I recently came across a brand of amp called Emotiva. They get very good reviews on AVS forums. They offer a 5 channel 200 watt amp for $799. And also a 5 channel 125 watt for $499. Any one heard any of these? They offer a 5 year warranty, and 30 day in home trial. It is extremely hard to find any used ones, so they must be pretty good. The Outlaw amps are more expensive. Do they sound better?

I have a co-worker that prefers Emotiva. They are also an internet company. His experience as far as customer service has been excellent. He has the 125wx6 amp and he is very happy with it driving Axiom m80 (4ohms). I believe Emotiva's amps are built off shore while Outlaws are built in California. That may account for the price difference. Both are heavy and well built products.

Either company's amps represent a significant "bang for your buck," I would say. Emotiva is a newer internet-direct brand than Outlaw, and the amps you mention (certainly the XPA-5) are new enough that I would not expect them to appear yet in the used market. My dealings with Emotiva have mainly been related to discussions regarding an older surround processor (the LMC-1, now discontinued) and while those dealings were not necessarily positive, they also don't relate to the actual hardware of those amplifiers. Their amps are built overseas (China, specifically), unlike Outlaw's US-built multichannel amps, and that is going to be responsible for some of the price differential. It's not the only reason for the price difference though, as there's too much disparity for that to be the only factor involved. I was actually looking at some of the pictures of and specs on their newer amps earlier this week, and noticed one or two things. First, the XPA-5 (their 5x200W amp) appears to have smaller heat sinks than the 7500 (the transformer takes up more of the depth than the 7500's pair of transformers). Heat rejection is certainly important, and I'd suspect that the 7500 would have an advantage here. Second, the 7500's signal-to-noise ratio is about 20dB better (120dB vs. 100dB). This, moreso than the extra heat rejection, is likely to yield benefits sonically. I don't know what differences might exist for factors such as crosstalk, which aren't represented in either amp's specs.

Are the Emotivas good amps? I'd expect them to be a step or two up from the typical receiver's internal amps, without a doubt. Are they as good as the Outlaw amps? The SN ratio numbers suggest that they might not be, but I haven't heard an XPA-5 to know just how it might compare to my 7500.

gonk:

excellent analaysis.
Thanks.

Also, it's worth noting that some of Emotiva's earlier amplifier offerings (the MPS-1/MPS-2 being the most obvious example) are fairly different beasts than the less expensive XPA-5 and its siblings. The MPS-1 originally sold for upward of $2000 for 7x200W of power, and aside from issues with DOA amp blades experienced by some users it was considered a first-rate amp. It (and the MPS-2, which is the same amp with a different faceplate) are, based on the reviews, easily peers of the 7500 and 7700.

I knew there was a reason why I stayed with Outlaw! I know this is the 7125 forum, but...but since we are talking about Emotiva, has anyone looked at their subwoofer offerings? Just curious on the product.

The difference in the 2 ampliflers (Outlaw 7500 & Emotiva XPA-5) is that the SNA was measured at different Voltage gains. After having talked with a Bryston engineer, which I tend to believe have very solid amplifier designs, there is little difference in measurement documented by either company on their specs for SNA. He also stated, like Altec stated in a M2200 thread, this is not a good source of comparing power amplifiers as a whole.

I'm very interested with the new IcePower Amps and was wondering if the Outlaws are looking into these as well?

I suspect that Outlaw has been watching the digital amps for a number of years now, but there's no word on any plans to develop product based on them right now.

I always shake my head in amazement as to why people are so eager about digital amps - they are a step DOWN in sound quality from the analog amps we have now for goodness sake!

Maybe I'm missing something, or maybe people just are more concerned about size, cheapness, and efficiency and not so much about the best sound quality anymore. I don't get it....