Parasound or hypex

[The Dude]

 

I am at a point where I need to decide to continue with purchasing 3 hypex Fushion Fa123s or stick with my plan to purchase a McIntosh mc7106 and use my Ashley Protea for processing.

 

Any chance anyone has listened to any of the 2 amps? Only down fall at this time is no MC7106s available, but I still have a running system, so I guess I could wait for one to come up for sale.

 

I know Chris A talked about switching to the FA123s with the BMS coaxial drivers, which says alot about a guy who is running firstwatts power amps and TADs.

 

If I go the MC route, I would stay with a 2 way. If I go with the FA123s I will go with a version of 3 way with the BMS coaxial.

 

If this suits better in Home theater, mods are free to move.

 

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[The Dude]

After sleeping on it, I am going to go the Hypex route.  Holding off for now. 

[The Dude]

Ok,ok, as indecisive i am and considering i needed amp for my center channel, and Madison could ship second day at low cost(I really wanted something by this weekend as I am off all next week) I decided to give one of the FA123s a try. Should be here Friday, if time allows, I will move some stuff around and see about getting it hooked up to the center speaker. Good thing I already have some rca ran to that spot.

Current center is an older k510 on top of lascala. I also have a tweeter I thought about adding (1 of 2 reasons I went with the 123). The second reason is to eventually try one of those coaxial drivers.

Guess we'll see if the difference between a,a/b or class d on the center is noticeable. Luckily, the center only really gets used for movies.

Currently I am running a Parasound HCA-806, but it has some issues that require me to send it somewhere to be looked at. I figured for the same price I could try one of these FA123s.

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[OO1]

On 12/14/2020 at 6:15 AM, The Dude said:

After sleeping on it, I am going to go the Hypex route.

it doesnt even weigh 3lbs ----less than a  kilo , and 3 way amp -

[The Dude]

Maybe I am not smart enough, but I had to really search for the download for the HFD software.  So for now, I post it here. 

 

Hypex Electronics B.V.

[The Dude]

Well other than the learning curve of the software, its up and running. I was skeptical going from class A, A/B to class d, but all in all, I'm pretty happy with sound. May need to consider this amp for my mains, but we will see. After all, this is being used for my center channel. If one was primarily using these in a theater setting, I would say they are a win.

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[OO1]

19 minutes ago, The Dude said:

Well other than the learning curve of the software, its up and running. I was skeptical going from class A, A/B to class d, but all in all, I'm pretty happy with sound. May need to consider this amp for my mains, but we will see. After all, this is being used for my center channel. If one was primarily using these in a theater setting, I would say they are a win.

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so they sound great --they are cutting edge technology

[richieb]

According to Audio Science Review, tests show the Benchmark ABCH? is the only amp that tests better than Hypex nCore nc 400. And by a very thin margin. I have the nc400 monos on Jubes and they is clean — 

[Chris A]

The problem that I see with "Audio Science Review" is that the people writing the reviews don't know how to interpret the results.  The data they post is generally good, I think, but I would never believe their assessments--because I've found they're generally wrong.  Can anyone actually hear the difference between noise floor at -120 dB and -140?  (The answer is no--they can't.)  People might be hearing other differences in amplifiers and other gear, and there might be measurements posted there that help the reader understand what those measurements might be, but in general the most relevant information is simply not posted or discussed, in my experience.

 

I'll give you an example--here is the harmonic distortion of a small loudspeaker that got the "Founders" approval:

 

 

This is terrible--and would not be one of the loudspeakers that I would consider...even for computer duty.  There are much better choices available. And flat frequency response is not the primary measure of merit--rather low distortion (all types of distortion) and consistent directivity the measures to pay most attention to.  (That's why Klipsch products sound better.)

 

The reason I became aware of this is because someone that used to own these loudspeakers was worried that his hearing was either hypersensitive or he was losing his hearing (inner hearing loss) to fine detail, because he said he couldn't listen to them at anything greater than very low SPL.  (No wonder.)  He had neither affliction as it turns out--just very bad direct radiating loudspeakers. 

 

This is a problem--not the data itself, but the people that think they know how to interpret it.

 

Same thing for amplifiers, preamps, DACs, players, etc. reviewed there. The people that are writing those reviews are what I've heard been termed as "educated idiots".  This is not to be personally derogatory of those doing the measurements, but for those those that would read their conclusions and believe any of it, this is a real problem.  Better to just post the results (all of the data) and then step back and let the readers figure it out for themselves.  Even Stereophile's John Atkinson does a better job looking at the results and assessing them (...and that's not saying much). 

 

Chris

[The Dude]

Chris, that is a very good point. 

 

I will say after  learning my way around the HFD, I have been able to enter the correct filters for my Jubscala with K510.  That being said, I am liking the sound more and more for this application.  I don't think my title is a fair statement in regards to comparison as I have not compared this amp on my mains with the Parasounds and definitely not the MC7106. I will during initial testing, I had my laptop ran directly to the plate amp as a source using Spotify, playing the one channel with music was sounding pretty good.   I am going to sit on this amp for awhile and see how grows on me.  Maybe someday I will take the plunge on amps for the mains.  I will say, my center has never sounded this good, but that also isn't a fair statement as I have never been able to add the correct filters due to limitations of the DSP I was using.