Posted by: Brian Ackerman / Aaudio imports
on behalf of Jorn Janckaz / Tidal
My name is Jörn Janczak from TIDAL, Germany. I want to clear some things if
it comes to the power needs of TIDAL speakers in general. Aside of private
experiences and opinions, I would like to offer my side as the engineer
behind Tidal Speakers and my experience with TIDAL speaker clients worldwide
for over a decade. Now my help and advice:
Electrically, one can run them also with low power amps and everyone should
feel free to check if they will be happy with it. About half of all TIDAL
clients do like to drive TIDAL speakers with tube amps below 100 watts and are
super happy with it. The other half drives them with very good solid state
amps and are also super happy with it. If a speaker is free of flaws and does
not colorize a signal, then one can "color" it with the amp of choice and
give it a preference in tonality.
In fact the Piano / Piano Cera / Piano Diacera series is the "hardest load"
TIDAL has, with impedance between 4.2 - 8.5 ohm, the electrical phase shift is
small, efficiency is the lowest in our range. We do have clients driving it
with 40 watt SET amps and are totally happy with it. Healthy 100 watt at 8 ohm
brings it even further and can drive it to the max, but it is not a must. As with
all TIDAL speakers it grows with the quality of the amps/chain/room. But
from the electrical side it is in fact an easy load. We never go down lower
then 4.2 ohm with these speakers.
Contriva / Contriva Diacera is an easy load at, 4.1 - 6.5 ohm all the time,
very good efficiency for a dynamic speaker with a linear (!) frequency
response. I had clients here in my demo room (40m²) bringing their 25 watt
SET amps, and it played amazingly loud and dynamic. As always; more power drives
it even further and with a real 160 watt at 8 ohms one can drive it already to
the max. excursion (depending on the software one is feeding this speaker
with) into an area where one can risk damage to their beloved ears already.
Absolutely ready for SET. And yes it can handle a lot of power and shows
that the limits can not be touched by 25 watts, but as always; it is a CAN
be, not a MUST to drive it with more power then that. Always quality before
quantity!
Sunray: from the electrical side - most easy to drive speaker. Even
though it has 7 drivers here, the impedance is almost linear at about 4.8 ohm -
5.5 ohm and has almost no phase shifting, the x-over inside is managing it
perfectly to melt all the seven drivers to a single-unit without any
electrical bug inside. Like other speakers can do with dips below 4 ohm,
sometimes even below 2 ohm. We have for e.g. a client driving a Sunray with
30 watt Audionote Ongaku amps in a big room (> 50m² with very high ceilings)
and it sounds great, live and dynamic. Yes, it could play even more dynamic
and louder with even more power, but the difference is like driving 120 mph
or 140 mph. In reality we all listen to normal level with headroom for
louder passages like in orchestral music, not crazy party levels. For those
guys, yes, we recommend power > 150 watts on 8 ohm. For all Tidal speaker models.
To show how "theoretical" numbers, here are some easy simple facts from
physics: 1dB more needs about a third more power, 1dB more is not to hear in
reality terms. 2 times more power just means a level increase of 3dB. Almost
not to hear. So if an amp has 100 watt or 200 watt makes electrical wise
almost no difference. About 10dB more means for the human ear about "twice
as loud", to make this happen one needs 10 times more power! That means: the
client with the a 30 watt SET amp would have to bring a SET amp with 300 watts to say
"now it is about twice as loud".
My point is; electrically one can run it also with low power amps and
everyone should feel free to check if they will be happy with it. About a
third of all TIDAL clients worldwide do like to drive TIDAL speakers with
tubes below 100 watt and are super happy with it. The other clients drive it
with very good solid state and are also super happy with it. If a speaker is
free of flaws and does not colorize a signal, then one can "color" it with
the amp of choice and give it a preference in tonality.
with best regards from Germany,
Jörn Janczak
CEO, TIDAL Audio GmbH
on behalf of Jorn Janckaz / Tidal
My name is Jörn Janczak from TIDAL, Germany. I want to clear some things if
it comes to the power needs of TIDAL speakers in general. Aside of private
experiences and opinions, I would like to offer my side as the engineer
behind Tidal Speakers and my experience with TIDAL speaker clients worldwide
for over a decade. Now my help and advice:
Electrically, one can run them also with low power amps and everyone should
feel free to check if they will be happy with it. About half of all TIDAL
clients do like to drive TIDAL speakers with tube amps below 100 watts and are
super happy with it. The other half drives them with very good solid state
amps and are also super happy with it. If a speaker is free of flaws and does
not colorize a signal, then one can "color" it with the amp of choice and
give it a preference in tonality.
In fact the Piano / Piano Cera / Piano Diacera series is the "hardest load"
TIDAL has, with impedance between 4.2 - 8.5 ohm, the electrical phase shift is
small, efficiency is the lowest in our range. We do have clients driving it
with 40 watt SET amps and are totally happy with it. Healthy 100 watt at 8 ohm
brings it even further and can drive it to the max, but it is not a must. As with
all TIDAL speakers it grows with the quality of the amps/chain/room. But
from the electrical side it is in fact an easy load. We never go down lower
then 4.2 ohm with these speakers.
Contriva / Contriva Diacera is an easy load at, 4.1 - 6.5 ohm all the time,
very good efficiency for a dynamic speaker with a linear (!) frequency
response. I had clients here in my demo room (40m²) bringing their 25 watt
SET amps, and it played amazingly loud and dynamic. As always; more power drives
it even further and with a real 160 watt at 8 ohms one can drive it already to
the max. excursion (depending on the software one is feeding this speaker
with) into an area where one can risk damage to their beloved ears already.
Absolutely ready for SET. And yes it can handle a lot of power and shows
that the limits can not be touched by 25 watts, but as always; it is a CAN
be, not a MUST to drive it with more power then that. Always quality before
quantity!
Sunray: from the electrical side - most easy to drive speaker. Even
though it has 7 drivers here, the impedance is almost linear at about 4.8 ohm -
5.5 ohm and has almost no phase shifting, the x-over inside is managing it
perfectly to melt all the seven drivers to a single-unit without any
electrical bug inside. Like other speakers can do with dips below 4 ohm,
sometimes even below 2 ohm. We have for e.g. a client driving a Sunray with
30 watt Audionote Ongaku amps in a big room (> 50m² with very high ceilings)
and it sounds great, live and dynamic. Yes, it could play even more dynamic
and louder with even more power, but the difference is like driving 120 mph
or 140 mph. In reality we all listen to normal level with headroom for
louder passages like in orchestral music, not crazy party levels. For those
guys, yes, we recommend power > 150 watts on 8 ohm. For all Tidal speaker models.
To show how "theoretical" numbers, here are some easy simple facts from
physics: 1dB more needs about a third more power, 1dB more is not to hear in
reality terms. 2 times more power just means a level increase of 3dB. Almost
not to hear. So if an amp has 100 watt or 200 watt makes electrical wise
almost no difference. About 10dB more means for the human ear about "twice
as loud", to make this happen one needs 10 times more power! That means: the
client with the a 30 watt SET amp would have to bring a SET amp with 300 watts to say
"now it is about twice as loud".
My point is; electrically one can run it also with low power amps and
everyone should feel free to check if they will be happy with it. About a
third of all TIDAL clients worldwide do like to drive TIDAL speakers with
tubes below 100 watt and are super happy with it. The other clients drive it
with very good solid state and are also super happy with it. If a speaker is
free of flaws and does not colorize a signal, then one can "color" it with
the amp of choice and give it a preference in tonality.
with best regards from Germany,
Jörn Janczak
CEO, TIDAL Audio GmbH