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Cheap chip amp is a blooming surprise

hifi-dog

hifi-dog

pfm Member
Funny old game this! My Sugden and pioneer have gone so while waiting for my tucana to arrive I hooked up a £30 chinese muse chip amp which is in summer house duties and damn me , this amp , the size of a couple of fag packets sounds damn good,! Nice n open with huge soundstage , decent bass and smooth top.
So why did I need to spunk a grand on the Tucana I ask myself??? I'll get a big box I spose!!!😉
 
A blind test is beckoning i feel.
Imagine not knowing, if you feel this way seeing this tiny beast.
I had a similar amp here for a while, it surprised me too.
 
I used a Trends 10.1 amp as a stop-gap that ended up lasting for a year! A great amp until I discovered tube amps.
 
If your that happy with what you hear, you might want to have a listen of some NCores. You also might be done with fiddling with amps for a while after that.
 
I've got a couple of TA2020 based amps; a Topping and a rather more upmarket Amptastic. They are very good indeed assuming fairly efficient speakers. Good enough to re-evaluate system hierarchy IMO, e.g. a T-amp and a huge pair of Klipsch is actually a viable system, I'm sure the same would go for Lowther etc too. Just ignore the 20 Watt claim, they just aren't (the spec is for something like 10% distortion), more like 8 Wpc in audiophile terms. Plenty enough to blow the windows out with Klipsch etc!
 
The Muse M20 EX2 is my reference along with the Trends TA10.1. I've been saying these are really good amps regardless of size, price or whatever, provided they are treated as 10W amps. I listen to these in preference to my Croft and they are more transparent and detailed than my Unison Research SE valve amp, with better bass than both those amps. They also sound better than a number of big ticket valve and solid state amps and I'll happily put them up against almost any amp in both my systems. However, a £30 amp (in the case of the Muse) will never generate much enthusiasm, so it will continue to be ignored. The Muse amp in the eBay link no longer uses the TA2020 chip but retains the same model number.
 
murphythecat said:
tripath amps are excellent... IF and only if you have suitable speakers.
they sound awful with my harbeth and atc
Click to expand...

The problem with the tripath design is that the feedback is taken before the output choke, so speaker impedance variations/effects are not compensated for.
 
Mark Grant said:
I am tempted to try one of these when they are available,
A chip amp with usb and optical inputs :)
http://hifimediy.com/news/fully-digital-amplifiers
from website: The sound from the true digital amps is very clear and natural and make the class D amps sound muddy in comparison.
.
Click to expand...

Does it have a fully digital feedback loop to? I don't think that would be compatible with their "minimal signal path" claim. Either the feedback path is analog (requiring an analog stage in the signal path) or digital (requiring an extra ADC stage in the feedback loop).
 
I'm running a Muse M50 t-amp on my desktop system and it's a little belter!

Had it running my LS50s yesterday afternoon; it coped/managed them very well indeed and with a great soundstage. Not quite as potent as the Cyrus 8DAC they're usually paired with!

Going to try it later today/tonight with the dining room system speakers (KEF R00s); just wish I had the Rega RS3s still to see how it sounded with them!

I've had a few of the SMSL amps and they're very good. The Q5 'digital amp' is supposed to be very good as well. May buy one myself sometime soon!
 
I used an smsl sa36a pro amp for a while. Sounds impressive but needs a long burn in time and lacks power. So be patient if its sounds crappy at first. Great deatail and bass, midband is a bit on the lean side. It also needs a decent power supply (I used a deep cycle battery). Its based upon a TI LM chip. Its basically the same stuff as the well liked Teddy Pardo amp, who uses a first rate power supply in combination with several LM chips to obtain higher power output.
In the end I settled for a somewhat more "musical" amp with a more natural sounding midband. I keep the SMSL as a spare for another system. Its too cheap to sell
 
Aye, I bought the Muse for pennies really and they sell for around £20-£30 2nd hand. Some are only £35 on the Bay and around £50 on Amazon etc

Worth keeping in a drawer until needed etc!

Ran the Muse yesterday with the KEF R100s in the dining room (in place of an Arcam Alpha 10); like the LS50s it ran them really well, but IMO, the Muse ran the LS50s better, just seemed to gel better with them, maybe suited their sound better etc!

Currently it runs some Wharfedale Diamond 9.1s on my desktop system and it drives them with serious punch, doesn't lack in any areas of the soundstage IMO...
 
I used a Temple Audio Bantam Gold as my main amp for about 4 years. I still miss it's qualities. A friend now uses it with his TV to power a pair of cheap sony 3-way speakers that probably came with a midi-system in the early 90's. Sounds good even through those trash-cans.
 
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