carver amps preamps!

[errol van]

Does carver still produce amps and preamps or am I just going to see twenty plus year old stuff on ebay! I know Sunfire has some items but they are still preowned on ebay! What's the deal with CARVER!

[blackraven]

There are much better choices than a used Carver amp.

[cjpremierfour]

If you go to Youtube and search Carveraudio.com 08 part 8, Bob Carver will talk about what happened to his Carver Corp. in a Q&A session while attending Carverfest. The Board of Director's Carver Corp went out of business back in 1999. Bob now runs Sunfire which was up and running while the B.O.D.'s Carver was being ran into the ground.

[Worf101]

My one and only foray in to vintage amps and pre-amps was a Carver 400 Pre-amp combined with one of their early amps. All vintage, all pristine with original manuals and all that stuff. Hooked it up in my computer room system... no go. One channel would constantly drop out during play back. Deoxit it and cleaned it up, problem persisted. Took it to my drummer who's an electric engineer and an IT tech by trade, he hooked the system up and blammo... capacitors and sech started blowing left and right. Right now I've a $400.00 paperweight sitting in my basement.

Carver was an innovative and ground breaking American made brand. They're also finicky, quirky and expensive to get fixed and keep running. Save your money.

Worf

[winston]

well "Errol van" you got your answer??!! from the posters above.. and I'm not going to "powder" you up either... I've had a very bad experience with Carver Receiver in 1997 I was of the opinion that i was about to own big deal, boy was I wrong!!

[JoeE SP9]

I've always been put off by the "trick" power supplies used in Carver power amps. Carver preamps always seemed too "gimmicky" for me. Sonic Holography and other "gadgetry" are things I have never desired.
With that said. If I could find a pair of Silver 7's (tube) at a price I could afford I'd buy them in a hot minute.

[Sir Terrence the Terrible]

I've always been put off by the "trick" power supplies used in Carver power amps. Carver preamps always seemed too "gimmicky" for me. Sonic Holography and other "gadgetry" are things I have never desired.
With that said. If I could find a pair of Silver 7's (tube) at a price I could afford I'd buy them in a hot minute.

Don't let the "gimmicky" name Sonic Holography fool you, it is a very legit psycho-acoustical principle based on the science of hearing.

Polk also did it(in a different way) in its SDA vintage speaker of the 80's.

The principle is simple but effective. When a single left loudspeaker produces sound, it radiates outward towards our heads. Both ears will hear the signal, but the left will hear it louder(and first) while the right ear hears it after it wraps around the head and is slightly reduced in amplitude by the shading of the head. This effect is reversed when the right speaker does the same thing. This HRTF will truncate the soundstage when both channels are playing a signal(even a stereo signal).

What SDA and Sonic Holography do is produce a anti-phase canceling signal that cancels the left signal from the right ear, and visa versa for the left ear when the right channel plays. When these HRTF effects are cancelled out by these principles, the soundstage is wider and more stable from the center seat.

Both of these circuits work extremely well(and transparently) when properly implemented.

[3LB]

I still have my Polk Audio SDA CRS+ and 'when properly implemented' the effect is stunning; its liking have a center channel. The soundstage is expanded well beyond the speakers when listening to a good stereo recording. There used to a company that sold Binaural remasters and the there used to be an advert on this site for a Binaural headphone amp and I've listened to one...does away with ear fatigue and almost gives you the sense that you are hear speakers and not phones. I heard a demo of a sonic holographer, and it was amazing, but it was expensive and add-on surround amps were a lot cheaper and did provide a similar experience. 5.1 surround was just over the horizon as well.

[JoeE SP9]

I am aware of how "Sonic Holography" and the Polk "SDA" systems work. The Headroom headphone amps also use a variation of the same principle. There was also a company called Omnisonic that made a similar device.

[poppachubby]

How about this?

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll...767925&afsrc=1

[E-Stat]

Don't let the "gimmicky" name Sonic Holography fool you, it is a very legit psycho-acoustical principle based on the science of hearing.

But their implementation bore nothing of the true meaning of the term. I find using no preamp provides more sonic holograpy (in the truest sense of the word) than Carver's attempts.

Both of these circuits work extremely well(and transparently) when properly implemented.

What preamps available today offer that feature?

rw

[RGA]

Personally, I find the best sounding amplifiers (and most everything else for that matter) is the units with the simplest designs, impementation with the best quality parts. This is why receivers tend to sound worse than integrateds, why 5 way speakers sound worse than 2 way and single driver speakers, why SE sounds better than non single ended, why no oversampling sounds better than oversampling etc.

And chances are when you buy used if you buy a product that is "simpler" in design with less parts it will be cheaper to repair if it should fail. That is unless the parts are very costly but then chances are if the part is higher quality it will last longer. I've only ever heard two Carver amps and I can't really comment on the quality because in both cases they were driving speakers that I didn't really care for so Carver could not have save them anyway IMO. I think you're on the right track looking used though as your money is going to go a lot further but check into the repair costs and whether you can still get parts.

My dealer Soundhounds was selling a McIntosh MA7000 for $2000 used in perfect condition - it retails for $8,800 new. Though I am not a fan of the sound of the thing it certainly pays to sacrifice a warranty for $6,800. http://www.mcintoshlabs.com/products/972.asp

Don't know what your budget is but there are a lot of fine tube amps out there and some may be off the radar that you might like. Mystere makes some nice tube amps as does Grant Fidelity, Audio Note (of course), Rogue, Tri Audio (which really is nice stuff for very cheap considering the looks in combination with build), Antique Sound Labs, and many others that may offer new units for the same price as some used units from the bigger name brands. For instance the MA7000 despite the watts and price at $2k used didn't impress me as much as new tube amps from the likes of Rogue, Tri or AN that retail new for less than $2k. So used is good but over the last few years there have been a lot of high quality tube amps for quite good prices. Granted they may be kits or made in China but still.

[atomicAdam]

]louder(and first) while the right ear hears it after it wraps around the head and is slightly

A sounds wave wrapping around something? I know from watching videos of wave generators it is possible for water to not just deflect, but wrap a small amount around the blocking object. But sound? maybe? and if so, it could only be minimal. And wouldn't a fazing out of this be subjective to the headsize/shape?

[atomicAdam]

How about this?

Did I see that in Starwars?