I find I usually spend about 1/2 as much on a receiver as I do on my front channel speakers. Is this about right>??? What kind of Receiver/amp are you guys running for said speakers?
I am currently looking at both the Parts express Solstice kit, or just buying the Philharmonics BMR Philharmonitor. With this said, my receiver is an old Marantz SR585. Will this suffice?
I am currently looking at both the Parts express Solstice kit, or just buying the Philharmonics BMR Philharmonitor. With this said, my receiver is an old Marantz SR585. Will this suffice?
I spent 8x on my speakers as my amp mixer & radio. Good speakers with a defined Harmonic Distortion specification are rare and even on the used market, expensive. ***pped out amps, mixers & radios are garbage in resale shops or on the internet. Resolder some joints, a few new capacitors, and in trashed units transistors diodes & even resistors, the amps mixers & radios are as good as new. Replacement speaker drivers run $200 up.
During the great bar band closure after smoking was banned in bars, I got the great SP2-XT speakers for about $600 the pair, the dynaco ST120 amp with crossover disortion & blown output transistors for about $50, the mixer with hissy hummy sound for $15. Took about $50 to upgrade the amp and $20 to upgrade the RIAA mixer. Plus lots of hours. The only thing wrong with the speakers was they were covered in cigarette ash. A FM radio I fished out of a trash can @ work needed new volume pot, a couple of capacitors, a headphone connector. Didn't bother with the cassette function, cassettes sounded like **** new.
Voila! high end sound for <$1000 plus 4 years learning & repairing. It's do it yourself audio.
During the great bar band closure after smoking was banned in bars, I got the great SP2-XT speakers for about $600 the pair, the dynaco ST120 amp with crossover disortion & blown output transistors for about $50, the mixer with hissy hummy sound for $15. Took about $50 to upgrade the amp and $20 to upgrade the RIAA mixer. Plus lots of hours. The only thing wrong with the speakers was they were covered in cigarette ash. A FM radio I fished out of a trash can @ work needed new volume pot, a couple of capacitors, a headphone connector. Didn't bother with the cassette function, cassettes sounded like **** new.
Voila! high end sound for <$1000 plus 4 years learning & repairing. It's do it yourself audio.
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so, soundwise the ratio is like 90% speaker and 10% Amp (only to name a scale).
Many blind test give doubts, that it is really possible to make a difference (better/worse) between two amps, if they designed well and have no other mistakes.
From my experience there are differences between amps, but the are subtle.
Also for me it seems more important that the amp matches the speaker and not that the amp is expensive.
Even professional Studio Monitors, like Neumann, Genelec,.., using in their their active speakers amp modules you can buy for less 10 $. And they sound very good.
Many blind test give doubts, that it is really possible to make a difference (better/worse) between two amps, if they designed well and have no other mistakes.
From my experience there are differences between amps, but the are subtle.
Also for me it seems more important that the amp matches the speaker and not that the amp is expensive.
Even professional Studio Monitors, like Neumann, Genelec,.., using in their their active speakers amp modules you can buy for less 10 $. And they sound very good.
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The question can only be answered : what do professionals do?
Every professional monitor is active. Amps can then be simpler and better no need for short / SOAR protection. Impedance of speakers are well known
and so are the mechanical and electrical limits. There is so to speak more intellectual effort in the limiters and in frequency/phase compensating than in the amp. Furthermore , current drive of voice coil could be advantageous and is easy to implement. Active is the way to go.
Every professional monitor is active. Amps can then be simpler and better no need for short / SOAR protection. Impedance of speakers are well known
and so are the mechanical and electrical limits. There is so to speak more intellectual effort in the limiters and in frequency/phase compensating than in the amp. Furthermore , current drive of voice coil could be advantageous and is easy to implement. Active is the way to go.
Well, most professional mixing engineers were driving NS10M with Bryston, some Crown. Driving small speakers was not an easy task, but Class-D completely changed the price ratio. Pre-class-D era, a good amp was as costly as a good speaker.
Today, many audiophiles choose highly efficient large speakers with small but costly analog amp, so the standard in today's professional world does not mean much for them.
Today, many audiophiles choose highly efficient large speakers with small but costly analog amp, so the standard in today's professional world does not mean much for them.
The cost to build a normal (not "high end") amplifier actually doesn't vary that much even as power level increases. More power requires a bigger power transformer, more heatsink and more output transistors. Things like labor and the rest of the circuit don't rise much with output power. So to go from a 50 watt amplifier to a 1,000 watt one may as much as triple the cost it doesn't go up twenty times.
However loudspeakers can vary greatly in quality even for the same size drivers. Now there is not that much change in price range for most of the components such as cones, surrounds and spiders. However going from a stamped frame to a cast one, using a large rare earth magnet etc. do increase costs significantly. The crossover in a high end loudspeaker may have many more components and of significantly higher quality. Compare the cost of a 20 uF non-polar electrolytic to a good film capacitor! Of course there is also the loudspeaker enclosure. A vinyl wrapped medium density fiberboard case is a trivial cost compared to a nice wood veneered multilayer braced plywood one.
So at the low end the loudspeakers can cost less than the electronics! But as things get better more money will improve loudspeakers until you reach the price point there the cost benefit curve reaches a knee, often called audiophile etc.
However loudspeakers can vary greatly in quality even for the same size drivers. Now there is not that much change in price range for most of the components such as cones, surrounds and spiders. However going from a stamped frame to a cast one, using a large rare earth magnet etc. do increase costs significantly. The crossover in a high end loudspeaker may have many more components and of significantly higher quality. Compare the cost of a 20 uF non-polar electrolytic to a good film capacitor! Of course there is also the loudspeaker enclosure. A vinyl wrapped medium density fiberboard case is a trivial cost compared to a nice wood veneered multilayer braced plywood one.
So at the low end the loudspeakers can cost less than the electronics! But as things get better more money will improve loudspeakers until you reach the price point there the cost benefit curve reaches a knee, often called audiophile etc.
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I agree. It is the synergy between amp and speaker that is important, not the relative cost.
It depends on your total expenditure. The more money you have to spend the higher percentage goes toward the speaker. Or, most people dont need more than 100watts, better speakers dont usualy need more power than cheap ones so the diminishing returns on amps starts at $500 where as for speakers its probably more like $2000. So if youve got $500 to spend $150 on amp $350 on speakers (ballpark). If youve got $5000 to spend I would buy a $1000 amp and $4000 speakers. But at $10000 I would probably get the same $1000 amp and put $9000 towards speaker. Unfortunatley, escpecially in hi end audio, the price has very little to do with performance so a $1000 amp maybe worse than a $500 one.
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Recording studios are a different bread. Ive never heard SPL levels even close at home, and the rooms are usually larger. A 400 watt amp with a large current capacity, is minimum to prevent cliping, which would blow tweeters. Couple that with unexpected dynamics during recording and its easy to see the need for excessive power.
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