Is the Crown XLS good as a sub amp?

[hifimaddy]

I have seen many guys using the Crown XLS series as a subwoofer amplifier. How does it compare with a dedicated plate amp? I am thinking of getting one. Please leave some suggestions.

(I am considering the Hypex plate amp too, but Crown is much cheaper but has has double the power ratio.)

Thank you.
Vishnu

 

[morerajendra5678]

I have seen many guys using the Crown XLS series as a subwoofer amplifier. How does it compare with a dedicated plate amp? I am thinking of getting one. Please leave some suggestions.

(I am considering the Hypex plate amp too, but Crown is much cheaper but has has double the power ratio.)

Thank you.
Vishnu

Crown XLS will be a better but you have to pay than Hypex plate amplifier.

 

[hifimaddy]

Crown XLS will be a better but you have to pay than Hypex plate amplifier.

but hypex is more expensive than crown

 

[morerajendra5678]

but hypex is more expensive than crown

How much you are getting it at and from where ?

 

[hifimaddy]

How much you are getting it at and from where ?

I am getting it from Europe, but the price has not much difference. Hypex FA501 around 37k and Crown XLS 1502 around 30k. But Crown has more power in bridge mode, but Hypex has onboard DSP, so I don't know which one is better. At the moment I haven't decided on the driver yet.

 

[morerajendra5678]

I am getting it from Europe, but the price has not much difference. Hypex FA501 around 37k and Crown XLS 1502 around 30k. But Crown has more power in bridge mode, but Hypex has onboard DSP, so I don't know which one is better. At the moment I haven't decided on the driver yet.

You are effectively getting Crown at a discounted price as crown has high sales volume in India. If you are aiming to build long term solution, opt for Behringer or DBX based dsp solution and opt for Crown amplifier.

 

[ssf]

When my Velodyne 15" sub plate (750w RMS) got spoilt, I decided to connect my Crown xls 2502 in bridged mode to the sub. While the Crown has no issues driving the 15" driver, I somehow liked the way the sub sounded with its original plate and it's original DSP.

 

[kapvin]

I continue to use XLS amplification for subwoofers. it is excellent cheap wattage but their are some caveats:

1. Not low distortion - but not likely to matter unless you have an uber clean subwoofer driver, so okay for most cases. 9the subs distortion is likely to be significantly higher in most cases, enough to make the amp distortion irrelevant
2. Diminishing response below 30hz. Again unless you love infrabass and if you have a subwoofer driver that capable, it should not be much of an issue. its easily correctible till about 20hz..
3. highish - noise floor - only will matter if you have a really efficient set of mains and an very inefficient subwoofer driver... again in most cases, it wont matter.

in fact for non infra bass duties, its pretty ideal. (again unless you have an uber resolving clean system in which case you would not be asking about this anyway )

hope this helps.