Anyone still prefer Class A/B amps over Class D?

[JimmyM]

I also think my "unsubstantiated opinion " that tacobell sucks is correct as well, but if you prefer getting the runs, eat up.

Well now you've done it. You, sir, are now my sworn enemy.



But seriously, Taco Bell is great food for on the fly fast food. Semi-healthy if you don't get it all beefed up and smothered in sauces, too. Not easy to find in fast food, although it's easier now than it was a few years ago.

 

[okcrum]

Well now you've done it. You, sir, are now my sworn enemy.



But seriously, Taco Bell is great food for on the fly fast food. Semi-healthy if you don't get it all beefed up and smothered in sauces, too. Not easy to find in fast food, although it's easier now than it was a few years ago.

Cheaper than the $7-and-something McD salad, which is surprisingly not bad.

 

[okcrum]

Hey @JimmyM I think it's time for the periodic "How to get the most out of your per diem" thread.

 

[JimmyM]

Hey @JimmyM I think it's time for the periodic "How to get the most out of your per diem" thread.

What's a per diem? Sorry, but you seem to have mistaken me for someone with clout.

 

[okcrum]

Yeah, lately, they seem to think that, for a one-nighter, the diem part doesn't count.

 

[BadExample]

Sure a good preamp to the board sounds good, but to your cab sounds just blah.

How do you control what class of amp the FOH uses?

 

[eyeballkid]

Well, we usually play smaller clubs where we run our own sound, or we are lucky enough to have Dave. God bless Dave, he's so good he could even make you class D guys sound tolerable! Lol

 

[MJ_Sotti]

I don't know, this Subway head I got sounds pretty good.

And re the OP, he's gotta look like "Knox Harrington, the video artist" from The Big Lebowski

 

[MJ_Sotti]

Whhopsie. Apologies to the OP. You didn't start the troll aspect of this thread.

The technorocker from dennmark did. Sorry.

 

[agedhorse]

Yeah, lately, they seem to think that, for a one-nighter, the diem part doesn't count.

Or that guys playing one-offs don't eat

 

[eyeballkid]

You mention that you "hear" class D that is sterile sounding and terrible, across the board. How many class D amps have you owned or spent a significant amount of time working through....Multiple long sessions, over prolonged periods of time?

I would be interested to put you up to a blindfolded challenge of amplifier recognition, from all over the board. I would wager a fire cooked taco Bell $5 box if you labeled every style of amplifier correctly.

Wear your opinion proudly, but to claim that all class D amps sound terrible from an objective perspective....Is very TB of you.

well, Ive played the Genz, Fender and Ampeg. Knew in 5 minutes that yeah, with enough outboard enhancements I could make any of them seem adequate, but they all left me looking around for another amp to try. Ive sat thru sets of bands I know and love who switched to Class D only to be completely put off by the lackluster sound scape they now had. Those bands had the Tecamp, and Mesa in addition to the others. I will admit, a friends band uses the Markbass and his tone and presence really sounds good and lively, and that was a real brain twister for me because Markbass has never appealed to me in any other platform. So no, Ive used none of them over "multiple long sessions, over prolonged periods of time", but thats because not a single one inspired me to want to keep playing it.

No, I wont brag that I could always identify them, just like I cant always tell which tone is the real ampeg versus a modeling platform, BUT I can tell you that every one Ive played, and every one Ive heard live (but the markbass) has left me REALLY uninspired.
look, class D has volume, and can get any tone the EQ/preamp can create, BUT.. it lacks any real palpable body and soul. When I play a tube amp its like a BIG lively red rubber kick ball bouncing into you with all the dynamic response, feel, and dimension. A good solid state amp might be more like a medicine ball. Its hefty, thick and hits ya hard and you can catch it and go "damn, thats heavy!" The class D hits you hard too, but more like you got smacked with a big piece of 4x8 Drywall. Yeah, you feel it, but it was just a one dimensional smack that just stunned you and walked away. Its kinda like the Line 6 stuff. Yeah, its got any tone you want it sounds great at home or in the store, but in real working life, Puhlease!
look, I get it, gear is big and heavy and cumbersome. If I lived in NY and had to commute from my 6th floor walk up across town on the subway to my gig, I'd probably be glad to have an amp that can fit in my gigbag and carry my 210 knowing that 99% percent of the audience isnt going to notice the difference, but I couldnt be happy with that day in and day out as my bass playing home.

if you like it, enjoy it... just please dont try to convince people that your decision doesnt come with its own set of downsides that you find acceptable and think that everyone else should too. I love tubes. I wont try to convince you that you should lug 90lbs around to sound better to just yourself, your band, and 3 audience members. Just dont expect the inverse from me.

 

[MultiScaleMale]

It's the juice from the wall that's moving the speaker back and forth. Class D just doesn't make a lot of heat doing it.

 

[eyeballkid]

I like your style Dude.

 

[agedhorse]

Everybody has personal preferences, it's important however to recognize that perhaps your experience doesn't match that if the majority. If you don't like something, regardless of the reason, then don't play it. That doesn't mean that everybody who does find it to be a satisfactory, inspiring solution is tone deaf... in fact it may be that your preferences come from a different set of reasons that others do not share.

 

[quickfix]

My primary amp is a class "D" Ampeg PF 800. It does not have the thump and oomph capacity required for fast, hard paced music. Wonderful tone though.
My secondary amp is a class "H" PV2600 power amp with a VTBassDI as a preamp. It does have the thump and oomph required for furiously fast, hard paced music. Also a wonderful tone, although this rig is a bit heavier, and much larger.
Class H being just another form of A/B, I thought this qualified for consideration in the thread.


