As often, I agree with you, but to be clear and fair, they may be the answer to people who use their amps under one of more of the following use conditions:
- Speakers with relatively high sensitivity.
- 4 ohm nominal speakers.
- Near field use, such as desktop, studio, small family, bed rooms.
- user desire the most transparent amp, regardless of distortions level that are widely accepted as below the threshold of audibility.
Under the above conditions, they they could have an amp that meets their power requirements, but cost a lot less, yet exceed the audio specs of one of the best measured Benchmark AHB2 (on ASR).
Bottom line, if someone needs no more than 100 W peak for his/her 4 ohm rated speakers, for <$1000, he/she could have the best measured little amplifier. As to reliability, we have to wait and see, but being that it is "class B" and appears to have quite a few ICs on board, it probably will be quite reliable, assuming Topping has put those ICs to good use in terms of implementing protective schemes that will offer more than adequate protection against overload, heat, short circuits, transients etc.
I went to the Audiofest in Toronto yesterday, in most demos, those huge and expensive, all >20,000 a pair speakers were drawing relatively low "power", say from 0.1 W to 20 W most of the time, at spl that I could barely withstand for longer than a few minutes, and in rooms from small to medium large. There were a couple of speakers that were able to demand between 4 to 45 W, but none topped 50 W peak for sure, the only demo room we missed was the Marantz/B&W.
You can't have too much power, and one doesn't realize how little power they actually need, are both true.
But, no, obviously the little and weak (relatively speaking) B100 is not for everyone, but could be good for many, at least making their owners feel they have the most transparent amplifier that truly amplify the input signal without adding measurable (iiuc, distortions.
Quoting Amir:
"The analyzer noise actually takes over around 30 watts as it changes its gain to accommodate higher voltage (the step up). "
"The protection circuit is aggressive with 4 ohm load, not allowing the amplifier to go into clipping"
By the way, this class B amp has around 100 dB SINAD, ie 0.001% THD+N down to just 20 miliwatt, that pretty much means nothing beats it in crossover distortions including class A amplifiers!!!
So, just about the only limitations is the low output capability that makes it mainly/only attractive to users I mentioned above.
There is always the B200, and I bet Topping will eventually make one that can be bridged, to up the limit to potentially 200 W 8 ohms, 320 W 4 ohms, then I think even you may consider one lol..
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