the sound, man!

binding posts, forward presentation

i bought the rotel rb993 from a local retailer. great sounding amp, but the rave reviews and unbeatable used price of $699 for the carver haunted me until i bought the darn thing. with over $3000 retail dollars of thx amp in my living room, i came to an immediate decision- the rotel sounds good, but the carver is pure home theater magic. it's 50 watts per channel more, but that can't possibly explain the noticeable boost in imaging, s/n ratio, and effortless listening pleasure. music, dialogue, and violence sound considerably more live and open. the rotel is touted as being "warmer",and i can only say the soundstage is deeper; but there's absolutely no harshness with the carver (at least in my setup). i did try hooking both with a music fidelity x-pre in 2 channel music-only arrangement. i will give the nod to the rotel here because of soundstage, but not by much.

i've read alot of reviews about alot of home theater amps. adding the carver to my yamaha 795 (receiver power to the surrounds) with paradigm reference speakers, and sony dvps7700 dvd player- i hope you can find one too!

Similar Products Used:

rotel rb993, yamaha 795 receiver by its lonesome

I like this amplifier a lot. It has great reserves of power and can be subtle and delicate. However this international model (240-220v/50-60hz) buzzes like a nest of angry bees from its transformer! I like it so much that I will get a local transformer built to drop the voltage from 240v+ to at least 220v.However I need the ampre rating of the factory transformer to do this.CAN ANYONE HELP! This is one of the problems of a company that can create a great sounding product,well made but let-down by poor export quality control.In the light of this problem, I give it five stars for sound quaility,five stars for value and minus two for letting Bob Carver go. Please e-mail me if can help. I`m still using the 753 (under a blanket,ha ha)and enjoing its use in home-theater and two-channel with Martin-Logan Monolith III.

Similar Products Used:

Carver A760-x,Krell 300i