advertisement


Temple Audio Bantam Gold or Monoblocks or Something.

The Bantam Gold sounds very good with a 12v car battery if you have the room . I've also used it with a Maplins 13.8v power supply with excellent results.
 
Alex S said:
Obvious thought at this stage is its pretty amazing for less than 200 quid but not necessarily an epiphany. Will try to say more later.
Click to expand...

This is where I've ended up with T-Amps myself - the ones I've tried (Topping, Amptastic) are absolutely amazing for their price tag (£50 & £100), but I don't think either really worries either of the Quad pre-powers I also have in daily use. The T-Amp presentation is very beguiling in many ways, but it does have something to do with mild compression and bandwidth-limiting to my ears. I think I could happily live with a T-Amp and high-efficiency speakers, and I'd even argue that would make for a pretty sensible allocation of system budget, but there is no such thing as a free lunch. In my context as a third-system / spare amp I couldn't be happier with the Amptastic, it really is better than it has any right to be for £100, but it's unfair to expect it to compete with far more expensive or more powerful amps into reactive loads.

Alex S said:
On the face if it there's nothing to complain about. It does everything, detail, imaging, timing, blah, blah, even the dreaded foot-tapping happens, but there's something unsatisfying, 'brittle', amusical almost. Not sure if this is me, never having heard a class D at home/office, burn-in? I don't think its the ProAcs.
Click to expand...

I suspect you are over-stretching the amp more than a bit. The ProAcs seem to like some current IME and they are rather mid-forward too, so really highlight any issues here. I felt they matched best to a good punchy push-pull EL34 or KT88 tube amp out of the things I tried.
 
Brian, could you link to a correct Maplins; would this be plug and play?

Tony, unfortunately, my only alternative to the ProAcs is The Neat Momentum 3i, just as bad a match I'm guessing (and don't really fit on a desk).
 
This site contains affiliate links for which pink fish media may be compensated.
Alex S said:
Tony, unfortunately, my only alternative to the ProAcs is The Neat Momentum 3i, just as bad a match I'm guessing (and don't really fit on a desk).
Click to expand...

I'm not criticising the ProAcs at all, only the idea of driving them with a T-amp. They are a very nice little speaker IMO, I'd just be inclined to throw more watts at them, e.g. something like a Exposure 2010, Quad 306 or a decent little EL34 or KT88 tube amp e.g. Prima Luna, Pure Sound etc. The lowest power 'known-good' partnering I can think of is any of the later Sugden A21s (i.e. the 25w ones, not the 1960s 12w wood-case).

In the short period I had them I tried my pair with an Exposure 2010 and Prima Luna Prologue 2 (both of which sounded very good in different ways) and a Leak Stereo 20 (which struggled with them - it sounded 'nice' but lacked dynamics or grip).
 
Thanks for that link. Sorry to be dim, but how do I plug and play it - I'm unsure what to do with the red and black binding posts?

I'm sure you're right Tony. Its why I've been hunting a Merdian 551 which I thought would be a good match at the shade over £200 they go for.
 
Best way is to get an old PSU with a 21mm plug on it ( try and plug it into the Bantam gold to make sure it fits ) and then cut it for the body of the PSU . You can then bare both the wires and either fit 4mm banana plugs or unscrew the nuts on the terminals and just use bare wire to connect it .
Alternatively you can get yourself some suitable cable and solder one end to one of these 2.1mm plugs http://www.ebay.co.uk/sch/i.html?_t...1MM+PLUGS&_nkw=2.1MM+PLUGS&_sacat=0&_from=R40
or if you can't or don't solder these are useful http://rover.ebay.com/rover/1/710-5...0001&campid=5338728743&icep_item=181312916297
 
This site contains affiliate links for which pink fish media may be compensated.
Thanks, Brian, I was hunting a longer thing. How do you know which bit goes to red and which to black?

Peter, does over-overkill mean overkill might become available? Maybe its time I bought another psu from you...
 
The positive wire usually has a white line running along its length . That's the cable which is connected to the positive red terminal . I'm no expert Alex so please double check before plugging in ;)

You have PM Alex.
 
I've been using custom hifi cables DC2 power supplies for about 4 years, since I got the Bantam Gold in fact. Sean is very good with custom service.

I think they boost SQ enough to make the T_amp + Power supply the equal, or better of a more conventional commbination at the same total price.

The volume pot holds the Amptastic mini-1 back, and is a lot better with a passive pre in front. My Bantam Gold is the power amp only version, but at just £10 extra for the volume control I wouldn't expect the volume pot to be any better than amptastics.
 
I'm quite impressed with my amptastic mini 1.
I'm looking at adding a passive pre. Have anybody tried it as a power amp?
 
Conan said:
I'm quite impressed with my amptastic mini 1.
I'm looking at adding a passive pre. Have anybody tried it as a power amp?
Click to expand...

Yes, it's very good, it's currently my power amp of choice, I also have a Bantam Gold, NAP 110 & Avondale S100. I was using it with Angle Audio LDR as pre, now I have a meridian 562V, which is a vastly underatted bit of kit at about £200 used.

I was using a dac (fidelity DA-150) for source switching (TV, CD & Streaming), the LDR has a phono stage. The 562V has 7 analogue inputs and 5 digital and goes very well with the Amptastic. Purely as a dac, it's not to be scoffed at!
 
I've had the DC2 PSU for a couple of hours. Early impressions are that the reservations I had about the BG are all but gone. It is now a rather lovely amp, albeit twice as expensive. I think those purchasing this type of amp need to double their budget, ditch the SMPS and get some sort of linear PSU, bench supply or battery.
 
Alex S said:
I've had the DC2 PSU for a couple of hours. Early impressions are that the reservations I had about the BG are all but gone. It is now a rather lovely amp, albeit twice as expensive. I think those purchasing this type of amp need to double their budget, ditch the SMPS and get some sort of linear PSU, bench supply or battery.
Click to expand...

So how do you rate it against another amp at £300-400 ?
 
New? No chance. Rotels at that price aren't bad. Second hand maybe. I guess the single input could be a problem, although most things can be fed in to a DAC and back out again.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.


advertisement


Back
Top