Denon PMA-1315R Integrated Amplifiers

Denon PMA-1315R Integrated Amplifiers 

DESCRIPTION

115 Watts (1994-1997)

USER REVIEWS

Showing 1-7 of 7  
[Jul 04, 2011]
James H.
Audio Enthusiast

I bought this new in about 1997. Early in its life it had a warrany repair job performed after failure of the protection circuitry that caused damage to the pre-amp electronics. This was repaired by a Denon technician and it has never missed a beat since. I don't think I have ever been game enough to drive this amp to clip. Other amps yes, no problem clipping them, surround sound recievers, a small Cambridge power amp, I think I've even clipped a rack mounted PA amp, but this Denon just pours more and more current into whatever you have connected up untill it gets scary. I've had smoke coming out of Pioneer car subwoofers and many many angry neighbors over the years, and lots of things falling off shelves, looking forward to continuing the tradition haha.

This is a true high current, low distortion, clean amplifier that does not colour the sound in any way. To outdo this amp you really have to move into the serious realm of specialist audio equipment. About the only area lacking is the damping factor, everything else is faultless.

OVERALL
RATING
4
VALUE
RATING
5
[Jan 01, 2008]
spyoun2007
Audio Enthusiast

Strength:

Durability, flexibility with anything other than Klipch legends.. Unless your deaf on the upper end of the hearing spectum. Robust, and dependable. This thing has been a workhorse. It will play loud, and never skip a beat.

Weakness:

I lost the remote in a move, and I can't seem to find another one.

I have used this intergrated amp on all sorts of speakers over the past 10 years. This is by far one of the sweetest sounding intergrated amps that Denon has ever made.. My buddy has the pma 2000. We ran them side by side on his NHT Super 2's, then on my polk ls70s... The 1315 just had more grunt to it.. Everything sounded more real. The one vs the other comparison really showed the 2000 to be muted, subdued...dead sounding compared to the 1315... I like the 2000 don't get me wrong, if I was to listen to it, by itself with nothing to compare it agianst, I would be impressed.. Denon hit a home run with the 1315. ITs durable, Ive ran all sorts of speakers on it, Paradigm reference Studio 20's, 40's a pair of 80's, a pair of polk ls 70's... I even ran it on a pair of Klipsch klf 20's for a about a minute, before I thought my ears were going to bleed... Thats not a ding on the Denon, just the Klipche sounded bright as phuck on the denon vs the dynakit st70 I normally run on them. The Denon 1315 can be gotten cheap, I see them on ebay from time to time. Putting it against the 2000 modle, ID rather pay 500 for the 1315... Trust me, you wont look back.

Customer Service

I have never had to use Denons customer service. Though Ive had a few Denon dvd players take a dump on me, their amplifiers seem to work pretty well.

Similar Products Used:

As far as intergrated, I used the current 2000 modle from Denon, but wasnt impressed.. Ive ran a intergrated VTL, but its not a fair compairson.
Ive had several Denon recievers over the years, no complaints.

OVERALL
RATING
5
VALUE
RATING
5
[May 31, 2004]
AllenL
Casual Listener

Strength:

As the volume increases, the sound becomes bigger, not louder. It never sounded 'loud', even at high volume levels. Smooth, if a bit bass heavy.

Weakness:

Extremely unreliable. The lights in my house dimmed at power up, which I thought was cool until its fireworks display! Disappointing, and phantom customer support from Denon.

My Denon PMA-700V integrated amplifier was my first venture into foo foo audio. It is the only amp, before or since, that is rated 100W per channel. The selling points I was attracted was its toroidal transformer high current direct coupled design. But over time, this PMA-700V has proven unreliable- like a fickle rare high performance high maintenance sports car. Mine spent its life far longer in non operation than in use. Less than a year following its third visit to the repair shop, it produced a fireworks show blowing out the entire right channel output transistors. It sounded great- when it was working!

Similar Products Used:

Used Sansui AU-717 superior to Denon PMA-700V

OVERALL
RATING
1
VALUE
RATING
1
[Jun 06, 2002]
Thomas Ankerlund
Audio Enthusiast

Strength:

Simply everything.

Weakness:

Simply nothing.

I have owned this amp PMA 1315R since 1996, and it is the best amp i have ever heard. I use it with a Denon DCD 725 and a pair of Cerwin Vega VS-15. This combination can rock your heart out and at the same time play easy listening music with the cleanest and purest sound i have ever heard. Play it with the Dire Straits "Brothers in arms" album and you will fall in love with this amp.

Similar Products Used:

An NAD at the same priceclass, but the sound and power was never near the Denon..

