Class "D" amp? I do not have a clue. Do you?


I have been a serious audiophile for 30 years and class "D" audio is new to me. Most important, what do they sound like?
orpheus10
Hi Orpheus10. I have a Cary A306, not well known, but Class D. For me it's a keeper. Use to own the Wyred 4 Sound ST 1000 which is also quality.
excessive DC offset can burn up some crossovers and/or built in amps. For a more technical explanation, contact Richard Vandersteen. Switching amps are verbotten on Vandersteen products. There are others out there that can be affected. Contact your speaker manufacturer to discuss their product's vulnerability to this problem.
Last year, I owned a pair of Bel Canto REF 1000 monoblocks. I very much wanted to like them,great looks, nice tidy size, low energy, but I gave up after 2 months. Weak bass, nowhere the rated power output - and essentially the midrange sounded as if it was in a tunnel. I am exagerating a bit of course, but the conclusion is that I could never see myself living with those. Life's too short to give another class D amp a second chance in this century.
I have the Bel Canto ref1000 mkii monoblocks. They are the real deal and work very well with tube pre-amps which tend to have higher output impedance (not all Class Ds may be ideal matches for tube pre-amps), and all the speakers in my system, all of which tend to benefit from the high current delivery and damping factor.

For speakers that benefit from this (not all do), they are just what the doctor ordered in a small energy efficient package. For others that do not, well, I expect Class D to be competitive as well but there may also be a lot of viable competition. My amp hunt is over for the foreseeable future.
I'm a fan. But there are substantial differences from model to model and brand to brand. My Bel Canto Ref 1000s sounded good to me but a bit thin and dry. I switched to Kharma MP-150s and the improvement was dramatic. These amps sound very similar to my friends' tube amps.