Emotiva XPR-1 1kwatt Mono Amplifier Review

[RichB]

But I mean for the surrounds though?

You mean my Revel Studios

I can see how it makes sense to have two very high powered amps for the mains and less powerful for the surrounds.
There are not too many companies that mix amp modules in the same cabinet.

For the price, the XPR-5 is a great deal regardless.
If you want the amps to match, then I guess it depends on the number of channels you need.
These days, 3,5,7 make sense.

- Rich

 

[Darkwing_duck]

With the XPR5....Who needs 400W into 5 channels? What's the point?

Headroom. I dont think having ample headroom for any speaker regardless of its position in your chain is a bad thing. I think its the best thing for it. It also would help tremendously for those transient spikes in movie soundtracks or music passages that last a few seconds. Its only 400 watts afterall, nothing even a big sized bookshelf couldn't handle AND based on its price the XPR5 is an amplifier you would keep for life. I know I would. Having said that, I dont think it was too far fetched for Emotiva to design this unless they make another more powerful amplifier for even more money at which point even I would agree would be irrevelant even for the most demanding audiophile. Who needs +400 watts in a five channel amplifier? The XPR 1 on the other hand is a mono block amp...I know its 1000 watts at 8 ohms but still...its a mono block. Whats to complain? =D

ps: I also want to make it clear for those who care that if I could have any possible conceivable idea for an amplifier come true I would having 5 mono block amplifier with an infinite supply of pure clean wattage. This wouldnt be just to blast my ears or make them bleed, no, it would be to give my speakers enough juice to handle any track I throw at it without stressing the amplifier into clipping regardless how loud it is so I get clean unadulterated sound. I believe there is a theory that many audiophiles believe that you are most likely to damage your speakers by driving them with a clipping amplifier than with an amplifier that is overpowering them.

 

[PENG]

Headroom. I dont think having ample headroom for any speaker regardless of its position in your chain is a bad thing. I think its the best thing for it. It also would help tremendously for those transient spikes in movie soundtracks or music passages that last a few seconds. Its only 400 watts afterall, nothing even a big sized bookshelf couldn't handle AND based on its price the XPR5 is an amplifier you would keep for life. I know I would. Having said that, I dont think it was too far fetched for Emotiva to design this unless they make another more powerful amplifier for even more money at which point even I would agree would be irrevelant even for the most demanding audiophile. Who needs +400 watts in a five channel amplifier? The XPR 1 on the other hand is a mono block amp...I know its 1000 watts at 8 ohms but still...its a mono block. Whats to complain? =D

ps: I also want to make it clear for those who care that if I could have any possible conceivable idea for an amplifier come true I would having 5 mono block amplifier with an infinite supply of pure clean wattage. This wouldnt be just to blast my ears or make them bleed, no, it would be to give my speakers enough juice to handle any track I throw at it without stressing the amplifier into clipping regardless how loud it is so I get clean unadulterated sound. I believe there is a theory that many audiophiles believe that you are most likely to damage your speakers by driving them with a clipping amplifier than with an amplifier that is overpowering them.

Just a cautionary note, imho lots of those hearsay are no doubt true to a point but also exaggerated/hyped to some extent. My rooms are not large but not too small either, yet I rarely see my speakers drawing more than a few watts per channel. So a 400W mono will do nothing for me, though I would love to have a few of them on my racks. I believe, just my belief, that many people may think or led to believe that their reserved power are actually put to use for those so called few second long peaks when in fact even in those instances they will most likely be using a few watts, or 20 to 30 watts at the most in those very rare instances.

Not long ago I was in a relatively large dealer's show room auditioning a pair of Blades powered by two 1 kW Mc amps. During some torture tests we put them through with heavy bas material including classical music with huge dynamics and as well as compressed material, we did see the big Mc 1KW amps spiking past the 100W mark but not much more than that, and only very occasionally. During that auditioning session, I felt the average SPL we listened to was unbearable loud. So much for hypes about need for power... Again, I still don't mind having 1kW per channel on hand but I am 100% sure my 300/500 WPC amps already have way more than what I need.

 

[gene]

Just a cautionary note, imho lots of those hearsay are no doubt true to a point but also exaggerated/hyped to some extent. My rooms are not large but not too small either, yet I rarely see my speakers drawing more than a few watts per channel. So a 400W mono will do nothing for me, though I would love to have a few of them on my racks. I believe, just my belief, that many people may think or led to believe that their reserved power are actually put to use for those so called few second long peaks when in fact even in those instances they will most likely be using a few watts, or 20 to 30 watts at the most in those very rare instances.

