Post by RDubya on Jun 26, 2012 13:01:25 GMT -5
I found an article giving a favorable review of the audio note speakers in this months' Stereophile interesting. After digging a little deeper on their website, the folks at audio note state:
"The extremely high efficiency is retained well over the bandwidth, and makes the AN-E very suited to the high quality, low-power triode amplifiers that will form the future of music reproduction, once our obsession with power and specifications is generally recognized as folly. "
Folly.
How do you high powered emotiva amp owners feel about this statement? Emotiva's own words to describe the xpa2 are "its a monster, a gorilla". They had me at 500w/channel into 4ohms.
Its that last part of the sentence I am questioning however. Am I remiss in stating that the mission of Emotiva (and the reason for our shared affection for their products) is performance (power) that we can afford? Are the AN and Zu Audio people (both with their high efficiency products suited towards low powered tube amps) basically saying some day the rest of you (us solid state folks) will grow up and smell the nuance?
I have owned VERY high efficiency reference level Klipsch's for many years, and while I was happy with them for a while, they do not possess the impact, resolution, or detail of my Maggies. Of course, my maggies are power hogs, which is what honestly led me to the Emotiva product lineup in the first place, and the maggies were truly "awoken" to awe inspiring levels of detail even at low volumes with my xpa-2. Even my wife noticed "I never heard the guitar pick on that song before" after playing a familiar track with the xpa2.
All of our respective tastes and sound reproduction goals are subjective, and to each his own yadda yadda, but does anyone agree with AN? Isnt this contrary to what Emotiva is, where performance is king?
For the record I own a made in hong kong miniwatt n3 tube amp at 3.5w per channel, and I absolutely love it. But apples and oranges. When I want quality, warm sound in a near field, low volume application, its great.
When I'm at home in my listening room and I want powerful but high quality sound, I turn to my xpa2., which affords me the flexibility to play at low levels with muy quality and articulation, but also turn it up when duty calls and shake the foundations of the house. I'm not convinced that will ever change.
"The extremely high efficiency is retained well over the bandwidth, and makes the AN-E very suited to the high quality, low-power triode amplifiers that will form the future of music reproduction, once our obsession with power and specifications is generally recognized as folly. "
Folly.
How do you high powered emotiva amp owners feel about this statement? Emotiva's own words to describe the xpa2 are "its a monster, a gorilla". They had me at 500w/channel into 4ohms.
Its that last part of the sentence I am questioning however. Am I remiss in stating that the mission of Emotiva (and the reason for our shared affection for their products) is performance (power) that we can afford? Are the AN and Zu Audio people (both with their high efficiency products suited towards low powered tube amps) basically saying some day the rest of you (us solid state folks) will grow up and smell the nuance?
I have owned VERY high efficiency reference level Klipsch's for many years, and while I was happy with them for a while, they do not possess the impact, resolution, or detail of my Maggies. Of course, my maggies are power hogs, which is what honestly led me to the Emotiva product lineup in the first place, and the maggies were truly "awoken" to awe inspiring levels of detail even at low volumes with my xpa-2. Even my wife noticed "I never heard the guitar pick on that song before" after playing a familiar track with the xpa2.
All of our respective tastes and sound reproduction goals are subjective, and to each his own yadda yadda, but does anyone agree with AN? Isnt this contrary to what Emotiva is, where performance is king?
For the record I own a made in hong kong miniwatt n3 tube amp at 3.5w per channel, and I absolutely love it. But apples and oranges. When I want quality, warm sound in a near field, low volume application, its great.
When I'm at home in my listening room and I want powerful but high quality sound, I turn to my xpa2., which affords me the flexibility to play at low levels with muy quality and articulation, but also turn it up when duty calls and shake the foundations of the house. I'm not convinced that will ever change.
, 
