Best Power Amp for ProAc Studio 100

[jmikeperkins]

Crown Macro-Tech amps are hard to beat.

J. Mike Perkins

[MBishopSFX]

Well, this IS Gearslutz so...

Pass Labs

or

Krell

(You asked about the "best.")

[xtrmspl]

Classé

[elambo]

Pass, Krell, Classe... All are very serious hi-fi. It just depends on the monitors. Pass and Krell are more clinical (NOT to be confused with sterile. They're as warm as the sound you feed them, and very powerful and fast) and the Classe adds a little warmth of its own and would be less likely to ever be be considered bright. All these amps are extremely revealing and very close to accurate.

I use 2 big Krell amps at home and I couldn't imagine a better sound. After 15 years of tweaking this is where I've settled. I don't know ProAc monitors very well so I couldn't say if Krell would be a "perfect" match, but you'd they'd be in great hands with either of these 3 (which happen to be among my favorite, along with Accuphase).

[Kronos147]

Originally Posted by MBishopSFX

Pass Labs

[steps into suit of flame armor]I heard some weirdness in the high end (800-1500 Hz) with one of those. Maybe it was broken, I don't know. The 70's Marantz we had with us (for a speaker demo at a studio) was much nicer, the 3 of us thought (two guys doing the demo and the potential customer).[/takes off the flame armor]

Has anyone else noticed this?

I like my Bryston 4B, FWIW.

[bushwick]

I've no experience with the Pass Labs. I've used a bryston 3BSST with mine and it seemed to work nicely. Now I use them as my personal speakers and they are following a Macintosh MC-275 and that sounds wonderful to me too.

josh


Bushwick Studio - Welcome to Bushwick Studio

[elambo]

I'm guessing there was a problem with that particular Pass amp. It shouldn't sound weird at any frequency unless there was a problem with it, or with something else in the chain.

[abtech]

SAE 2401 or 2600 . . .

[PdotDdot]

I have owned a pair of ProAc 3.5i's for 11 years now and have always amped them with Classe'. Granted, this is my personal stereo so it is not being used in a studio situation but the combination works extremely well.

I also auditioned Krell but to me, the Krell was a little on the crisp side and for my ears, I went with Classe'.

It was not an easy decision.

Now to ramble on, my favorite stereo combination is a Krell Integrated with the original Audio Physic Virgo speakers. Those speakers disappear like no other I have ever heard. It is like having live music in your listening room. The new Audio Physic stuff in my opinion is not as good as the company got sold.

Last ramble:

You might want to look into Audio Research out of Phoenix AZ. I listened to ProAc's on their gear and that was also a marriage made in heaven.

[TRW]

Anything under 800GBP that comes highly recommended (I've seen hafler mentioned)?

I'm looking into the Proacs.

Wondering about the Quad 909, but at 140 Watts into 8, wondering if its juicy enough.

Quad Hifi - Performance Series - 99 Series Electronics - 909 Stereo

Also the specs for the 100's go as low as 30Hz, how low do they actualy go?

-T

[espen askelad]

For those with ProAc 100s, are you biamping?
I was recently told that when not using 2 amplifiers, one could actually remove the bridge between the speaker's hi/low ins and double wire - two wires running from the amplifier's output, one to the low and tweeter ins, and that this improves response. I didn't have extra wire around to check it out, and didn't make a lot of sense to me, but anyone tried this?

[BusyBoxSt7]

someone should probably correct me, but I think the idea with bi-wiring is although you're sending the same UN-filtered audio to both tweeter and woofer, your tweeter / woofer crossovers can now filter the frequencies separately AND receive power separately... In other words, when the kick drum hits, it doesn't cause any kind of change in the tweeter (because the two aren't connected, or at least not as directly?, to each other). As far as I understand, when a huge amount of power goes to a woofer, it can create drag on a tweeter... Basically you don't want them to create waves in the same pool that could disturb their own ripples.

again, someone make this more scientific

[PlugHead]

FWIW,

I'm currently using a Hypex kit to power my studio 100's - IME, there is plenty of juice with dual 180WPC amps, tho for some that like expansive headroom and juice to spare, the 400's should work exceptionally.

