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PASMAG Amplifier Reviews.
- Thread starter Hi-FiDelity
- Start date
Driftdad541
Noob
An old thread I see... Does anyone know much about the Rockford Fosgate 2500.1 bdcp? I've seen Steve Meade's amp dyno video but I'm curious as to how good it sounds. I'm piecing together a system for my scion and bought one today. I got a good deal on it. I've never owned any gear from Rockford before but the bdcp constant power, the over total available power, the fact that it's class bd, it makes it's rated power at 2 ohms and it can go down to 1 ohm or lower if you're competing, it's strappable, has master and slave capabilities... So many features! But how does it sound? What does it compare to in the sound quality department? I'm running Mosconi One amps with hybrid audio legatia 3 ways up front. On paper this amp seems ideal for what I want and it's versatile. Does it compare to a Zero 1? Are they two different animals? Feedback, please?
I've been looking for more SQ-oriented ratings for the Rockford Fosgate T-series Power amps, myself.
There's amp dyno videos out there - the coverage of the T1000X5ad shows that it's surprisingly underrated. (for it's size, not that I wouldn't expect underrated RF amps). But that's where the frustration starts-
They use the CEA-2006 standard, which is to rate the amp "at or below 1% distortion". I'd like to know what the actual THD is, at rated power. Honestly, there's other SQ tests you could possibly perform to amplifiers, but a simple black-box THD test at rated power (with a little reveal on any THD changes at different input voltages, or different pre-amp settings) would go a long way to describe if one amp is actually cleaner than another... worth the extra money. RF doesn't publish a spec (at least that I've seen) showing it. Helix, on the other hand, also has some compact class-D based amps, and they claim 0.015% if I recall... that's really good, and significantly lower than "1%". I also expect RF's to be significantly lower than "1%" for this Power line - but it's an unfortunate unknown.
But that seems to be where they stop, these days. Everyone plugs them into their SMD AD-1, runs the automated tests, and calls it a day.
To be honest, I'm surprised that product doesn't already have an automated test like that - it obviously has something akin to their distortion detector built in, calibrated for 1% distortion, used for the automated power tests. I'm positive those same EE's could design a circuit that allows the user to input a target wattage (could just be an up/down button pair even), then when you click "go" on that test, would raise the amp up to that level and display the distortion percentage. Seems like it could be just another automated test.
For $3,500, I know I would want more than the caveman-grunt "watts!" number.
There's amp dyno videos out there - the coverage of the T1000X5ad shows that it's surprisingly underrated. (for it's size, not that I wouldn't expect underrated RF amps). But that's where the frustration starts-
They use the CEA-2006 standard, which is to rate the amp "at or below 1% distortion". I'd like to know what the actual THD is, at rated power. Honestly, there's other SQ tests you could possibly perform to amplifiers, but a simple black-box THD test at rated power (with a little reveal on any THD changes at different input voltages, or different pre-amp settings) would go a long way to describe if one amp is actually cleaner than another... worth the extra money. RF doesn't publish a spec (at least that I've seen) showing it. Helix, on the other hand, also has some compact class-D based amps, and they claim 0.015% if I recall... that's really good, and significantly lower than "1%". I also expect RF's to be significantly lower than "1%" for this Power line - but it's an unfortunate unknown.
But that seems to be where they stop, these days. Everyone plugs them into their SMD AD-1, runs the automated tests, and calls it a day.
To be honest, I'm surprised that product doesn't already have an automated test like that - it obviously has something akin to their distortion detector built in, calibrated for 1% distortion, used for the automated power tests. I'm positive those same EE's could design a circuit that allows the user to input a target wattage (could just be an up/down button pair even), then when you click "go" on that test, would raise the amp up to that level and display the distortion percentage. Seems like it could be just another automated test.
For $3,500, I know I would want more than the caveman-grunt "watts!" number.
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Does it compare to a Zero 1? Are they two different animals? Feedback, please?
They're certainly different animals considering that the RF is a monoblock subwoofer amp with a frequency response range only up to 250hz, while the Zero 1 is a 2-channel class AB fullrange amplifier. Haven't heard the RF, but I did have 3x Zero 1 amps at one time, replacing a Class A and a Zero 4.
I won't say that a Zero 1 is "wasted" as a subwoofer amp, as it's very good at that as well, but I don't think it scores high in the value for money department as a sub amp.