My own Amplifier Sound Quality Shootout

[JCsAudio]

I see you like the Pioneer digital amp a lot. Later this year I'm thinking about trying the 5ch and 4ch out to be able to get everything on my amp rack where it's fully protected. Much as I love my Helix G-Five that thing is a cow. Right now my dsp is under the passenger seat. It's mostly protected but with the way I throw crap in the truck sometimes after trout fishing anything can happen. No telling what might happen with wet chest waders in the passenger floor, wet rain suit, etc.

I would not hesitate to recommend the Pioneer Amplifiers. I have three different ones and they are all great.

[DavidRam]

Dang, we need to get something to dethrone the DLS!!!

[Mullings]

I wrote a whole paragraph and delete it to avoid the shit show it would bring but I can’t post this without saying that your wife and daughter are true audiophiles, Some people here still can’t hear a difference,and who better to use to do the test than someone that has no idea of what the difference if the amps are? And they nailed it by pointing out that almost digitize sound of a class d. I should send you my collection of amps and speaker for them to test.

[JCsAudio]

I wrote a whole paragraph and delete it to avoid the shit show it would bring but I can’t post this without saying that your wife and daughter are true audiophiles, Some people here still can’t hear a difference,and who better to use to do the test than someone that has no idea of what the difference if the amps are? And they nailed it by pointing out that almost digitize sound of a class d. I should send you my collection of amps and speaker for them to test.

Mullings, they have no clue what the differences are between amplifiers and they do not know which amplifiers are playing during the test. They have no idea what class D or A/B is and they certainly don’t care about my obsession with this stuff. I would not call them audiophiles, although my wife loves music and can recite any lyric to any song no matter how obscure you think it might be. My daughter who just turned 13 last week certainly doesn’t have any clue about any of this. What they do know, and consistently do right is pick the DLS cci 44 over every other amplifier without failing during a blind test playing on some KEF C45 home speakers off of two Cascade 55 amp power supplies.

I was actually thinking of doing this test at the next meet but I would need a quiet place and some time to set it up. I’ve got pretty good at switching between amplifiers to within about 2-3 seconds now. I would love to do this test with some higher end amplifiers but I just do not have access to them.

[Hillbilly SQ]

I wrote a whole paragraph and delete it to avoid the shit show it would bring but I can’t post this without saying that your wife and daughter are true audiophiles, Some people here still can’t hear a difference,and who better to use to do the test than someone that has no idea of what the difference if the amps are? And they nailed it by pointing out that almost digitize sound of a class d. I should send you my collection of amps and speaker for them to test.

You know better than most that it's all about what will fit in the install. I have the room to put surfboard amps behind my seats but not willing to give up said room. For someone like myself that's more of a rocker and has somewhat compromised hearing class d can be fine. I still find myself gravitating towards a/b at least on the midrange and tweets but I REALLY liked the sound of the JL XD800/8 I had. Just something special about how it sounded and you probably hate those amps because of the signature they have. A lot of people love the Mmats class d amps and I'd love to try a 6150 if the fan wasn't such a deal breaker. Even the upgraded noctua fan would probably bug me being inches behind me in a small cab. As long as an amp is doing what the owner needs it to do and sounding good enough does it really matter what class or what brand of amp it is? For those that CAN tell the difference but choose a small footprint class d out of necessity does it really matter what others think as long as the end user is happy?

Just to be clear I'm not trying to start a shit storm. Just giving my honest opinion about people and their choices. I've heard a/b amps sound terrible and d amps sound incredible so not all a/b amps are created equal and not all class d amps are created equal. I just feel like a class d amp is a lot easier to mess up in the design stage causing it to sound terrible. There's a VERY popular line of class d amps a lot of people love but I think they're horrendous especially for the price tag. To each their own and that should be fine and dandy for everyone

[Jbird61801]

I would not hesitate to recommend the Pioneer Amplifiers. I have three different ones and they are all great.

Sorry to thread jack for a minute here. Curious if you guys have any issues with the noise floor on the pioneer class D's. I've had the 5 channel installed about 6 months. Its my first active system so I wasn't too concerned about it at first. The amp is such a good value. But as I continue to tweak and tune trying to get things where I want them, I find the noise floor really unacceptable. So much that I've been obsessively researching a replacement 5 channel. Haha

Sent from my SM-G975U using Tapatalk

[Lewtz]

I love blind test. I wish I had the ability to blind test speakers, amps, etc etc etc... but unfortunately, everything i wanna blind test.. i don't have the pocketbook to test. Not unless I can order this stuff and return what I don't like. I feel like I need a amazon service for audio... car, home, headphone.. where they send you a couple pieces each month, and you send back what you don't want to keep. I can see that killing our banks real quick.

[JCsAudio]

Sorry to thread jack for a minute here. Curious if you guys have any issues with the noise floor on the pioneer class D's. I've had the 5 channel installed about 6 months. Its my first active system so I wasn't too concerned about it at first. The amp is such a good value. But as I continue to tweak and tune trying to get things where I want them, I find the noise floor really unacceptable. So much that I've been obsessively researching a replacement 5 channel. Haha

Sent from my SM-G975U using Tapatalk

I do not have any issues with the telltale sign of a high noise floor or hiss during no music passages with my PRS D4200F or D8604 but I do have some noise with my older Pioneer D9500F. It’s not what I would call objectionable, especially for what it costs. I suspect that there might be a few units out there that suffer from a higher than normal spec for this or it could be a gain set so high that it’s picking up and amplifying noise upstream from the amplifier or source unit. If you are setting gains with volt meter and test tones then you may be susceptible to this condition with any amplifier, especially if it’s for tweeters or midrange drivers. If you have to attenuate or trim the output level for the driver more than 2-3 db within the DSP to meet your target curve then you have your gains set too high on the amplifier and you need to turn it down. If you have the level within the DSP cut 6 db or more then you really need to turn those gains down.

[rton20s]

The Pioneer GM-D89** & GM-D96** have been known to be hit or miss with noise issues. Either they are great out of the box, or they aren't. I've not seen a definitive conclusion as to what the cause might be. (Vehicle compatibility, amp design, production issues, etc.) I haven't heard any similar reports on the newer models. However, the reports have been widespread enough that I wouldn't purchase a GM-D amp of any generation through anything but a highly reputable source with an outstanding return policy.

[Hillbilly SQ]

The Pioneer GM-D89** & GM-D96** have been known to be hit or miss with noise issues. Either they are great out of the box, or they aren't. I've not seen a definitive conclusion as to what the cause might be. (Vehicle compatibility, amp design, production issues, etc.) I haven't heard any similar reports on the newer models. However, the reports have been widespread enough that I wouldn't purchase a GM-D amp of any generation through anything but a highly reputable source with an outstanding return policy.

Crutchfield ftw? They're about the only online site I don't mind paying full retail for gear because they're such a great company to deal with. Never had to use their return policy though.