On November 1, 2013 at 10:37, BrettLee3232 said...
Oh my bad let me rephrase....
Lol, sorry I didn't know a lot of mini amps were in the market.
Neither did I, but see Fred's comment, and maybe you were talking about a brand we had not heard of. We simply would not know until you told us the brand and model.
On November 1, 2013 at 14:08, Soundsgood said...
I am looking forward to trying out the 2 channel version. I don’t think I will be using the 3 channel version due to this statement on the product sheet.
Note: This amplifier uses an internal DSP for intelligent blending of signals to create a unique center channel while maintaining stereo separation. It supports two-channel inputs only and does not perform surround decoding for Dolby/DTS formats.
That's not a big surprise, and I bet it would cost $75 more if it could decode 5.1 to 3
I know the reason for this is because most TV’s don’t output 5.1 over the digital out. Not Snaps fault and they are trying to make a product that compensates for bad TV’s but to me it feels like going back in time 20 years.
Odd. That's what was expressed here about the TVs when we discovered they did that. An amp that works with existing product should not be shunned!
They are essentially just trying to fake a center channel.
Wait a minute. From the very first DynaQuad wiring schemes forward, center channels were faked by putting in the center the sounds that are the same and of equal volume on left and right. You can actually do this yourself with a stereo signal and an extra speaker. And did you refuse to sell AV Receivers with ProLogic because they faked a center channel? They absolutely did that.
As I said, the TVs represent old audio technology and you should probably try out the three channel piece. Here's a quote from
[Link: head-fi.org] about a product from the 70s that did the same thing passively:
At one point, after dropping thousands of dollars into my audio system, I would have never expected that a $20 gadget could transform my conception of hi-end audio. But a $20 little box I bought on Ebay actually took my speaker and headphone systems to a higher level, and forced me to think deeply about what the word "stereo" actually means.
The gadget is Dynaco QD-1 Series IIL, a passive box to perform ambience extraction, turning stereo audio into five-channel surround. The device was originally marketed by Dynaco in the 70s, called QD-1 Quadaptor.
Et cetera. Digital surround is pretty spiffy, but so is passive surround.
I know the point of this is to have a small amp located behind the TV. IMO if that is the only option I would much rather have a 2.1 system that is actually playing the program information as recorded then a 3.1 system that fakes a center channel just so you have 3 speakers that are making sound. Good 2.1 is better then bad 3.1 IMO but to each their own.
You have no reason to believe that this amp does this badly. You're just saying so. The only reason I would not want it in a similar situation would be if the center level were not adjustable. DynaQuad didn't let you adjust the center level, but ProLogic did.
I normally don’t post things like this on a public site because some manufactures see them as a slam but I know that Snap is one of the good guys and takes installer comments seriously and uses them to give us better products.
Then they should listen to me: this is a cool product!
If they want to go beyond 2.1 what we really need is a device that passes thru the HDMI video to the display and strips and amplifies the audio. This would be killer for use with their HDMI matrix products. Basically a product that strips all of the stuff out of a receiver that we don’t need like multiple audio/video inputs and switching and gives us just what we need. One HDMI input or an HDbaset input, 1 HDMI out to display, an audio decoder and 5 or 7 amplified channels and a .1 out for the sub.
What is the retail for the three channel amp, and what would be the retail for the product you describe? How, in a practical manner, could you use a device that outputs five or seven channels and is placed behind the TV? You're not talking about the same product.
