Crown Power Amp owners / Specially for integration in HT setup

[ssf]

I am not giving away this Crown for now and shall test it more
When I hooked up center with Crown, I did feel the harshness.

To my understanding, the PA may not be just about giving continuous high power ... there are some parameters that change from PA to PA that make them different.

The Crowns are professional amps. They need more input voltage to reach their full power. 1.4 vrms setting with home audio preamps won't cut it. One might get away with a 2502 but not with a 1502.

Power amps have only one duty. To amplify the signal without changing it. But unfortunately that does not happen in all cases. And different classes of amps have their own advantages and disadvantages.

Glad you found your amp in emotiva. I found mine with the 2502s. Do test the Crowns further though. Especially with .775 setting. You might be surprised.

 

[ankitbhargava]

Definitely with emotiva power amp i noticed 80 % improvement for music and movies. There will not be much difference in tonal quality (tonal quality is from avr anyways) , but the music and vocals come alive and sound is crystal clear and dynamic range improves a lot. Even my wife could notice such difference. Also we could improve SQ by adjusting tonal configuration from AVR to match with PA dynamic range. Crown is Professional audIo amplifier , it could have some limitations though. Emotivas have < 0 005 % THD and good snr ratio > 115 db. But they are pricier also. My initial plan was to go with two Crown amps.

I can echo this now though improvement to my setup so far has not been leaps and bounds but very impressive.

 

[skumar]

I can echo this now though improvement to my setup so far has not been leaps and bounds but very impressive.

Each person may express this in different ways, but as is the case with many things in life, the last ~20% outcome takes ~80% of the effort/cost/time. Also, room, source, speakers, DAC and cables also should complement/align with the amp as we move up the chain to hear the difference.

 

[ssf]

The crowns are not perfect. Far from it. It does things that I would not want power amps to do. Like adc/dac, digital crossovers, roll off at top and bottom frequencies, restricted bandwidth etc. The crowns are not advertised by Harman as home audio amps. But the point that I am trying to make is that, in an entry level setup, either for HT or stereo, in all the horrors of rooms that we place our theaters and our music systems in, one will be hard pressed to find an amp that will deliver what the crown delivers at the price. From what I have heard in my setup, the ADC/DAC, the digital crossovers etc are not stopping the crowns from providing a lovely musical experience. It would be a shame if our friends, young and old, new into audio who don't want to spend a lot of money, get the impression that the crowns are not worth looking into.

 

[ankitbhargava]

The crowns are not perfect. Far from it. It does things that I would not want power amps to do. Like adc/dac, digital crossovers, roll off at top and bottom frequencies, restricted bandwidth etc. The crowns are not advertised by Harman as home audio amps. But the point that I am trying to make is that, in an entry level setup, either for HT or stereo, in all the horrors of rooms that we place our theaters and our music systems in, one will be hard pressed to find an amp that will deliver what the crown delivers at the price. From what I have heard in my setup, the ADC/DAC, the digital crossovers etc are not stopping the crowns from providing a lovely musical experience. It would be a shame if our friends, young and old, new into audio who don't want to spend a lot of money, get the impression that the crowns are not worth looking into.

Crowns are definitely not to be ignored! I did put this up in my first impression that for this price, it did it's job. Most probably Emotiva performed better in my setup and on my room. Crown may just do equally good job to some other setup in some other rooms and there are FMs who confirms this

 

[samgurung]

I just got myself a crown xls 2002 from amazon ( as an aside it came horribly packaged. Just the original box with a plastic sheet around it and no other protection. The box looked ok and it was only later i noticed one side was a little torn. I took out the amp and it had a dent and the bracket was bent. However it seems to be working fine ).

I have hooked it up to my HT setup. Took preouts from the avr and connected them to the the crown and i can definitely hear a marked improvement in the sound. So far so good!

However is there a way to have the crown go on standby when nothing is playing and automatically come on when i start playing something? Would appreciate any help.

 

[skumar]

However is there a way to have the crown go on standby when nothing is playing and automatically come on when i start playing something? Would appreciate any help.

Check if your AVR has trigger out and the amp has trigger in?

 

[samgurung]

Thought I'd pen down my observations on the Crown XLS 2002 which I hooked up to my HT setup yesterday. I have a Marantz NR1509 which were powering the Elac B6.2 speakers. That work is now offloaded to the Crown through the front LR preouts in the Marantz. I noticed a definite improvement in the SQ. Wider soundstage and better imaging and there seems to be more air around the instruments and you get more sense of the room where the recording took place. ( if that makes sense ). However, there are a few doubts and would love for you all to chime in.

Given the power rating of the Crown I was surprised that I have had to put the gain knobs at the 3 o'clock position to get the sound level i want out of the speakers. I thought they would not be required to be set that high. At that position the sound is slightly louder than when i was using the Marantz to drive the Elacs at the same pre-amp volume.

On certain recordings I have found the treble to be a tad gritty, though am still to test this properly. Just an initial reaction.

I played music for few hours( 3-4) today. Relatively loud but not excessively so. The LED green light was flashing at -20DB below clip throughout. But towards the end the Crowns fan turned on. Was wondering if this is normal given that most reviews have said that they have hardly ever had the fan come on.

 

[samgurung]

Check if your AVR has trigger out and the amp has trigger in?

