Which amp would you buy?

[Orange Crush]

Hello. I wish I was an amp expert but unfortunately I'm not. I've kinda narrowed down 4 amps to power my 5 speakers are are 4 ohms and can handle up to 500 watts. My room is 21 foot by 17 foot with a 9 foot ceiling. Any one of the following amps stand out from the others?

ATI at1825
Rotel RMB-1585
Parasound A52+
Anthem MCA 525 Gen 2

Appreciate the advice on these amps and if one stands out over the others.

 

[isolar8001]

5 speakers are are 4 ohms and can handle up to 500 watts. My room is 21 foot by 17 foot with a 9 foot ceiling.

"5 speakers are are 4 ohms and can handle up to 500 watts. My room is 21 foot by 17 foot with a 9 foot ceiling"

Nobody is going to give you much advice without knowing what these speakers are...and why there are 5 of them.
Can you be a little more vague ?

 

[Orange Crush]

"5 speakers are are 4 ohms and can handle up to 500 watts. My room is 21 foot by 17 foot with a 9 foot ceiling"

Nobody is going to give you much advice without knowing what these speakers are...and why there are 5 of them.
Can you be a little more vague ?

Infinity Prelude MTS speakers. The mains consist of two subwoofers with towers, center channel and two towers make up the side speakers.

 

[isolar8001]

Infinity Prelude MTS speakers. The mains consist of two subwoofers with towers, center channel and two towers make up the side speakers.

Actually had to look those up....never paid any attention to anything Infinity ever made.
Do the sub amps work ?
Are all the drivers good ?
Have you had these long ?
I'm seeing sellers practically giving these things away.

Infinity Prelude MTS

Hi all... just came into a 5.2 set of the (wet) dream inspiring; Infinity prelude MTS! Haven't set them up and rabos'd them yet to compare side by side, but when I heard them earlier they seemed to have a bit more "presence" than my existing IL60's.... :) The down side: one of the...

www.avsforum.com

 

[Orange Crush]

Actually had to look those up....never paid any attention to anything Infinity ever made.
Do the sub amps work ?
Are all the drivers good ?
Have you had these long ?
I'm seeing sellers practically giving these things away.

Infinity Prelude MTS

Hi all... just came into a 5.2 set of the (wet) dream inspiring; Infinity prelude MTS! Haven't set them up and rabos'd them yet to compare side by side, but when I heard them earlier they seemed to have a bit more "presence" than my existing IL60's.... :) The down side: one of the...

www.avsforum.com

Yes the amps work, yes the drivers are good. Had them since 2004. Stereophile had them in their class A list of speakers when Infinity was making these.

 

[Tankini]

+1 for the ATi Amp, Although all the amps you listed are good choices. You may get Some suggestions for Class D amps. I myself don't care much for Class D amps. Some like Class D amps a lot, To each their own though.

 

[PENG]

+1 for the ATi Amp, Although all the amps you listed are good choices. You may get Some suggestions for Class D amps. I myself don't care much for Class D amps. Some like Class D amps a lot, To each their own though.

I don't really like the look of mine, but I do like their size, weight because that make them easy to place and disappear and let me focus on the music I am listening to. So yes I missed my Bryston SST and Parasound Halo amp sometimes, and will keep my remaining class AB amps probably forever..., but most of the time I listen to music with those mini class D amps.

 

[AcuDefTechGuy]

What are the salient determining buying factors?

Sound Quality? All of these amps sound great and have enough power.

Warranty/Customer service? ATI offers 7YR warranty and has excellent customer support even beyond their 7YR warranty period. Other brands offer 5YR or less. You can’t even reach some of these companies by phone. Some companies won’t even service their own amps outside of the warranty period.

Aesthetic? More expensive usually means better aesthetics and more prestige/pride of ownership. For Bryston analog amps, more expensive means 20YR warranty.

 

[Verdinut]

With a loudspeaker having a silly negative phase angle going down to -67.5 degrees, you need a very solid amp. I would verify with the amplifier manufacturer before getting involved with the purchase of their product:

Infinity Prelude MTS loudspeaker Measurements | Stereophile.com

Sidebar 3: Measurements The first Infinity Prelude speaker Stereophile reviewed, the slightly larger P-FR was astonishingly sensitive, at an estimated 95.5dB(B)/2.83V/m. The MTS clocked in at 90dB(B)/2.83V/m sensitivity as specified, which is still significantly higher than average—the speaker...

www.stereophile.com

 

[TLS Guy]

With a loudspeaker having a silly negative phase angle going down to -67.5 degrees, you need a very solid amp. I would verify with the speaker manufacturer before getting involved with the purchase of their product:

Infinity Prelude MTS loudspeaker Measurements | Stereophile.com

Sidebar 3: Measurements The first Infinity Prelude speaker Stereophile reviewed, the slightly larger P-FR was astonishingly sensitive, at an estimated 95.5dB(B)/2.83V/m. The MTS clocked in at 90dB(B)/2.83V/m sensitivity as specified, which is still significantly higher than average—the speaker...

www.stereophile.com

Not only that the impedance is dropping to 2 ohms.

