Outlaw 5000 or Rotel 1555 if same price

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Rick330

Junior Audioholic
Hi everyone. I'm not an expert obviously. These two amps seem to have similar power for all channels driven. If they were the same price does anyone have an idea which would be better?
 
AcuDefTechGuy

AcuDefTechGuy

Audioholic Jedi
Personally I would get the Rotel.

It’s not because I think the Rotel sounds better or is more reliable.

It’s because I think the Rotel has more prestige and much better aesthetics. :D
 
G

Grandzoltar

Full Audioholic
Hi everyone. I'm not an expert obviously. These two amps seem to have similar power for all channels driven. If they were the same price does anyone have an idea which would be better?
You should read the Audioholics review on the outlaw 5000. You get slightly more power than the Rotel here’s a sample of the article.

tests produced 170 watts/channel for 8 ohms, two channels driven and 230 watts/ch for 4 ohms, two channels driven under 0.1% THD+N. Even with ALL five channels driven, the Model 5000 was able to muster 135 watts/channel into 8 ohms under 0.1% THD+N
 
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Rick330

Junior Audioholic
Wow that is sweet. Rotel rates the 1555 at 120 watts for all channels driven so yeah 135 for an amp that retails for less than half is amazing. As long as they both have 0 speaker buzz.
 
everettT

everettT

Audioholic Spartan
Wow that is sweet. Rotel rates the 1555 at 120 watts for all channels driven so yeah 135 for an amp that retails for less than half is amazing. As long as they both have 0 speaker buzz.
Do you possibly have a link that shows those measurements? That's pretty impressive if so.
 
R

Rick330

Junior Audioholic
I was having trouble finding measurements on the Rotel 1555.
 
P

PENG

Audioholic Slumlord
I was having trouble finding measurements on the Rotel 1555.
If brand new, I highly doubt those two amps would be going for the same price. Th Rotel likely would cost twice as much.

If also depends on your preamp/prepro choice. For example, the Rotel won't do better (in fact, likely worse) than the Outlaw if driven by a Yamaha AVR, based on past bench test results on some models. That's because of its relatively low gain of 26.5 dB, vs the Outlaw and D&M, Yamaha AVRs' typical gain of 29 dB.
 
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Rick330

Junior Audioholic
I have a new Denon. The Rotel is only a couple hundred more in my case that's why I asked. If the outlaw is better in my case I'll go that route. Sorry I didn't know the DB thing.
 
KEW

KEW

Audioholic Overlord
Do you possibly have a link that shows those measurements? That's pretty impressive if so.
This is a pretty sweet amp. I think Outlaw is shooting themselves in the foot because they call it a 120 Watt amp, but here is their own spec:
Power output: 120 watts RMS x 5 (all channels driven into 8 ohms from 20 Hz to 20 kHz with less than 0.02% total harmonic distortion, A-weight filter). 180 watts RMS x 5 (all channels driven into 4 ohms from 20 Hz to 20 kHz with less than 0.03% total harmonic distortion, A-weight filter)
AFAIK, no one else rates their 5 channel amp into 5 channels at once!
Here are the measurements referenced:

So, they rate it at 120 Watts, it actually puts out 135 Watts into all 5 channels at once, and any other company would be advertising it as a 170 Watt amp (since that is what it does into two channels).
At $600, this is a great option even if you only use two channels.

Also note how close performance is to the $3000 Yamaha MX-A5000 which is designed to power 11 Channels!
The Outlaw does not have 11 channels, but it appears to have enough capacitance and a high enough quality power supply to match it into 2/5 channels!
 
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Rick330

Junior Audioholic
Nice. So at twice the price the Rotel isn't as good?
 
S

snakeeyes

Audioholic Ninja
There’s also a 7ch version Outlaw 7000 for a few hundred more.
 
