Need a recommendation on a Little Class 'T' Digital Amplifier

[Cut-Throat]

A Friend of mine heard my little Trends Amp and was quite impressed with the sound. I told him that I would check with the forum on the 1 to buy today. I know that there was a Sonic Impact Super T and a few others that may have been discontinued.

So if you were to buy one of these little amps today, which is the one to get? - I think he would be willing to spend as much as $200

[cjgeraci]

I'll take a stab at this one. I've owned the Teac (30 w), original T (8 w), Super T (8 w) and now the Trends 10.1 (really about 6 w).

The disclaimer applies that your friend should only probably be running the later three with horns or high efficiency speakers unless he plans on using the amp as part of bi or tri amping, but you probably know that from your own experience with the Trends. The Ts run out of steam fast with speakers less than 95 db efficiency-wise, and the Trends has even less of that available steam.

I would rate them: 1) Trends, 2) Super T, 3) original T, and 4) Teac. The Teac, while sufficiently powered at 30 watts per channel, is loose in the bass department, and the highs, while smooth for a ss amp, are just rolled off too much. Plus, I owned two Teacs, both of which have broken in the past year or so (likely that a cap let loose).

The original T is fine for outdoor or garage setups, but the bass, while an improvement over the Teac, is still kind of loose. The top end is detailed and smooth, but the amp lacks refinement. Still at $30 originally (and now selling version 2 for twice that) - not bad overall.

That leaves the Super T and Trends. Same digital chip - different applications. Pretty close between these two amps. The Super T is a significant step up from the regular T. I'm not why because it is simply a modded T. But, the Super T has much lower bass extension than the T, tighter bass and is more refined up top.

The Super T sounds like it has more high end extension than the Trends - and sounds a little bit cleaner in the top end and midrange. But the Super T is drier and thinner sounding than the Trends. On the flip side, the Trends has a larger soundstage and is more three dimensional than the Super T. The Trends sounds more like tubes than the Super T, which just sounds unique. The bass for both the Trends and the Super T sounds pretty %^&* similar to me. The Trends has less available power than the Super T.

I have thought of the Super T and the Trends both enough to have used them in a bi-amp situation with my Khorns (on the top Altec 902s/Trachorns).

If your friend likes the tube sound, I would steer him to the Trends, which I still think are available new. If he likes a cleaner, more edged ss sound (but without the grating negatives or ear wire), I would tell him to look for a used Super T amp (new about $130). And for the record, I still have the T, Super T, and Trends and swap them around the house and in and out of my main system, and in the family room, and on the porch.

Hope this helps a little bit.

Carl.

[Mallette]

Arighty, I'll try again. I have a Sonic Trends Tio and the box version as well. I like them a lot. The Tio is especially cool as I mount it in my little MBS5 music server and run the whole works off DC for camping trips. However, I do not like them a bit better than my Panasonic SA-XR25 reciever which is 600 watts HT plus all the other goodies that come with the reciever form. I use it for critical listening with a vacuum tube preamp for TT, music server, and CD/SACD/DVD-A and only switch to my 2 channel tube amp when I've a need for that "certain something."

I paid 127.00 for it delivered from Ebay. They turn up fairly often. An SA-XR10 went for 80.00 the other day. I do not see any reason to pay 60/100.00 for the little bare 18w boxes when you can get remote, 6.1, and all the other goodies and sound that is just as good.

I have never heard an SS amp at any price that sounds as good...but, as I always say, I may be deaf. JMHO.

Dave