as good as another. Therefore other than looks, price is the only concern. (eg. David Rich, Sensible Sound, etc...)
Otoh, if the system and program material played (for the purpose of "testing") happen to "mask" or otherwise fail to be physically capable of reproducing accurately enough (in one way or another) then one could not possibly discern said difference(s) and none would be appreciated.
How does one know a priori that a given system can or can not "rise to the occasion"?
So, that's it then.
Lovely day for a walk. Back later chaps!
I say burn the amps first, ask questions later!!
The "burden of proof"?
Prove this, prove that.
Let's avoid the mid-fi tests of Toole, etc... not that there is nothing to be learned at all. Just that these "tests" yield little in terms of peeling back the onion. There is little dispositive in said "tests".
Dear SY, dost thou belivest truly? Sayeth thou that "...any other good solid state amp with these characteristics (e.g., Bryston, Parasound, Adcom...)..." do truly sound the same? They sound the same as any better than good amp of the solid state persuasion? And, what - I must go forth and prove your assertion to be false?
I think John Curl would tell you that his amp (Parasound) does sound better than the others aforementioned. But he would only say that because he designed them... <sigh> He is biased in this regard.
Well, my personal view is that if you can not (you your physical and metaphysical self) discern clearly audible differences between amps of the quality aforementioned and better (better technically speaking) then there is nothing to discuss, as one is truly as good as another. Therefore other than looks, price is the only concern. (eg. David Rich, Sensible Sound, etc...)
Otoh, if the system and program material played (for the purpose of "testing") happen to "mask" or otherwise fail to be physically capable of reproducing accurately enough (in one way or another) then one could not possibly discern said difference(s) and none would be appreciated.
How does one know a priori that a given system can or can not "rise to the occasion"?
So, that's it then.
Lovely day for a walk. Back later chaps!
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