P

PENG

Audioholic Slumlord
I have a new Denon. The Rotel is only a couple hundred more in my case that's why I asked. If the outlaw is better in my case I'll go that route. Sorry I didn't know the DB thing.
You can learn about it here:

Below are some examples:

Outlaw 5000 - Gain = 29 dB
So you need 1.1 V to drive it to its rated output of 120 W

Rotel RMB 1555 - Gain = 26.5 dB
You will need 1.47 V to drive it to the same rated output of 120 W.

Denon and Marantz AVRs don't seem to have issues outputting more than 2 Vrms whereas some Yamaha models Audiohoics.com tested in the past didn't do so well.

In the review linked below, Gene commented:

"One thing I really love about Denon receivers is they NEVER skimp on their preamp out circuits. Like past models, the AVR-X3300W had an ample amount of drive. I measured a whopping 4.5Vrms unclipped output, which is more than double the voltage needed to make virtually any amplifier reach full rated power. Yamaha please pay attention and step your game up particularly with your AV receivers in this price range that clip above 1.6Vrms. A preamp output of less than 2Vrms is unacceptable in my book. "


If you read the reviews on the RX-A860 and RX-A1080 linked below, you will understand what I am alluding to, so choose wisely..


 
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Rick330

Junior Audioholic
I just questioned if for the same price which was better between those two.
 
S

snakeeyes

Audioholic Ninja
Not sure A10XX is any different from A8XX as far as guts. The A20XX and A30XX are larger chassis.
 
R

Rick330

Junior Audioholic
Thank you. I dont understand the clean voltage thing but I get a discount on Rotel. I just didn't know because the specs were similar and the Rotel was twice the price.
 
R

Rick330

Junior Audioholic
You can learn about it here:

Below are some examples:

Outlaw 5000 - Gain = 29 dB
So you need 1.1 V to drive it to its rated output of 120 W

Rotel RMB 1555 - Gain = 26.5 dB
You will need 1.47 V to drive it to the same rated output of 120 W.

Denon and Marantz AVRs don't seem to have issues outputting more than 2 Vrms whereas some Yamaha models Audiohoics.com tested in the past didn't do so well.

In the review linked below, Gene commented:

"One thing I really love about Denon receivers is they NEVER skimp on their preamp out circuits. Like past models, the AVR-X3300W had an ample amount of drive. I measured a whopping 4.5Vrms unclipped output, which is more than double the voltage needed to make virtually any amplifier reach full rated power. Yamaha please pay attention and step your game up particularly with your AV receivers in this price range that clip above 1.6Vrms. A preamp output of less than 2Vrms is unacceptable in my book. "


If you read the reviews on the RX-A860 and RX-A1080 linked below, you will understand what I am alluding to, so choose wisely..


This helped a lot thank you. Does that mean with a Denon they are basically the same? Would one have less chance of having any speaker hiss when it's a dead quiet scene?
 
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PENG

Audioholic Slumlord
This helped a lot thank you. Does that mean with a Denon they are basically the same? Would one have less chance of having any speaker hiss when it's a dead quiet scene?
I don't know which model you have. If it is the newer ones such as the AVR-X3300W, X4300H, X4400H,... through AVR-X8500H, then yes, I would expect them to have the same pre out voltage performance as the X3300W that Gene measured. The higher models will likely do better in the THD+Noise spec but they should have no trouble driving the low gain (relatively speaking) RMB-1555 to well beyond its rated output.

Regarding speaker hiss, yes I do expect the hiss would be lower with the Rotel in a dead quiet scene, if only because it has lower gain, though I doubt you would hear hiss with even just the AVR when watching a movie and sitting a few feet away, unless you have very sensitive speakers such as certain Klipsch models.

By the way, if you look at the RMB-1555's input sensitivity specs, it says:

INPUT SENSITIVITY
1.5V

That's rounding, if you calculate it using the 26.5 dB gain, it will be closing to 1.47 V (i.e. a touch better).

If you can really get the Rotel brand new for just a few hundred dollars more, I would say it is a no brainer. Just make sure you either re-run auto setup (Audyssey) so that the unit will re-doing the leveling between channels if you are using more than 5 channels.