OVERALL
RATING
5
VALUE
RATING
5
[Dec 19, 2000]
Nic Brooke
Audio Enthusiast

Strength:

Plenty of power, nice dynamic range, much better than my old amp

Weakness:

Temptation to blow the roof off...

In my view this amp is outstanding. As noted I moved up from a smaller, older Denon amp, and the difference is immense. The bigger amp has reserves of power and clarity undreamed of by its ancestor. With the old amp I was running the tone controls bass at 3 oclock, treble about 11 to try and get the balance I wanted. The bigger amp runs flat and sounds beautiful. Both ran Cerwin Vega VS120's. The only big problem I now have is excess treble at low volume (speakers, not amp) and worries aobut future hearing loss at about 50% of the amps power.

In comparison to the similar price range amps I tried, the Denon was far superior. The NAD, while slightly more powerful at 8 ohm sounded harsh, having noe of the smoothness present in the Denon. More tellingly, while listening to the NAD I was hearing specific frequencies etc, rather than just the music.

The Rotel combo was very nice sounding, with the promise of adding another power amp later, but apparently Rotel don't recommend using 4 ohm speakers with their amps while bridged. The same problem arose with the Onkyo. The consensus seemed to indicate that this combo sounded fine with some speakers, not with others, especially 4 ohm ones (like mine).

I have a suspicion that the comparison was not very fair at all. The indication given to me was that the 1315 was both more powerful and of a higher class than the PMA-2000. This sounded about right to my ear - the 2000 sounding worse in a soundroom than the 1315 does at home. I suspect from comments other salespeople made that the NZ retail for the 1315 may be substantially more than the $1600 I payed.

In summary, this amp seems about the pick of the reasonably priced bunch and should last for years.

Similar Products Used:

demoed NAD 319, Rotel RC/RB 971 combo, Onkyo P301/M501 combo, Denon PMA-2000
Replaced Denon PMA-320

OVERALL
RATING
5
VALUE
RATING
5
[Sep 09, 1999]
Ronny
an Audio Enthusiast

I wanted to sell one of my amps (Denon PMA-1315R or NAD2600 Power-amp withpre-amp NAD1300) so I took it to a friend of mine (who has an Evolution AVM-1,
>$3000, Mission 753 renassaince, Technics SPL-1000).
We started to listen to his AVM-1 and it sounded very good, a little thin
at the lower but soft and good presence in the middle/highs.
The Denon-1315R was not any shame....very good middle/highs too, and much
more punch in the lower, he was very impressed (he usually hates Denon).
Then was the NAD's turn.... the lower was good too but the middle/highs are
much more laid back with not so much presence as the other two but I would
say that the NAD is a very good amp too.

On my system at home (big room, ~35 m2, and my home-built speakers (Zachry-710))
the Denon sounds a little dull at the lower, but with a smaller room it sounded
great.
Here has the NAD advantage with its more power (dynamically 600W at 4Ohm).
I have had different Denon's and NAD's past years and now it was time to keep
the NAD, but now after a half of a year I regret it (I'm lazy, missing the remote).
Conclusion: Buy Denon if you want clean sound and NAD if you want power (power with good sound).

OVERALL
RATING
5
VALUE
RATING
[Sep 27, 2000]
db
Audio Enthusiast

Strength:

power, cosmetic appearence,

Weakness:

common, its a denon, a little bright

owned it for a couple years, sound is clean and pure. i tried it on a pair of alon rascils. too bright. from 901's to polks ls 70's, and american audio monitors, this amp is detailed and fluid. great piece.

Similar Products Used:

this catigory sucks, amps are different period. each onne has its own sonic differences.

OVERALL
RATING
5
VALUE
RATING
5
[Oct 01, 2000]
David
Audio Enthusiast

Strength:

Since our purchase of the PMA-1325R. There has not been a dull moment in our listening pleasure. The Denon put out clean, present, clear and robust power. Paired with a good set of large floor standing older Altec 14 monitors it really shines. The Denon makes music come alive! However it helped a great deal when we changed from Denon's 460 CD player to NAD's 523. This helped attenuate the high end brightness and carry the low end which Denon sometimes seems to overpower with it's clarity and brightness.

Weakness:

Wish the bass control boosted at 50Hz instead of 100Hz, that would help. Requires speakers which can produce good solid low end. The Denon 1315R has good solid low end but needs a bit of help.

Excellent Integrated Amp if you have good low end speakers, or powered speakers. The rest of the music spectrum is covered superbly!

Highly recommend!

Similar Products Used:

Older Sansui 990, Dynaco 40, and Yamaha

OVERALL
RATING
4
VALUE
RATING
4
Showing 1-7 of 7  

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