In the market for a very powerful yet great sounding amp for the new pole barn/shed/shop.

I've had some very good sounding equipment in the past & built a nice tube preamp & had it running a Carver C220 but tired of it catching on fire & replacing tubes. My wife got tired of the big floor standing speakers also.  Tubes are amazing but won't be sitting in the magic chair & spinning vinyl. This will be outdoors in the pole barn on an acre with the closest neighbor 1/4 mile away. My family says I play music way too loud & I do but I really like loud great sounding music. I currently use a Bluetooth class D amp kit that I built from Parts-Express. For a class D it sounds pretty good. I have some nice Polk bookshelves I'll be using & maybe a sub later. Would like a class A & maybe build one from a kit. 
Any suggestions. Here a pic of the almost finished pole barn & then need to add the shed/work shop. It's Florida so no walls will be added except the shed portion. 

 

If you want power, quality, and a good price I'd say to with Emotiva. I have a preamp/processor and 7-channel amp that I absolutely LOVE. It's not a kit. I can't steer you toward a kit as I'm out of that loop.  
Go to youtube and search for Cheapaudioman

For my son's graduation party, I cobbled together a system from some junk I had laying around.  Two Realistic 2-way systems with 15" woofers and horn-loaded tweeters, two 100-watt single channel PA amplifiers--one Realistic, one TOA.  A 1980's vintage Realistic mixer to feed the amps.  Source was a laptop streaming a spotify playlist.  It filled the smallish local community center with nice clear sound for hours and never broke a sweat.  I kind of regret not cranking it up and seeing just how loud it could get, but you know, I was trying to act like an adult. 

Nothing you don't know, I'm sure, but if you want to play it loud, it's all about big, efficient speakers.

Edit:  If you had $20k to throw at an amp, you could probably do worse than this Luxman:

https://www.stereophile.com/content/luxman-m-10x-power-amplifier

In reply to DrBoost :

Thanks for recommending Emotiva. That looks like what I'm looking for AB is probably the way to go. Maybe I will add a tube pre-amp. The tube pre-amp with a nice solid state is the next best thing to all tube. 

In reply to mdshaw :

That's what I'm kicking around right now. I am thinking about selling my Emotive processor and amp to get a tube preamp and a 2-channel Emotiva amp.  

I use a 20 watt T amp and a couple of old 15" Jensen 3 way speakers in my shop. It's plenty of noise 95% of the time. 

For the other 5% of the time I drag out a pair of these. 2000 watts each. Good quality sound. Durable. Wake the dead and piss off the neighbors sound levels. Also fun at Lemons races, birthday parties, and Halloween. I love them.  

Not budget friendly at close to $1k each. 

QSI K12.2 powered speakers.

In my shop I run two NAD 2155's bridged at (conservatively) 125W each into 8 ohms. They're rugged amps, sound great, and being vintage you can get them cheap.

New on a budget the new Fosi V3 amps are really interesting

EDIT: I put this together on trades, and money I got from other vintage gear, except the 3020 which I've owned since the early 90's

"Here a pic of the almost finished pole barn & then need to add the shed/work shop. It's Florida so no walls will be added except the shed portion."

So, just a roof and one wall? I thought that Florida was the Hurricane/tornado capital of the world. How do you secure stuff?

I am a big fan of obsolete high powered Yamaha A/V receivers. Cheap, clean, durable, able to run 3 pairs of stereo speakers... I also love Bose speakers, but only because of the churches and schools who dump their large, high quality PA speakers to down size to Bose. Just remember that PA speakers need a 15 band stereo equalizer to sound their best. And a subwoofer.

ebay.com: $150 w/ remote - YAMAHA RX-V2500 THX 910-watt 7channel home-theater receiver AUTHORIZED-DEALER

130 WPC, 20-20,000Hz, 0.04% THD @ 8 ohms x 7 channels.

usa.yamaha.com: RX-V2500.pdf

Unfortunately, I don't know how to decipher the individual model numbers of Yamaha amps without searching the internet one by one. 

Maybe give a different class D a try? If you're a little adventurous you can put together an integrated amp from some DIY components that's pretty killer.

I've put together several systems using the TI TPA3255 board from 3e Audio: https://www.3e-audio.com/amplifier-kits/tpa32xx-with-pffb/

You have to order through Aliexpress but they're trustworthy. Add a Meanwell 36V 350W (LRS-350-36) or 48V 350W (LRS-350-48) switching power supply and you're good to go w/100+wpc for under 200 bucks. 

I sent away a couple of Onkyo Integra receivers, a pair of Bryston 2LP amps and the Adcom GFA-555 I'd had forever once I heard this thing. It has no problem driving less efficient speakers like the old B&W Matrixes I used to have or the Kef 104.2.