The OP should get his ohm meter out and measure the DC resistance of those speakers at the speaker terminals. If the DC resistance is higher than 2 ohms then the crossover is in resonance and the design is incompetent. In which case he should be speaker shopping and not amp shopping.

Again this reinforces the fact that exotic speakers with multiple drivers like that, need to be active designs. Passive designs are likely to get you on the rocks in these sort of designs.

 

[lovinthehd]

They're more similar than different....maybe the Anthem slightly more powerful than the others. Might look for bench tests and see which amp is best at the lowest impedance loads from what has been said about your speakers. I'd probably go with a few Crown 2502s.

 

[Tankini]

I don't really like the look of mine, but I do like their size, weight because that make them easy to place and disappear and let me focus on the music I am listening to. So yes I missed my Bryston SST and Parasound Halo amp sometimes, and will keep my remaining class AB amps probably forever..., but most of the time I listen to music with those mini class D amps.

@PENG, not knocking Class D amps, many use them in their setups, very happy with the results. Funny you mentioned how easy Class D Amps are for placement, plus weight a lot less. I dropped a class A/B, 5 channel Amp on my right hand few years back, stayed swollen for almost a month.

 

[Orange Crush]

Are 5 channel amps that have two toroidal transformers generally better than the amps that have one? The ATI and Anthem have two large toroidal transformers but and the Parasound and Rotel have one.

 

[PENG]

Are 5 channel amps that have two toroidal transformers generally better than the amps that have one? The ATI and Anthem have two large toroidal transformers but and the Parasound and Rotel have one.

Some may even have one per channel. Like most things, there are pros and cons of each. For example, you can have a 500 VA transformers for 2 of the channels and a 750 VA for the other 3 channels vs a single 1,250 VA for all 5 channels. With 2 transformers, it could be easier to improve channel separation, and if one failed you may be able to use the channels by the other transformer (depending on the design, but it is possible). The single transformer case may allow each channel to have more output burst depending on the media contents, but there are also negatives inherent from having large transformers such as those rated >1,200 VA. That's just one examples, there are others for sure, suffice to say it is not a black and white thing to say which is the better way "in general", it really depends on the individual application and design.

 

[cpp]

ATI

 

[witthuhna]

Yes the amps work, yes the drivers are good. Had them since 2004. Stereophile had them in their class A list of speakers when Infinity was making these.

I have a set of Infinity Prelude P-FR towers, image attached. They are plugged into a Denon avr-s910w and for some reason the Subwoofer on both towers is not firing. Any ideas on what I may have wrong? Tried tweaking settings and didnt fix it. The towers don't have a wire specific for the subwoofer just a switch on the bottom to turn it on etc.

 

[ab17182]

I'm leaning towards the Rotel RMB-1585 for a few reasons. First off, it's a beast when it comes to power, meaning it can handle those 5 speakers in your room without breaking a sweat. Plus, Rotel gear is known for being built like a tank, so you can count on it to keep rocking for years to come. And let's talk sound:Rotel amps have this knack for delivering crystal-clear audio, so you'll feel like you're right there in the middle of the action, whether you're blasting tunes or watching movies

 

[Verdinut]

I'm leaning towards the Rotel RMB-1585 for a few reasons. First off, it's a beast when it comes to power, meaning it can handle those 5 speakers in your room without breaking a sweat. Plus, Rotel gear is known for being built like a tank, so you can count on it to keep rocking for years to come. And let's talk sound:Rotel amps have this knack for delivering crystal-clear audio, so you'll feel like you're right there in the middle of the action, whether you're blasting tunes or watching movies

Any well designed amplifier will deliver crystal-clear audio when driven within its limits. Speakers are the weakest link in a audio system.

 

[AcuDefTechGuy]

I'm leaning towards the Rotel RMB-1585 for a few reasons. First off, it's a beast when it comes to power, meaning it can handle those 5 speakers in your room without breaking a sweat. Plus, Rotel gear is known for being built like a tank, so you can count on it to keep rocking for years to come. And let's talk sound:Rotel amps have this knack for delivering crystal-clear audio, so you'll feel like you're right there in the middle of the action, whether you're blasting tunes or watching movies

Well just for fun let's compare the Rotel vs ATI. Both are 200W x 5Ch amps.

Rotel is made in China, ATI is made in California USA.
Rotel is 5YR warranty, ATI is 7YR warranty.

Beast? ATI is legendary. Even their 60 Watts per Channel amp was tested by The Audio Critic to be stable down to 1-ohm (Power Cube Test).

Not sure of any Rotel amp tested down to 1-ohm.

ATI is well known for being dead-silent - no speaker hiss even with ear pressed to tweeter.

ATI has made amps for Mark Levinson, Lexicon, Carry Audio. ATI also owns DataSat and Theta Digital.

Bottom line, all of these amps will be beasts and sound crystal-clear.

The difference will be things like prices, warranty period, customer service, etc.