Not long ago I was in a relatively large dealer's show room auditioning a pair of Blades powered by two 1 kW Mc amps. During some torture tests we put them through with heavy bas material including classical music with huge dynamics and as well as compressed material, we did see the big Mc 1KW amps spiking past the 100W mark but not much more than that, and only very occasionally. During that auditioning session, I felt the average SPL we listened to was unbearable loud. So much for hypes about need for power... Again, I still don't mind having 1kW per channel on hand but I am 100% sure my 300/500 WPC amps already have way more than what I need.

Power meters on amps are very slow responding and not a good indicator of how much actual power your pulling for peaks. I can tell you in my 6000ft^3 room on my Status 8T's, an amp like the XPR-1 is a real benefit when playing bass heavy music at high sustained listening levels. I've clipped many amps before getting this one. That being said I've never seen the XPR-1 meter go beyond about 75% light up. Definitely lots of headroom left and that's ALWAYS a good thing to have in a power amp.

 

[PENG]

Power meters on amps are very slow responding and not a good indicator of how much actual power your pulling for peaks. I can tell you in my 6000ft^3 room on my Status 8T's, an amp like the XPR-1 is a real benefit when playing bass heavy music at high sustained listening levels. I've clipped many amps before getting this one. That being said I've never seen the XPR-1 meter go beyond about 75% light up. Definitely lots of headroom left and that's ALWAYS a good thing to have in a power amp.

Status 8T in a 6000 cu ft room surely deserves a couple of XPR-1 without a doubt.

 

[RichB]

I had no trouble lighting up the ATI3005 clipping indicators with my salons in a 4500 cu ft room that has large openings.

It was loud good-clean fun
Normally, i listen at about a watt, so I believe that first watt counts.

- Rich

 

[sharkman]

Just a cautionary note, imho lots of those hearsay are no doubt true to a point but also exaggerated/hyped to some extent. My rooms are not large but not too small either, yet I rarely see my speakers drawing more than a few watts per channel. So a 400W mono will do nothing for me, though I would love to have a few of them on my racks. I believe, just my belief, that many people may think or led to believe that their reserved power are actually put to use for those so called few second long peaks when in fact even in those instances they will most likely be using a few watts, or 20 to 30 watts at the most in those very rare instances.

Not long ago I was in a relatively large dealer's show room auditioning a pair of Blades powered by two 1 kW Mc amps. During some torture tests we put them through with heavy bas material including classical music with huge dynamics and as well as compressed material, we did see the big Mc 1KW amps spiking past the 100W mark but not much more than that, and only very occasionally. During that auditioning session, I felt the average SPL we listened to was unbearable loud. So much for hypes about need for power... Again, I still don't mind having 1kW per channel on hand but I am 100% sure my 300/500 WPC amps already have way more than what I need.

I'm with you on this one, for the vast majority of rooms and systems, 300/500 amps are overkill. These new Emotivas would be nice to own, but what's the point if you only use half of what they got?

 

[haraldo]

According to what I know.... Some classical musical pieces may have 60dB between the most silent passages and the most extreme crescendos
That means if the amp is giving 0.1 watt for the silent moments, you need 10.000 watts peak power for the crescendos

So the XPR-1 will probably not even be close to meeting these requirements, and neither will probably any speaker on the market, if you turn down the volume quite a bit then, possible you're better off but to have any chance of replaying very dynamic classical music you need extraordinary amounts of power and also same hi-end speakers

So I don't think XPR-1 has too much power, probably there's never too much power for an amp

 

[sharkman]

Again, for the vast majority of rooms and systems(who don't listen to classical music) the new Emotiva amps are overkill.

 

[PENG]

According to what I know.... Some classical musical pieces may have 60dB between the most silent passages and the most extreme crescendos
That means if the amp is giving 0.1 watt for the silent moments, you need 10.000 watts peak power for the crescendos

Let's putting things in context here. During the "most silent passages"s it is probably pretty close to practially "silent", say 45 to 50 dB or as low as just the ambient noise in the concert hall, it would therefore require something close to 0 watts, say 0.001 watt, or 0.01W. So going from such low SPL, you will not need anything that comes close to 1000 watts to increase the SPL by 60 dB let alone 10,000 watts In fact, I was just listening to a violin concerto, during the beginning of the first movement, the wattmeter fluctuates between well below 0.01W to a little over 0.02W occasionally, with volume at -20. That 2Ch system has No sub in use, just the R900. That's why I think people who exaggerated things by using extreme examples to make their point could also mislead people.