For a preamp, the Nelson Pass-designed H2 Generator is hard to beat: https://diyaudiostore.com/products/h2-harmonic-generator . Super simple matched JFET circuit set up to encourage a little bit of tubey 2nd harmonics.

Add a volume pot, a bluetooth DAC of some sort and a case, and you're good to go.

Nice to see there are other audio geeks here.

I'm a big Yamaha fan also.

I'll be adding a lean-to-shed on one side, extending out from 2 of the 3 -12' sections. So will be @11x24.  Hopefully no hurricanes for a long time.
 

It's on a golf course, on the 9th Tee. It's actually called The Blue Tee Golf Villa. It was the senator's golf weekend house years ago.  He built the course & the house & then gave the course to a group of buddies.  Now the county owns it. So it would be interesting to play some really loud tunes when the snobby Georgia tourists are teeing off.  Or some really loud special sound effects.  

The last big hurricane Michael is why we got it so cheap. I guess everyone was so busy with their own damage we were able to steal it. 

What's your budget?

Around here, FBM is full of rack amps that have plenty of life left in them.  The one I'm currently using at the theater for program is a used Yamaha 750x2 that drives four Yamaha 15" cabinets with super clarity and tons of clean output.

Anything you put through bluetooth will be your limiting audio factor.  Sad truth is that bluetooth kinda sucks, but plenty of bluetooth adapters out there that could plug into any amp.  If you go that route, I might suggest a digital interface that has bluetooth, like a Scarlett.  That will allow you to plug nearly anything into it - USB, 1/4", 1/8", XLR, RCA, bluetooth, and control their gains independently for the amp

What's your longest throw?  I might suggest compression drivers/horns instead of tweeters.  It doesn't take much distance for tweeters to completely lose their punch.

If I were doing it with my current pile of equipment, I'd take my SP-3Gs, hang them in the corners, and drive them with my Yamaha 750 x 2

https://www.facebook.com/marketplace/item/247580891226452/?ref=search&referral_code=null&referral_story_type=post&tracking=browse_serp%3Aed187d74-5a7a-477b-90ed-185eed4b6d7a

If you are looking for something new and that is serviceable, how about a Crown power amp? I have no experience other than owning an old 45 year old DC300A 150 wpc amp (as used at Woodstock I think) that I used to drive a pair of Altec A7-500 Voice of the Theater speakers (refrigerator sized baby brother to as used at Woodstock) in my home stereo. Edit: These are the smallest offerings of this style of amps.

Class AB: Crown XLi 800 300W 2-channel Power Amplifier

Class D: Crown XLS 1002 350W 2-channel Power Amplifier

VolvoHeretic said:

If you are looking for something new and that is serviceable, how about a Crown power amp? I have no experience other than owning an old 45 year old DC300A 150 wpc amp (as used at Woodstock I think) that I used to drive a pair of Altec A7-500 Voice of the Theater speakers (refrigerator sized baby brother to as used at Woodstock) in my home stereo.

Class AB: Crown XLi 800 300W 2-channel Power Amplifier

Class D: Crown XLS 1002 350W 2-channel Power Amplifier

My neighbor is something of a musician, and he has a Crown amp that he has beaten mercilessly for about a decade, and it's still going strong.

1988RedT2 said:

VolvoHeretic said:

If you are looking for something new and that is serviceable, how about a Crown power amp? I have no experience other than owning an old 45 year old DC300A 150 wpc amp (as used at Woodstock I think) that I used to drive a pair of Altec A7-500 Voice of the Theater speakers (refrigerator sized baby brother to as used at Woodstock) in my home stereo.

Class AB: Crown XLi 800 300W 2-channel Power Amplifier

Class D: Crown XLS 1002 350W 2-channel Power Amplifier

My neighbor is something of a musician, and he has a Crown amp that he has beaten mercilessly for about a decade, and it's still going strong.

The great thing about the class D XLS amp is that it would be cheap to mail back to the factory for servicing only weighing about 8 pounds.

Back when I had some power hungry speakers, I  ran a pair of Carver TFM350s, they come in 350 to 550 watt models.  Old and hard to find now but didn't mind pushing high current speakers.  I still have a Carver integrated amp in the cabin and a carver 5.1  receiver in the garage.

http://www.audioreview.com/product/amplification/integrated-amplifiers/carver-audio/cm-1090.html

https://www.hifiengine.com/manual_library/carver/hr-895.shtml

paddygarcia said:

For a preamp, the Nelson Pass-designed H2 Generator is hard to beat: https://diyaudiostore.com/products/h2-harmonic-generator . Super simple matched JFET circuit set up to encourage a little bit of tubey 2nd harmonics.

Add a volume pot, a bluetooth DAC of some sort and a case, and you're good to go.

Dude, I've been looking for a website like this! Thanks!