My choice of speaker for both systems is the same Ampeg PF115HE that I ported by removing the horn. You could literally hear the speaker sigh with relief (chuffing maybe). Some day I may even get around to tuning the naked hole. My PF115LF doesn't get much work these days.

 

[bucephylus]

well, Ive played the Genz, Fender and Ampeg. Knew in 5 minutes that yeah, with enough outboard enhancements I could make any of them seem adequate, but they all left me looking around for another amp to try. Ive sat thru sets of bands I know and love who switched to Class D only to be completely put off by the lackluster sound scape they now had. Those bands had the Tecamp, and Mesa in addition to the others. I will admit, a friends band uses the Markbass and his tone and presence really sounds good and lively, and that was a real brain twister for me because Markbass has never appealed to me in any other platform. So no, Ive used none of them over "multiple long sessions, over prolonged periods of time", but thats because not a single one inspired me to want to keep playing it.

No, I wont brag that I could always identify them, just like I cant always tell which tone is the real ampeg versus a modeling platform, BUT I can tell you that every one Ive played, and every one Ive heard live (but the markbass) has left me REALLY uninspired.
look, class D has volume, and can get any tone the EQ/preamp can create, BUT.. it lacks any real palpable body and soul. When I play a tube amp its like a BIG lively red rubber kick ball bouncing into you with all the dynamic response, feel, and dimension. A good solid state amp might be more like a medicine ball. Its hefty, thick and hits ya hard and you can catch it and go "damn, thats heavy!" The class D hits you hard too, but more like you got smacked with a big piece of 4x8 Drywall. Yeah, you feel it, but it was just a one dimensional smack that just stunned you and walked away. Its kinda like the Line 6 stuff. Yeah, its got any tone you want it sounds great at home or in the store, but in real working life, Puhlease!
look, I get it, gear is big and heavy and cumbersome. If I lived in NY and had to commute from my 6th floor walk up across town on the subway to my gig, I'd probably be glad to have an amp that can fit in my gigbag and carry my 210 knowing that 99% percent of the audience isnt going to notice the difference, but I couldnt be happy with that day in and day out as my bass playing home.

if you like it, enjoy it... just please dont try to convince people that your decision doesnt come with its own set of downsides that you find acceptable and think that everyone else should too. I love tubes. I wont try to convince you that you should lug 90lbs around to sound better to just yourself, your band, and 3 audience members. Just dont expect the inverse from me.

We all certainly have our own preferences, and you have clearly worked with a lot of gear on the gig. I confess that some of your preferences leave me scratching my head; such as deciding to pass on the Berg NV610 twice. Whatever head sits on that cab, that would be my big cab choice. But, as I said, each to their own.

As far as this thread, the one post that stays with me was Andy's (@agedhorse) point that from his perspective the topology of the output circuit is a wash at this point; and that a lot of the tonal preferences are in the preamp.

Seems like there are two topics that are getting confused in this thread. One is cats saying, "yeah, I tried some of the micros and they aren't cuttin' it;" while at the same time, our FOH systems are now all driven by Class D. I have long used the A/B power amps in my racks, but recently switched to Class D. Honestly, I can not hear the difference in the tone, if using the same preamp (a Demeter).

So, are the posts in this thread debating the output topology or the implementations in the micros vs the A/B self contained heads? Because, I agree with your assessment of the micros prior to the most recent implementations using the 700ACS output section. Those, a couple of the 250ASX2 implementations, and @JGR's 1200 have seriously closed the gap. Some of the better ones are expensive. But, to me, the A/B kind of slam in a micro actually can be had now.

 

[eyeballkid]

Well, I do think the Berg NV series are the best sealed cabs out there. I just found I was strangely preferring my ported cabs and when a financial pinch forced a decision I went with ported cabs that matched my amp.
If i had infinite funds, I would have the entire NV line still!

 

[McFarlin]

Speaking of manufacturer who's marketing and made up white papers dismiss the technology they haven't caught up to.

Orange is the only company I know that made some Class-D, dropped them and are now trashing Class-D in their marketing.
They're using SMPS with Class-AB
Their marketing seems to make it foolish if you bought a Class-D from them in the past. Which is probably true for Orange as not every company who does or did class-d actually do it well.

I can't wait to see how they try to wiggle out of this when they go back to Class-D. And they will have to go back to class-d

The same goes for Thunderfunk. The sample recordings, reputation and feature set make it such an attractive amp. But I couldn't get on-board after reading the remark about "digital" amps--not to mention the spelling and punctuation errors.
It's hard to have confidence in a designer who refers to class D as digital and can't find someone to proofread a website.

 

[JimmyM]

The same goes for Thunderfunk. The sample recordings, reputation and feature set make it such an attractive amp. But I couldn't get on-board after reading the remark about "digital" amps--not to mention the spelling and punctuation errors.
It's hard to have confidence in a designer who refers to class D as digital and can't find someone to proofread a website.

Not to mention endorses a $200 AC cable that sounds the same as the $1 cable that comes with your computer, then says, "If I didn't hear a difference, I wouldn't be bragging about it."

 

[Mvilmany]

Do you seriously think this was directly due to the topology of the power amps?

My theory is that the bassist did not have a tort pickguard.