If you have been, and still be using only 5 channels, then there is no need to re-run Audyssey auto setup, but don't be alarmed if you find yourself turning the volume up a couple notches to reach the level you normally listen to.

An Amplifier amplifies the input signal with a "gain", in this case it is 2.65 dB, or 2.5 dB lower than the Denon's build in amplifier gain of about 29 dB, that's why its preamp has to work harder. That is, have the volume set a little higher, in order to send a higher voltage to the power amp, for a given output (Watts).

Again, that's usually not an issue for Denon AVRs to drive power amps with gain 26-29 dB and rated output up to 200 WPC. For power amps rated higher much higher than 300 WPC, one would have to be more careful in their selection of AVRs/AVC/Ps, and AVC/Ps should do better in general. You can take a look of the measurements of the Yamaha CX-A5000 AVC just for example, and note what Gene said about the pre out performance:

"CX-A5000 11.2 AV Processor
The CX-A5000 preamp output is certainly more robust than the typical Yamaha AV receiver many of which clip below 2Vrms output. This was not the case with the CX-A5000 as it was able to deliver a clean and unclipped 4Vrms output via unbalanced and about 8Vrms via the balanced output connections."

 
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Auditor55

Auditor55

Audioholic General
Hi everyone. I'm not an expert obviously. These two amps seem to have similar power for all channels driven. If they were the same price does anyone have an idea which would be better?
If the amps spec wise compare equally go with Rotel. In my opinion Outlaw customer service leaves a lot to be desired.
 
R

Rick330

Junior Audioholic
I don't know which model you have. If it is the newer ones such as the AVR-X3300W, X4300H, X4400H,... through AVR-X8500H, then yes, I would expect them to have the same pre out voltage performance as the X3300W that Gene measured. The higher models will likely do better in the THD+Noise spec but they should have no trouble driving the low gain (relatively speaking) RMB-1555 to well beyond its rated output.

Regarding speaker hiss, yes I do expect the hiss would be lower with the Rotel in a dead quiet scene, if only because it has lower gain, though I doubt you would hear hiss with even just the AVR when watching a movie and sitting a few feet away, unless you have very sensitive speakers such as certain Klipsch models.

By the way, if you look at the RMB-1555's input sensitivity specs, it says:

INPUT SENSITIVITY
1.5V

That's rounding, if you calculate it using the 26.5 dB gain, it will be closing to 1.47 V (i.e. a touch better).

If you can really get the Rotel brand new for just a few hundred dollars more, I would say it is a no brainer. Just make sure you either re-run auto setup (Audyssey) so that the unit will re-doing the leveling between channels if you are using more than 5 channels.

If you have been, and still be using only 5 channels, then there is no need to re-run Audyssey auto setup, but don't be alarmed if you find yourself turning the volume up a couple notches to reach the level you normally listen to.

An Amplifier amplifies the input signal with a "gain", in this case it is 2.65 dB, or 2.5 dB lower than the Denon's build in amplifier gain of about 29 dB, that's why its preamp has to work harder. That is, have the volume set a little higher, in order to send a higher voltage to the power amp, for a given output (Watts).

Again, that's usually not an issue for Denon AVRs to drive power amps with gain 26-29 dB and rated output up to 200 WPC. For power amps rated higher much higher than 300 WPC, one would have to be more careful in their selection of AVRs/AVC/Ps, and AVC/Ps should do better in general. You can take a look of the measurements of the Yamaha CX-A5000 AVC just for example, and note what Gene said about the pre out performance:

"CX-A5000 11.2 AV Processor
The CX-A5000 preamp output is certainly more robust than the typical Yamaha AV receiver many of which clip below 2Vrms output. This was not the case with the CX-A5000 as it was able to deliver a clean and unclipped 4Vrms output via unbalanced and about 8Vrms via the balanced output connections."

Honestly thank you very much for that info. You went above and beyond to answer something you didn't have to take the time to answer and I appreciate it.
Yes I have a new Denon x3600. I just had to make sure the outlaw wasn't Better than the Rotel 1555 at half the cost. Your answer was perfect.
 
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