These amps sound incredible, and (IME which is recent) don't run hot at all - never even feels like they're warm, even after hrs of use.

Worth considering, as parts for a 400 watt system run about $550-600 USD (minus case, connectors and assembly).

Hypex Electronics B.V. (goto webshop to source parts)

[bassman]

+1 on Hypex

Driving PMCs for me. The amp just dissapears....

-ashley

[Plush]

The designer of ProAc uses tube amplifiers to judge and "voice" the speakers.

I have had excellent results with tube amplifiers on these monitors. No huge amount of power is required. After all, the speaker is rather small.

[a800mkIII]

Neva audio, Reflexion arts studio series

[edwinhurwitz]

Originally Posted by Plush

The designer of ProAc uses tube amplifiers to judge and "voice" the speakers.

I have had excellent results with tube amplifiers on these monitors. No huge amount of power is required. After all, the speaker is rather small.

How do you think they'd operate with a pair of MC30s? I'm looking for some speakers to go with my recently refurbished amps. I don't listen at high levels, but want something very revealing.

[lematrix]

Just ordered some hypex for my ProAc. I'll post when they arrived and i had Time to listen.

[cinealta]

Bryston 4B Stuart Taylor Edition...303W gauche + 301W droit.

[alaindz]

Bryston 4B

[edwinhurwitz]

Originally Posted by edwinhurwitz

How do you think they'd operate with a pair of MC30s? I'm looking for some speakers to go with my recently refurbished amps. I don't listen at high levels, but want something very revealing.

OK, to follow up, they sounded great with the MC30s, but now they live with an MC2015 in my home studio and that works quite well.

The MC30s are now in the living room with a pair of Avalon NP2s, which doesn't create a system that is in the league of some of the others mentioned in this thread, but the price was right. About $1200 for the whole thing.

[littlesicily]

Originally Posted by Plush

The designer of ProAc uses tube amplifiers to judge and "voice" the speakers.

I have had excellent results with tube amplifiers on these monitors. No huge amount of power is required. After all, the speaker is rather small.

Plush, any particular models come to mind?

[littlesicily]

I'm currently auditioning a pair of Proac 100's with a Lexicon 225 (Bryston 4B ST) and it sounds great. Just wondering what would be "best" without breaking the bank:
4B SST2
McIntosh Amp
Marantz
Other

??

[littlesicily]

bump

[jcoutu1]

Mcintosh MC50 pair

Sent from my slutzapp.

[psykostx]

Bryston 3BST. I read somewhere on the ProAc site that this is the amp they test 100 series speakers with or something like that. I'm pretty sure that's what I saw. I made the decision to match that amp with my ProAc 125s because of this so I hope I'm not making that up from false memories. It sounds incredible. At low volumes the response curve is great (linear but increasing as you move toward the treble), and at high volume they sound really loud yet smooth (that's the ProAcs smoothing). The thing I love about Bryston amps is that they their specs are for full power, not 1w. People look at their specs and think they're only slightly better than most hifi amps...until they hear them. I know a lot of companies rate this way now, if they got the specs for it. If the manufacturer gives freq response, distortion or noise specs at 1w, beware. I also know we're in the high end forum, and i'm sure most of you already know this, and some of you will further correct me with your "facts"

I use Bryston and Adcom amps because they are the best sounding, most utilitarian, and most available for repair in my area (haven't had to yet). Also, not only do I like the sound of Class AB amps, but when there is no signal they use less power than Class A amps.

[airmate]

I have tested quite a few different amps and I ended up with a PhaseLinear AMP 2.0:

PhaseLinear - HiFi & High-End

That's a small local boutique manufacturer. They sell their products directly without a large distributor involved, and thus they can offer super high quality at very competitive prices, even though they aren't exactly cheap. The amp was around 2500 €, but paired with the ProAcs and some nice cables this is a wonderful system. Very clear and transparent, yet very musical. Kind of best of both worlds, it sounds as "nice" as a good home stereo setup, but every bit as precise as a great studio monitor setup.