No they do not

 

[ssf]

Given the power rating of the Crown I was surprised that I have had to put the gain knobs at the 3 o'clock position to get the sound level i want out of the speakers.

Did you set the input sensitivity to .775 ?

 

[samgurung]

Did you set the input sensitivity to .775 ?

Yes I have

 

[ssf]

Crowns fan turned on. Was wondering if this is normal given that most reviews have said that they have hardly ever had the fan come on.

The fans turn on. It's difficult to hear.In my stereo setup with a ifi zen dac and a tube pre, keep the gain knobs at 2 O'Clock. The LED green light flashing at -20DB below clip is too loud to listen in my system continuously. It plays cleanly without any treble grittiness probably due to a tube in the chain.

I have heard that it might play better after a few hours of use.

 

[samgurung]

The fans turn on. It's difficult to hear.In my stereo setup with a ifi zen dac and a tube pre, keep the gain knobs at 2 O'Clock. The LED green light flashing at -20DB below clip is too loud to listen in my system continuously. It plays cleanly without any treble grittiness probably due to a tube in the chain.

I have heard that it might play better after a few hours of use.

My room is 20x13 ft. Fully carpeted floor. So can play a little loud.

I guess the fan turning on was normal then. The treble seemed fine. Didn't notice any colouration of the sound except on one or two recordings but then I'll have to test that further.

What tube amp are you using and where did you buy it from?

 

[ssf]

What tube amp are you using and where did you buy it from?

https://hifimart.com/product/fx-audio-dp-02-pre-amplifier-html/

Changed the tubes to Riverstone audio - GE Jan 5654W

 

[samgurung]

Is there an ideal gain level setting for the Crown 2002. I have set mine at 3 O'Clock position to get the same amount of volume with my elacs as I did when they were connected to the AVR and volume was set at 50 in the AVR ( which now functions as a pre-amp ). Given the power of the crowns am surprised that I have to set the gain that high to get same/similar volume levels. I thought it would need considerably less gain level

 

[ankitbhargava]

Is there an ideal gain level setting for the Crown 2002. I have set mine at 3 O'Clock position to get the same amount of volume with my elacs as I did when they were connected to the AVR and volume was set at 50 in the AVR ( which now functions as a pre-amp ). Given the power of the crowns am surprised that I have to set the gain that high to get same/similar volume levels. I thought it would need considerably less gain level

Keeping on 0.775V, I also had to dial to 3'O clock on 1502 to keep up the output (around +1db as gain in AVR settings). From what I know, it should be safe as far as speakers go.

 

[ssf]

Is there an ideal gain level setting for the Crown 2002. I have set mine at 3 O'Clock position to get the same amount of volume with my elacs as I did when they were connected to the AVR and volume was set at 50 in the AVR ( which now functions as a pre-amp ). Given the power of the crowns am surprised that I have to set the gain that high to get same/similar volume levels. I thought it would need considerably less gain level

Are you comparing the outputs of Marantz in two channel direct mode and with the amp attached ? In 5.1 or 7.1, Audyssey would have calibrated the levels of all channels including the ones with the power amp.

I also have the sneaking suspicion that our home audio receivers are not supplying these professional amplifiers with enough output voltage to drive them to full unclipped power. You can keep the gain at full in the Crown. I will not cause any problems. Might increase the noise a bit though. I was testing this in my BIL's setup with a FX Audio DP-02 and Crown XLS 2502 driving the Quad 12L2's. The pre volume goes to around 31 or so. It was quite loud at 7.

https://www.audioholics.com/audio-amplifier/amplifier-voltage-gain

 

[samgurung]

Are you comparing the outputs of Marantz in two channel direct mode and with the amp attached ? In 5.1 or 7.1, Audyssey would have calibrated the levels of all channels including the ones with the power amp.

I also have the sneaking suspicion that our home audio receivers are not supplying these professional amplifiers with enough output voltage to drive them to full unclipped power. You can keep the gain at full in the Crown. I will not cause any problems. Might increase the noise a bit though. I was testing this in my BIL's setup with a FX Audio DP-02 and Crown XLS 2502 driving the Quad 12L2's. The pre volume goes to around 31 or so. It was quite loud at 7.

https://www.audioholics.com/audio-amplifier/amplifier-voltage-gain

yes am comparing in direct mode as well as with multi eq. So I guess Ill crank up the gain in the Crown and reduce the volume on the marantz. The AVR has a max volume limit.. Will set that low so that I dont blow my speakers by mistakenly blasting the avr volume.

 

[samgurung]

When I stick my ear close to the speakers ( when nothing is playing of course ) I do hear a hissing sound both from the mid range driver and the tweeter. However it isnt audible from my listening position!

 

[ssf]

Got my Marantz 7010 back from the repairs. Connected the Crown XLS 2502. I can now tell for sure that the Marantz is not giving the Crowns the voltage it needs. I tried placing my DAC and my tube-pre amp after the pre from the Marantz. Was not satisfied with the results. Music was not sounding the way I liked it. For my room, at my listening levels, I found that the Crown XLS 2502 were not required, The Marantz on it's own was good enough to give me the immersion needed to watch movies. I am now using the Crown XLS 2502 for 2 channel listening. The Zen DAC and the FX Audio tube pre give the Crown enough voltage to make them play loud effortlessly. Music sounds lovely through them.