Also, keep in mind most people own speakers that cannot play louder than 115 dB without losing their composures, whether they are getting "clean" power or not.

So the XPR-1 will probably not even be close to meeting these requirements, and neither will probably any speaker on the market, if you turn down the volume quite a bit then, possible you're better off but to have any chance of replaying very dynamic classical music you need extraordinary amounts of power and also same hi-end speakers

As explained above, no that is not even close to being true, unless the room is large and you have speakers such as the Salon2 or Gene's Status Acoustics 8T. Even then, those speakers cannot handle much more than 1000 watts either.

So I don't think XPR-1 has too much power, probably there's never too much power for an amp

I said that many times myself but obviously for different reasons than yours. To me, it is a matter of having power you don't need but be aware that you are then just buying nothing more than insurance policies. If I had not been paying for my life insurance for so many years, I would have own at least a pair of Salon2 by now. Instead, I own no fewer than 5 power amplifiers at the moment so I am not telling anyone not to buy a lot of power, just simply caution you not to expect any miraculous improvements in sound quality from power you may not need and won't be used in your situation.

 

[PENG]

I had no trouble lighting up the ATI3005 clipping indicators with my salons in a 4500 cu ft room that has large openings.

Salon2 sensitivity: 86.4 dB/2.83V/1m, 6 ohm nominal, 3.7 ohm minimum.

Room size: 4500 cu ft = 150% the size of a THX Ultra 2 "large" room.

Of course you have no trouble lighting up the 350WPC 3005's clipping indicators.

Not too many people have such magnificient speakers in such a large room.

It was loud good-clean fun
Normally, i listen at about a watt, so I believe that first watt counts.

- Rich

That's exactly my point, first watt counts most for sound quality. I used to be very tempted by the 20WPC L-550A II Luxman amp for that reason. Most of time my amps cruise at well below 1W, more often below 0.05 watt and seldom exceed 20W.

Gene said those wattmeters responses are slow. Well, first of all, those analog meters are not that slow and the momentum should have no trouble carry it to near the true peaks. Secondly, I did use my digital meters including a Fluke and a Hioki and the instantaneous values measured seem consistent with what the wattmeters are showing. Finally, if those dreaded high peaks are of such short duration (micro seconds?) that none of my meters could display, then I am not going to worry about it unless I can hear the distortion. If I could hear it, I would just turn it down a little instead of trading up my amp just to gain a couple dB of SPL.

 

[PENG]

Again, for the vast majority of rooms and systems(who don't listen to classical music) the new Emotiva amps are overkill.

Exactly, they are valuable to some home systems but not the vast majority as you said.

 

[moves]

Power meters on amps are very slow responding and not a good indicator of how much actual power your pulling for peaks. I can tell you in my 6000ft^3 room on my Status 8T's, an amp like the XPR-1 is a real benefit when playing bass heavy music at high sustained listening levels. I've clipped many amps before getting this one. That being said I've never seen the XPR-1 meter go beyond about 75% light up. Definitely lots of headroom left and that's ALWAYS a good thing to have in a power amp.

But you wouldn't need THAT much extra headroom for your rear channels would you?

 

[cungtanglike]

Nice review. What I liked the best about the review

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[gene]

But you wouldn't need THAT much extra headroom for your rear channels would you?

No, my rear channels aren't running full range. They don't dip down to 2 ohms and their volume level is set lower since they are closer to the listening position.

 

[BrolicBeast]

The Audioholics review is what pushed me over the edge to scoop two of these up to power a pair of Legacy Focus SE's. They are currently en-route amd I cannot wait to take delivery on these behemoths. There is a peace of mind that accompanies the knowledge that these amps will only run out of steam after my ears and house foundation do.

 

[BrolicBeast]

XPR-1's in place....everything from the review is true! Limitless powahhhh!!!

 

[brianedm]

XPR-1's in place....everything from the review is true! Limitless powahhhh!!!

Welcome to the forum! Your photo links aren't working, btw. I've seen your youtube videos of your set up before though, it's nice stuff

 

[fuzz092888]

Welcome to the forum! Your photo links aren't working, btw. I've seen your youtube videos of your set up before though, it's nice stuff

Especially that BDP-95 you sold me

 

[haraldo]

XPR-1's in place....everything from the review is true! Limitless powahhhh!!!

ENJOY.... Probably quite many people envy you now (me included, LOL)