Richard Clark, well known car audio legend, once did a test with several well known car audio people, reviewers, manufacturers, etc.

He sat them down in front of two amplifiers, one from a high-end manufacturer and one generic one out of china/korea, et al. He then conducted what is known as an ABX test where you listen to amp A, then amp B and then you listen to Amp X, which could be either A or B. The listeners know what amp A and B are but they do not know the identity of amp X. After listening they are asked to correctly identify amp X as A or B.

This test was repeated with many high quality amps from all the big manufacturers. One would assume that most of the listeners could hear the difference between the expensive US made amps and the cheap asain made amp, but the correct identification if Amp X was only 50%, in other words a very similar result that would be returned by guessing!

What does this mean? I don't know, but Richard Clark concludes that most amps sound substantially similat used within their limits and that most of the differences people hear can be attributed to differing volume levels.

I would love to repeat this test here one day, and when I finally get around to it, I will invite CAA members who live in Brisbane or close by who are interested to attend.

sounds like a great idea! this would then provide some additional evidence for the debate, from a local perspective. we'll then see how many people are confident their amps are so sonically superior

Point of topic????
These tests are a dime a dozen everyone has heard some sory about certin high end amps sounding simalar to their cheap buddies. You want quality you buy the amp you want, Remember K-mart did it with A/C cola (coke and Pepsi.) A/C cola is similar to coke so why do people buy coke?? Cause it's coke, plain and simple.
Mick

People have beaten him in this a couple of times

I thought this amplifier ABCDEFGHI... whatever class amp SQ differences have been sorted??

I have no problem believing that there may be no subjective SQ difference between classes when an amplifier is within its limits.... Hell if an amplifier is designed to do what is it supposed to do then if inputs are the same the outputs should be the same between amplifiers when matched to the same volume levels.

I'd still want to listen to them myself as it's my brain not anybody elses that will do the sound processing ... I still don't see why people can't understand that people will just hear things differently to others because of that fact, even when all parameters between the two measure exactly the same!! Just like a colour can appear red to one person and pink or purple to another???

We all usually push the amps past their limits anyway and to me its the performance beyond the amplifiers limits that would be much more interesting to compare.

When RC changed the amps from alpine to kenwood in his SQ car (one he paid for not built) the car didn't sound the same anymore so why if all amps sound the same

Psychoacoustics.