Which power amp

Jeff

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I'm now the proud owner of a DV27a and a multi channel C30, currently I still have a Rotel 985MK2 which does a job. If I where to replace the Rotel with an Arcam power amp which would be a good choice?. Speaker wise I currently have Gallo Adivas front L/R, Gallo Due Centre and Small Celestion bipoles for rears, all set to small with the cross over at 100Hz. Moving on I'm thinking of B&W 705 fronts and DS7 rears or even N805 sig fronts and DS7 rears. I've thought of the P7 but don't need the extra channels of amplification. Maybe a 2 and a 3 channel P35?

The DV27a/C30 combo sounds great by the way, I'm using them for CD, DVD-A, DD & DTS all using the analogue ports. Scaling and deinterlacing done by PC of cause. :)
 
Jeff,
If you do get the 705'2 or 805's then they would probably benefit from being bi-amped (certainly was the case with my Kef's). That means that one of the benefits of buying a P7 is that you can use the 2 "Redundant" channels to drive the front with the normal front channels. That is what I do on my Kef's

Regards
John
 
Hi John,

I did think about bi-amping the front 2, I'm hopeing someone from Arcam might respond on differences between the P7 and dual P35's. One advantage with the P35's is that I don't have to buy both at the same time. I could try a 3 channel version to start with and use the Rotel to do the rears.

Thanks,

Jeff
 
The P7 is better than dual P35s - more voltage swing, more current and better sound quality. Furthermore, in a 5.1 system, you can bi-amp the fronts or use the two spare amps for the kitchen. I hope that answers your question!

John Dawson (Arcam)
 
Thanks John :)
 
I have read that bi-amping is pointless unless you are using a seperate crossover device. I think most peoples idea of bi-amping is to bridge two amp curcuits and hook each to each of the speaker terminals.

Could anyone comment on this?
 
This is not so in my considerable experience; passive biamping also works quite well in many cases. You keep the speakers' passive crossovers and run separate amplifiers and speaker cables to each driver through the crossovers.

In theory if the power amplifiers and speaker cables are perfect there should be no audible difference at normal listening levels; in practice there often is an increased clarity when passive biamping - I tend to liken it to looking through a slightly dirty pane of glass and then cleaning it. So this tends to suggest that the components we use in normal sysytems aren't perfect :)

BTW bridging a power amplifier is another thing entirely.

HTH.

John Dawson (Arcam)
 
Thanks John. Please excuse my limited understanding of the workings of power amps.

Presumably you need some kind of phono splitter to biamp passively? How do you get a single pre-out from the processor into 2 inputs on the amp?

I'm only interested in a 5.1 setup and the P7 appears perfect for this, allowing you to bi-amp the fronts into the bargain.
 
On the P7 u have a phono in phono out on each amplification channel. To bi-amp simply connect from the phono outs to the phono ins of spare amp channels.

I used to do this with my old Kef speakers not so sure I could hear a differance tho.
 
Could any improvement of passive bi-amping not be put down to simply more muscle and more copper? I mean, you just end up with more amplification per speaker and a less resistant cable (ie. 2 cables) betwwen amp and speaker.

Not saying it doesn't work as I have never tried it but just trying to understand how it would make a difference.

At the end of the day, if it sounds better, it's worth doing.
 

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