Can pro amps possibly sound good? Crown, QSC, etc


I have been looking into pro amps for a to-be-built HT/music room. Recently I came across an old review in The Stereo Times: The Complete Audiophile Magazine, which reviewed 2 discontinued Crown amps, the K2 and the Studio Reference I. The K2 the reviewer thought "not distinguished or especially musically refined", but the Studio Ref he thought an EXCELLENT full-range amp. It does have some amazing specs:

Signal-to-Noise (A-weighted) below rated full bandwidth power: 120 dB.
Damping Factor: >20,000 from 10 Hz to 400Hz.
780WPC into 8 ohms, 1160WPC into 4 ohms.

The review is here.

From what I've found so far, there are possbile downsides to using pro gear in an otherwise consumer setup, but in my case I think these are non-issues:

-fan noise: not an issue for me since I will have an equipment closet. Won't have to do a "fan mod".

-ugly: again, not an issue for me with an equipment closet

-hum: I believe not an issue as long as I use balanced interconnects from the prepro. Someone correct me if I'm wrong.

-expects pro-level input levels: I think not an issue if the amp has dip switches or gain controls?

And yet, over on a couple of AVS forum threads, I actually got asked to leave when I started suggesting pro amps. It seems as though some of the audiophiles there (and the same guys might be over here) don't even want to hear about a class of gear which imo just MIGHT sound good. It just isn't worth "polluting" an audiophile thread. Am I missing some other downside to pro amps, other than the above pints? Were these guys attitudes based on something substantive and audibly detectable, or just a form of audio bigotry?

I'm not saying all pro amps are going to be great (for instance I know the Behringer A500 is lousy), but might there be some good stuff too, like QSC DCA, or Crown Macro Reference (other suggestions would be welcome)?
syswei
I owned clubs. I've had Crown, Crest, QSC and more. I still have a qsc running my whole house audio (quality is marginal with in ceilings anyway). However, I really don't like the quality of sound compared to most mid-fi amps. I have a PSE Studio IV for sale and a QSC 1200. I'll take the PSE with 100 watts over the QSC 120 watts any day. Much more detail, better soundstage, and yes a little softer/more forgiving/not rudely revealing.
My big Crest amps were awesome for $4000 each. But that's ridiculous for home. If you are spending that, get custom engineered JBL or Genelec speakers made for the room too...
Ok, I went home to prove to myself that I wasn't full of it. My PSE is worth about $375, QSC worth about $300.
I did a side by side test. It was like night and day. My dog could tell the difference...Needless to say, the QSC is for sale. Besides raw power, a cooling fan and being a bulletproof sub amp, it sucks for stereo listening or theater.
And, I did the side by side using a Denon multi room receiver and Paradigm in-walls. Imagine how it would do with my AR pre and Sota table?
I was at a outdoor party a couple of weekends ago and the DJ had some pro audio gear and I was really impressed on the quality of sound, lots of detail, and at a low volume. I was curious so I decided to look and see what he was using in his setup. The amp what an older version Tascam, a cheap cd player and was using a crate equalizer. I started looking for pro audio gear on the net and there are two pro amps I am considering, QSC RMX and Face Audio. Face Audio is a Class H amp with zero distortion. I might be consiering the face audio, still doing more research. David
I have three CarverPro ZR1600 amps and five Channel Island D200 amps, and each set of amps has been used in a multichannel system using Maggie MG1.6 speakers. The ZR1600 is juat as good as the D200 (which is a well regarded "audiophile" amp) and delivers more power at half the cost. Gain is easily changed to suit need with a jumper plug, and fan noise is not a problem because the amps are in the cellar. My ZR1600 cost slightly more than $2400 for three. Current price is a bit more. What a deal!
Maybe it's the really nice front end stuff I have feeding it (Zero One Mercury CD/HD and Supratek Chenin tube preamp), but the Crown sounds fine to me for casual listening. YMMV