I would like to see the Outlaws develop a high current amplifier in either mono-block of two channel configuration. There are some of us out here with main speakers that aren't very efficient (I have Infinity Kappa 9.1 Series II) for which an amp able to stably drive a one ohm load would be attractive.

My thoughts are along the following lines:
200 watts into 8 ohms
400 watts into 4 ohms
800 watts into 2 ohms
1600 watts into 1 ohm

The 2200 M doesn't fit that bill already?

What are you going to power that beast with? Your own personal nuclear co-gen plant? Doing the math:

1600x5=8000 watts
8000watts = 8000 VA
8000 VA / 120 V = 67 amps. And that's assuming 100% efficiency. More like 100+ amps in real life.

So ...

Visiting the APC UPS product search calculator web site, I find that to cover a load of 1600 watts, I will need a 2200 VA unit. To cover a load of 8000 watts, I will need a 10kVA unit.

However, IMHO, that would be overkill. Why? I have two subs that can pull six amps each under full load, and an Outlaw 770 powering seven 6-ohm rated speakers all on just one 15A circuit breaker. Even running for several minutes with SPL levels pushing over 120dB mid-room, the breaker never tripped. I would say I was not pulling anywhere near the maximum draw of about 3500 watts or 5kVA. In fact the power consumed would have to be about half that at most.

In truth, most listening uses somewhere between 5% and 20% of amplifier power available. Unless one needs enough UPS protection to run amplifier all-channel clipping tests during power failures, don't go too crazy on the protection.

Is that a nuclear power plant in your basement?

Or are ya just glad to see me?

8-)

Very true, and I also expect that any reasonable speaker (including those Infinity's) won't tap out the current (hehehe) Outlaw amps in any real listening application. This sort of wishing for a perfect voltage modulated infinite current source is almost never driven by realistic requirements.

I feel that a more powerful amp would be a nice addition to the Outlaw fimaily. For bragging rights if nothing else. That's why I suggested a 5 channel 300W per channel at 8 Ohm amplifier. That would give you a little extra head room for those dynamic moments. I have to run two 20A circuits now to run what I got. I don't think a 300W amp would be a difficult design for the Outlaws. In fact if they took the larger torroidals from the 7700 and put them into a 5300 it might work out great.

The 7500 is already 80 lbs. Can't imagine how heavy it would have to be to output 50% more power.

I'd say a better idea would be a 300W 2 or 3 channel amp. Then if you wanted to do surround, you could match that with a lower power amp (yeah if you can call 200 W lower power, hehe) for the surrounds.

Well, the 790 is reportedly still coming, and it'll be 7x300W at 8 ohms. They apparently had to do some significant re-design due to some heat rejection issues and I suspect they tried to get the other amps into production first, so there hasn't been much news on it in a while, but I think it's still planned.

Heh, sick.

I think I'll stick with lusting for the 7700. Don't see myself ever getting speakers that need more power than that.

My plan is to use active crossovers and probably a pair of 7 channel amps. I'd like to have 790(0)s, but I might just go 7125s. I wonder what the family price for a pair of amps and a 990 would be?

That's assuming I go Outlaw - I'm also looking at Sunfire and Arcam, and maybe Rotel. But Outlaw is the front runner.

Good discussion; however I never said that the proposed amplifier needed to be pure class A. That would be the only way that the power problem several of you alluded to would come up.

The quality of the switching circuitry available today is so high that a very good high current amp could be made that could drop from class A to class C under high current loads and still provide the kind of power I listed for those applications that would require it (such as Outlaw bragging rights without melting down the 15 amp breaker in your home breaker panel.

Power out has to be less than power in. Amplifier class has little to do with that fact.

Actually, it wouldn't have to be heavier. It would just have to improve efficiency. The vast majority of the weight of the current amps is taken up by output transformers and heatsinks.

There are companies out there that are outputting 400wpc into 4ohms in substantially lighter and smaller form factors, but they're doing it using more efficient PWM digital amps. As these amp designs are perfected and gain more market acceptance, they will take over the class AB amplifier space.

Cheers,

That's just crazy talk. We want our amps to eventually weigh as much as an Abrams tank.

Amps getting lighter, whoever heard such a thing?

I have seen an amp that had two power cords. I assume that this would allow you to plug them into two separate circuits each on a different 15 amp breakers which would allow you to reach beyond the 1800W normal house limit. A possible solution for a 7 channel 300 WPC, 2100W amp.

The Model 790 will be configured in exactly this way (see this picture of the old 790 design, taken by psklenar in May 2004) to achieve a 300Wx7 capacity. It'll need two dedicated circuits to reach full output, of course.

I want one. So what is the problem with the 790? Heat? If they have to put a fan in it that won't bother me. They can make fans pretty quite these days. Less than 30db.
Another amp that uses two power cords.

The design seen in Pat's pictures apparently had problems with heat rejection, and Outlaw decided to take it all the way back to the drawing board (at which point I suspect the 7125, 7700, 7500, and 7075 got ahead of it). Last I heard, though, it's still coming at some point.

Is it to late to ask for LED's on the front panel that would give you some type of power level status? I have never had a separate amp that didn't have something showing you how hard the amp was working until the M200.

I ordered the Sherbourn 7/2100A. It should be able to put out a butt-load of power. It requires two outlets (or a single 20A), and it has a bunch of extra tricks up its sleeve as well like Load Detection etc.

Take a peek!
http://www.audioholics.com/productreviews/avhardware/Sherbourn71250Ap1.html

http://www.hometheaterhifi.com/volume_11_1/sherbourn-pt-7000-ssp-7-2100-amp-1-2004.html

I haven't heard a bad thing about it!

Just my two bits!

--TDA

Looks interesting, but I am wating to see what the 7900 amp from the Outlaws will provide. It should be out this year sometime.

i too, have been waiting for the 7900.

The Carver Sunfire Cinema Grand Signature 400~seven claims to produce 400w per channel continuous all channels driven on a single 15a breaker. But the fuse in the Carver still blows at 1800w. What does this mean?

That their physics textbooks use different equations than the ones that the rest of us use? That does seem pretty improbably to me - 2800W of output from a 15A 120V circuit (1800W) doesn't make sense to me.

I am using a Sampson SX2800 for my two passive subwoofers and noticed that it also uses a 15A breaker. There was also a note in the manual: NOTE: If you are operating the SX amplifier at high power levels for long durations in fixed installations,
you may consider switching the operating voltage to 220 volts. A licensed and insured electrician and/or
technician should perform this modification.

I didn't know I could switch my power circuit over to 220V and use the same 120V amplifier in a 220V circuit. Is that possible?

Your house service is typically 120V/208V - some appliances use 208V connections. It's a different receptacle than 120V, though. I'd be curious to hear what one of our electrician or EE residents had to say about that (feeding a 220V power supply with 208V, cord & plug issues, and the like), but I'd probably leave mine 120V.

Some devices have power supplies that can be set for 120/240 and some (usually smaller) devices have power supplies that can work with a wide range of input voltages. For instance, the adapter for this notebook PC works 50-60 Hz, 100-240 volts AC.

So you need to consult you owners manual on what voltages are acceptable for the device and how to configure it.

Converting a recepticle over to 240 isn't a big thing usually, but as Gonk says, there are different blade configurations for the recpticles and plugs for different voltage and current ratings.

After all that, we listen to music, so in reality it's probably a waste of time for anyone using their amps for listening rather than as a heater.

But it is an odd spec, for sure.