Audio amplifiers are at the very heart of every home theater system. As the quality and output power requirements of today’s loudspeakers increase, so do the demands of audio amps. It is tough to pick an amplifier given the large number of models and fashions. I will explain probably the most common amplifier designs like “tube amps”, “linear amps”, “class-AB” and “class-D” along with “class-T amps” to help you understand some of the terms widely used by amplifier manufacturers. The following information should also assist you to discover which topology is perfect for your particular application.
To put it simply, the purpose of Cayin A88t Mk2 would be to convert a small-power audio signal right into a high-power audio signal. Our prime-power signal is big enough to operate a speaker sufficiently loud. To do that, an amp uses a number of elements that are controlled through the low-power signal to generate a large-power signal. These elements vary from tubes, bipolar transistors to FET transistors.
Tube amplifiers was previously common a couple of decades ago. A tube has the capacity to control the current flow based on a control voltage which is attached to the tube. Unfortunately, tube amplifiers have a fairly high amount of distortion. From a technical perspective, tube amplifiers will introduce higher harmonics into the signal. However, this characteristic of tube amps still makes these popular. Many people describe tube amps as using a warm sound versus the cold sound of solid state amps.
Another problem with tube amps, though, is definitely the low power efficiency. Nearly all power which tube amps consume is being dissipated as heat and merely a fraction is being changed into audio power. Also, tubes are usually costly to make. Thus tube amps have mostly been replaced by solid-state amps which I will appear at next.
Solid state amps replace the tube with semiconductor elements, typically bipolar transistors or FETs. The earliest type of solid-state amps is referred to as class-A amps. In class-A amps a transistor controls the present flow according to a little-level signal. Some amps use a feedback mechanism in order to minimize the harmonic distortion. Class-A amps have the lowest distortion and in most cases also the lowest level of noise for any amplifier architecture. Should you need ultra-low distortion then you should take a closer look at class-A models. The primary drawback is that similar to tube amps class A amps have suprisingly low efficiency. Consequently these amps require large heat sinks to dissipate the wasted energy and they are usually fairly bulky.
Class-AB amps improve on the efficiency of Audiophile Cables. They normally use a series of transistors to interrupt in the large-level signals into two separate areas, every one of which is often amplified more effectively. As such, class-AB amps are generally smaller compared to class-A amps. However, this topology adds some non-linearity or distortion in the region where signal switches between those areas. As a result class-AB amps normally have higher distortion than class-A amps.
Class-D amps improve on the efficiency of class-AB amps even more simply by using a switching transistor which can be constantly being switched on or off. Thereby this switching stage hardly dissipates any power and phczif the ability efficiency of class-D amps usually exceeds 90%. The switching transistor is being controlled by way of a pulse-width modulator. The switched large-level signal needs to be lowpass filtered in order to eliminate the switching signal and recover the audio signal. Because of non-linearities from the pulse-width modulator and the switching transistor itself, class-D amps naturally have among the highest audio distortion of any audio amplifier.
To solve the issue of high audio distortion, newer Line Magnetic 518ia incorporate feedback. The amplified signal is in comparison with the initial low-level signal and errors are corrected. A properly-known architecture which uses this sort of feedback is referred to as “class-T”. Class-T amps or “t amps” achieve audio distortion which compares using the audio distortion of class-A amps while on the same.