staggrlee Posted June 14, 2005 Report Share Posted June 14, 2005 hehe, dont mean to bash you at all, ...I agree with many of your points and Memphis is a great choice as well which I mentioned earlier. In home audio lingo the point you're making (often referred to as the Boston "School" philosophy or something similar); is that, all things being equal, many home electronics components across a wide price range offer fidelity differences that are essentially undetectable to the listener in all but the most stringent listening environments even with the purest source material, and only then at the upper limits of their performance profile. This can be even truer of bass and sub-bass where frequencies approach the edge of audible frequencies. Truer still of the acoustically challenged mobile environment. The notable exceptions to this "rule" are the speakers themselves.For a professional installer, matching an amp and subs is not rocket science and neither is that the case for the casual DIY. But for DIY, IMO it really comes down to what is readily available and easy to install and you can't really go wrong matching JL amps with their subs as long as you provide sufficient power. In this case, the 2 10W3's & the 500/1 are perfectly matched IMO, its easy to install, used ones are readily available, and the over-engineered design of the RIPS makes it less likely that the previous owner damaged the amp with an improper match or wiring. The added benefit of consistent power delivery across a wide range of input voltages also makes them better suited for older cars with <100 amp alternators.There aren't many amps that I would consider buying used. JL's one of them. They're not the end-all be-all, but I think it makes the most sense in his case. If we were talking new off-the-shelf amps it might be a different case but I still don't think a new $300 amp would match a used JL in features, power, and ease of install. Even at retail they're a good buy IMO (even though few are marked lower than 10% off MSRP), used even more so. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
staggrlee Posted June 14, 2005 Report Share Posted June 14, 2005 ... not sure if yall remember, old school PPI amps had essentially the same "shifting" amps,I'm very familiar with Precision Power. I just sold a PPI 225 that I had been hanging onto for years hoping to have a chance to use it again. They were the best amps out there for a lot of years. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bing_0 Posted June 14, 2005 Report Share Posted June 14, 2005 point well taken...i would say i am more of hte "richard clark" school of thought when it comes to sub amp selection there are so may brands that i wish was still the same quality as they were back in the late 90s...b Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chris_R Posted June 14, 2005 Report Share Posted June 14, 2005 point well taken...i would say i am more of hte "richard clark" school of thought when it comes to sub amp selection there are so may brands that i wish was still the same quality as they were back in the late 90s...b←Oh yes... PPI, Autotek (not bad, but not what they were), Rockford, HiFonics, Lanzar, Linear Power (are they still around?). So many back then. <sigh>Richard's philosophy was "more power", wasn't it? His GN is still one of my favorite cars... Even back when USD built the initial car. Such a groundbreaker. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chris_R Posted June 14, 2005 Report Share Posted June 14, 2005 another thing to note:JL's RIPS system is not patented by JL, infact, its not even JL who originated the design. Years ago, not sure if yall remember, old school PPI amps had essentially the same "shifting" amps, i forgot what the model number was, some DSM i think. THat was back in athe mid to late 90s. I heard that the same engineer who desinged those ppi amps is also the person who designed the RIPS amps for JL...as for the impedance matching thing, there are a few otehr companies who offer essentially the same thing, though via slightly different methods (some manipulate via the powersupply, some the input or output stages)...i cant remember who, but i thing phoenix gold and JBL may have these systems...i think there may be 2-3 others...rememer, i am not bashing JL, just pointing out the facts that their technology is not new, and there are other good amps too b←Or you can manipulate it after the amp via an AccuBass/AccuMatch device. Richard Clark and Dave Navonne swore by these. Dave had a switching system set up in his T-Bird where he could switch them in/out of the system and they say it was a HUGE difference. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bing_0 Posted June 14, 2005 Report Share Posted June 14, 2005 richard and david's thing was, you cannot tell the difference in sound with different amps, provided they are gain matched. i take it one step further and say that different amps, given similar ratings and quality, sound baiscally hte same, especially on subs.he has a 10k prize that has been out for 20 years almost now, bsaically, you can go, takt he challenge, where you take i think 5 amps, the rest of the system is the same, and he play the amps one by one by one with the same material, and if you cfan correctly match whcih amp is whcih, you win 10k. in all these years, many of tried, including professioanl recording artists, sound engineers, i.e. people who have good ears for a living, but none have come even close to getting the 10k. and i belive you dont have to use all good amps, you can match a pyramid up wtih a brax, a jl, a optimus etc...now of course, that is a controlled environment, but i would persoanlyl host my own $1k contest for people to come down with similar rated quality sub amps, and try to disquish 5 amps, and if they can, i will give them 1000 bucks b Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
