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Class D is affordable and sounds as good or better the SS/Valve why buy anything else ?

I have spent a fair amount of my hard earned money on big ticket brand new SS and VT/Valve amplifiers over the years without hesitation, with state of the art 2019 class D amplifiers becoming cheaper and sounding better, i wouldn't join in again.

For older technology amplifiers SS VT/Valve to compete with State of the art class D, Their prices are going up and up.

One example is Pilium Audio from Greece or Bulgaria their Divine Line the prices are all over £100,000 for their pre amps and power amps, I know the UK importer he said they sound OK,

Another example FM Acoustics again up to and over £100,000 for pre and power amps. i have owned FM Acoustics pre and power again their OK,

I am not saying they do not sound good, i am saying why spend this much when state of the art class D probably sounds as good now and can only improve with the GaN capacitors and is nearly up to 100 times cheaper.

Is there still a market for multi thousand £$s SS or VT/Valve amplifiers ?

When class D finally overtakes SS VT/Valves what will people do with their multi thousand £$ amplifiers, keep them knowing there is something better ? Or will we see the market flood with exotic used amplifiers ?

Digital technology is rapidly growing pace and becoming cheaper, with GaN capacitors being introduced the sound is going to get better and better and will slowly or quickly become even more affordable.

If you had 50,000 to spend on an Amplifier, would you buy a high ticket SS amplifier and hope for the best ?

Would you stay safe and go with high ticket valve amp, class D can never match good valves right ?

Or would you sit tight and see how the GaN capacitors can further improve the performance of state of the art class D ?

Please feel free to join in, everybody is welcome, i think its a very delicate/touchy discussion for some people with big bucks invested in older type amplifiers.
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dorkwad
317 posts
 
I have a Nuforce Ref 9 V3 Se mono amps w/ TDSS level 3 upgrades. They are class D.  The standard Nuforce Ref 9 V3 SE amps already sounded very good.  It is why I Iooked into the many Nuforce and Nuprime owners that were having their amps upgraded by Bob Smith at TDSS and were very excited by the results.  For well under $4000 including the cost of the Nuforce amps originally, I ended up having them done and the result was now like having a pair of super amps for sound.  It also made them more reliable than stock.  I've used them in friend's houses with very different systems and speakers.  In every case, the TDSS Nuforce amps made the best sounds compared to expensive and well reviewed amps they were using prior.  The 2 mono amps are so small and light I can carry both under one arm easily.  I happen to have a very good TRL DUDE preamp that is 75 lbs. of great sound.  I was using VMPS RM40 BCSE ribbon speakers and they sounded great.  Now, I have an awesome pair of Vapor Joule Black speakers and the sound is just off the charts fantastic in every way.  I also upgraded my cables after hearing the potential of the Vapors.  This was the last touch the made a very nice difference.  At this point, following a 5-6 year plan I had, there is nothing to want in any way from my system.  I will just kick back and enjoy the music.  I had Edge and Bryston amps prior.  They were both good amps but these with the TDSS upgrades are many rungs higher on the ladder of sound.  

Bob
itsjustme
91 posts
 
The simple answer is that some people don't agree with your hypothesis, me included.  Maybe we are wrong, but that's the answer. If we all start with the assumption that class D is perfect, the discussion becomes entirely meaningless, except to a marketing manager trying to decide when old habits will die. IMNSHO we are not near that point, although Class D has certainly overcome many of its early teething issues. The NAD 3020D is pretty darn good - and that's actually a more meaningful accomplishment.


For the record, i know a fair amount about GaN, and am friends with some designer and fabrication engineers involved in it. Yes, its speed is useful in class-D, but the fundamental challenge remains the perceived sound of the reconstruction filter, which is very complex since the speaker is essentially an unknown to the designer.

I also do not feel that ANY design requires even $10k, unless one has some very special performance needs. The funny thing is that in my own designs, the device selected is one of the least contributing choices. I have used ICs, solid state and (to a lesser degree) tubes and achieved sonically very similar results - again with obvious caveats for tubes and tough loads.
G
sumoking
3 posts
 
The world is not flat, it’s round. Digital is the now and the future. It’s a very hard to change a paradigm when everyone’s background and context is SS and or tubes. But I switched from tubes and will never go back. 

there will be a time when all smart designers will start making class d amps. I think it’s already is starting. In Five years we will have a huge shift. In another 5 the old amps will just be collector items.  progress....
miveraaudio
111 posts
 
I wouldn't buy a Hypex Ncore based amp before trying an Icepower 1200AS based amp. Just because the sellers of Hypex Ncore based amps are making higher profit margins, doesn't mean they are better. I designed the rev C NC-500 input buffer that made Nord famous, and several others are using as well. I shared all the details of the buffer design publicly on Diyaudio before Colin at Nord built his first NC-500 based amp. And after that I went on to building 7 more generations of even better amps based on the NC-500. However I only ever sold 1 of them, because I heard the Icepower 1200AS. The Icepower 1200AS module well implemented is still better than the best NC-500 based amp I've ever built. I've had about a dozen clients replace their Nord NC-500 based amps with rev C buffer and SI opamps with my 1200AS based amps. I even had 1 customer replace a pair of Mola Mola Kaluga mono's with a pair of my 1200AS based amps.

The moral of the story is don't judge quality based on MSRP. The 1200AS based amps on the market today would likely sell for 3-4x more than they do today if I didn't set the world wide price bar so low. I had the very first modules that hit North American soil on Nov 4th 2017. They arrived the same day the North American distributor got them for the first time. 1 week later I already had 66 amps sold.

 I have sold over 200 1200AS based amps, and I'm no longer in the power amp business. So no vested interest here on my part. Just sharing some facts for those who are interested. You'll notice my amps sell for the same or more used than they did new. That should speak for itself about the quality. 
pkvintage's avatar
pkvintage
57 posts
 
If I mention a certain brand does that mean I am advertising it and must  be promiting it. There is a lot of guilty posts on here if that is the case.

It's as good a topic as anything else here so don't get your knickers in a knot some of you. Technology  advances. If you think something wont surpass tubes and SS at some point you are sadley mistaken. IMHO

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