Originally Posted by racebum

amp wise? not a lot unless you spend. robert zeff of zapco designed those arc amps and he is one of the best car audio amp designers on the planet. he has a good ear. some of his earlier zapco amps like the z220-2 and z150 were stellar.

there is a very short list of good car amps made today. the best is an audison thesis. below that there are still good choices. you have a couple of them. mcintosh car audio is good but again it's older, may need a refresh just like the amazing phoenix gold zpa amps. linear power from the 90s is very pleasing to listen to. precisio'n powers power class from the early 2000s was good. remember those big black 3ft long tunnel amps. soundstream class A also from the 90s, excellent.

i guess for new it's really audison, arc, high end zapco, JL slash series, mosconi and that's about it. JL owns what i consider entry level hi-fi. the slash 300/4v3 is about $400 if you find a good shop. you'll pay double that for a mosconi as 100.4 or zapco z150 4ch. arc i haven't kept up on and the entry level audison isn't terrible. would like to back to back it against JL for low cost options to see what i think. the audison sr4 is a $400 amp. less powerful than a slash 300/4 but it's the same price category and didn't sound that bad when i heard one

speakers are where i'm nervous. you have morel and....ummm...well...not a lot else. dynaudio obviously but they are money, nothing on the low and mid level. focal is terrible unless they are in perfect enclosures and ran through a dsp. imagine dynamics and some of the others may have good mids/tweets but it's hard to find stores that carry them. so much retail is just big brands.

nelson pass from threshold. some of the best home amps ever made wrote a piece about this trend in audio. home audio mind you. the number of people willing to pay for quality in america is small and growing smaller. some of the bigger hi fi audiences are overseas. the fall of peerless and vifa along with other quality raw driver manufacturers a decade back wasn't by accident. with a DSP you can make a lot of things sound pretty good. speaker building is a dead hobby and car audio is dying on the aftermarket level as OEMs get better and there is SO much integration. car audio is alive in the low cost market right now. few hundred dollar systems sell but even my local morel dealer said he had to look at pricing on the hybrid and elate when i was curious since they rarely sell. that's kind of sad. everyone buys the entry level or mid level like the tempo ultra {which is a great speaker for the $$}

Originally Posted by carls2004

I think there may be other good amps out there that havent been mentioned and tried but most here in U.S. are buying what our seller's have or can get to us ...
Like how would a
TWISTER IVseries F4/650 sound ? From GT-trading. I bet no one on forum has ever heard of and this is just one of many...

Originally Posted by racebum

possible. but who wants to take the risk buying 10 junk amps to try and find one good one. same with mids and tweets. there may be other good ones out there but morel works, is easy to get and outperforms most

Originally Posted by carls2004

Was just saying..
Can also search off this forum to possibly learn more on other amp's..

Originally Posted by racebum

it's all either A. older or B. lower end

you can get great older amps. way more choices. use to be more of a focus on quality. today the quality amps are few

older amps however have their own issues 1. they are often large 2. they often need to be rebuilt. if a cap ever shorts it can take out all the speakers connected to that amp

Originally Posted by carls2004

Not sure if that may be 100% correct unless you had tried some of tho's other amp's.
Example could be the one i posted might be a kick *** unit ..and quality...

Originally Posted by racebum

it's all either A. older or B. lower end

you can get great older amps. way more choices. use to be more of a focus on quality. today the quality amps are few

older amps however have their own issues 1. they are often large 2. they often need to be rebuilt. if a cap ever shorts it can take out all the speakers connected to that amp

Originally Posted by TheProsecutor

Tier 1 car amplifiers
http://mosconi-america.com/
http://www.arcaudio.com/
https://www.zapco.com/

Originally Posted by racebum

eh. have you heard some of the new zapcos? their high end Z line is still good but below that i would take a JL slash all day everyday.

also missing is the king. audison. their thesis is by a mile the best amp currently in production

Originally Posted by 02BlownZ06

The price on a Thesis is a little bit insane though.

Originally Posted by racebum

if it's tied to fred & sound i would ask them. those guys have good ears. if they like it i would heavily weigh that opinion

Originally Posted by racebum

eh. have you heard some of the new zapcos? their high end Z line is still good but below that i would take a JL slash all day everyday.

also missing is the king. audison. their thesis is by a mile the best amp currently in production

Originally Posted by Homer3D

I am currently running the JL Audio RD 900/5 which is a full range 5 channel class D amp. And while I think overall it is a good amp, it does not compare to what I had in my 2005 corvette which was the JL Audio 300/4 (class A/B) and JL Audio 500/1 (class D). I love those slash series amp but they come at a price. If I picked up those same slash series amps today it would have easily been double the cost of the RD 900/5.