staggrlee Posted June 15, 2005 Report Share Posted June 15, 2005 richard and david's thing was, you cannot tell the difference in sound with different amps, ...Absolutely and if point-in-time fidelity in a fixed comparison is your only criteria it almost doesn't matter what you buy. It really comes down to feature set and reliability. And in the first case, if like most consumer electronics a lot of it is window dressing and you'll end up using at best about 40% of the features that you're being sold on as product differentiators, then even that doesn't matter much. Car amps are pretty much set it and forget it so you don't need a lot of features.When it comes to reliability though - that's another matter. In cars heat, vibration and power fluctuations are the slow death that start killing your amps the minute you hook them up. The more bullet proof amps with good power management and passive thermal dissipation are going to last 5+ years which is as long as many people keep cars. If your $1000 amp dies the moment the fan does, was that worth it? If you're continually overheating a cheaper amp and its thermal protection has to keep saving the amp, it will do so for only so long and if you end up buying two $300 amps when you could have bought a single $500 amp over that period of time, have you saved any money?The old adage you get what you pay for holds to some degree here as well. Although you can pay more for Butler tube amps on the far end of analog or digital amps on the other, you have to ask yourself what designs have stood the test of time? JL's Slash line is one of them. And that's my $.02 <_< Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bing_0 Posted June 15, 2005 Report Share Posted June 15, 2005 you are absolutely correct joe this has been a great discussion...speaking of bullet proof amps, there is one particular amp that i wish was still around, old school second generation orion HCCAs, i rememer we had a 225 that was powering three jl 12w3s in the back of a volkswagen. i think the owner did everythign he can to dispatch it, stuff the trunk full of cloths, get water on it, turned it up way luod for ever, eerything, and when he got a new car four years later, he brought the amp back to us to put into antoher car, the amp looked terrible, scratched dirty, even some waht rusty, but guess what, hooked it up to a new set of kickers, and the sucker banged! WOW! b Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
staggrlee Posted June 15, 2005 Report Share Posted June 15, 2005 you are absolutely correct joe this has been a great discussion...speaking of bullet proof amps, there is one particular amp that i wish was still around, old school second generation orion HCCAs, i rememer we had a 225 that was powering three jl 12w3s in the back of a volkswagen. i think the owner did everythign he can to dispatch it, stuff the trunk full of cloths, get water on it, turned it up way luod for ever, eerything, and when he got a new car four years later, he brought the amp back to us to put into antoher car, the amp looked terrible, scratched dirty, even some waht rusty, but guess what, hooked it up to a new set of kickers, and the sucker banged! WOW! b←Newer isn't always better and latest isn't necessarily greatest. I have a bought-used 1970's Hafler DH101 pre-amp as a first stage in a brand new home stereo system and I paid $200 getting it refurbed/updated when I could have bought a new Adcom or Parasound for the same amount. I cared far less about the amp. Input stage and speakers, the middle's less of a concern.But I put my $$ where my mouth is right or wrong and I like rugged in a car. This is my DIY job: Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bing_0 Posted June 15, 2005 Report Share Posted June 15, 2005 looks good man, looks good, much better and more study looking than kai's s60R which also had jl amps mounted in that manner...rugged is definetly the way to go...i love amps taht will play loud and never overheats and shut off, cuase most of my isntalls are under hte floor, and covered... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jozone Posted June 15, 2005 Author Report Share Posted June 15, 2005 Glad to see you guys are having such a great discussion Well anyways, I'm heavily leaning towards this amp, it will give me more then enough power, and as I see it, some expandability in the future.. although I must say I'm still on the lookout for a JL 500.1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AnthonyR Posted June 15, 2005 Report Share Posted June 15, 2005 I wonder how that one would compare to my old school jbl 1200.1 which rocks. It's basically teh same as teh infinity 1200w sub amp, which my friend has, and it is definately a solid amp. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bing_0 Posted June 15, 2005 Report Share Posted June 15, 2005 i would say jbl took a serious step into becoming a major amp brand, so i would say this amp may be even an improvement over the older powervalve amps b Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
staggrlee Posted June 15, 2005 Report Share Posted June 15, 2005 I wonder how that one would compare to my old school jbl 1200.1 which rocks. It's basically teh same as teh infinity 1200w sub amp, which my friend has, and it is definately a solid amp.←With the exception of cosmetics the Infinity REF1211A is probably pretty much the exact same amp. JBL and Infinity are both owned by Harman Kardon. So if you can find that one or the other for less, probably doesn't matter which you buy.Just realize that the 1200 Watt rating applies to 2ohm loads not the 4 you'll be running. At 4 ohms it's rated at 780 watts at 14.4 V. Figure you'll be running closer to 12.5V after installing it and at 1% THD (20x higher than the .05% of the JL) you'll probably be getting about 500 net. Still more than adequate for the 10W3s.Although the THD rating is far less important for D amps in terms of sound quality, it means that much more "noise" is being amplified and sent to the subs and that they're both working hotter and harder and may clip at lower volumes than a cleaner amp. It also means that the same amp will require more current for the same level of amplification. You may need to address that with a Red/Yellow top and/or upgraded alternator. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
theunderlord Posted June 15, 2005 Report Share Posted June 15, 2005 c'mon Joe.. just hang out here instead of SS.. you know we don't have any of that R forum I'm dumb! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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