Now I dont know how it performs yet but tomorrow is supposed to be close to 60 degrees out so I am gonna try to get it hooked up in the car for alittle listen. I am still trying to find a power supply for a cheap price to test it out with the stingray scope and see how much power it puts out before clipping

Definetly looks alot better than soundstreams previous stuff or atleast fro the past couple years

 

Not bad.

What urged you to take the risk?

 

Just wanted to see if what I was hearing was true, and the fact that I think I am done with all the expensive gear I used to use, if these are decent with the output I can use 3 of these for less than the price of one of my other amps. I am gonna focus more on the installation that the components. The specs look good as far as thd and SN, just need to see what kinda power they put out

 

Thanks for the pics man!

Looking forward to your opinions on how it sounds.

KC

 

Looks good. I cant wait for the review. This amp is called a Lil Wonder III LW4.620 over seas.

 

Dave is the one that told me about the newer cheif engineer Karl Cummings and the new line, thanks for the info Dave, I hope to know how she performs tomorrow

 

So what are the opinions on the guts. I dont know what Im looking at

 

Grizz Archer is the man responsible for turning around the quality @ Soundstream.

 

Has he said anything about where he would like SS to be in the near / distance future? Which product lines will we see the quality change, if there not already out.


BeatsDownLow thanks for the pics. I was on the fence also but change my mine. SS interior design department did a nice job on the looks thou.

 

thanks for the info Dave

 

This is a pic from 2009 CES

 

That thing looks like a power acoustik board; some crooked stuff and no SMD, soldered jumpers. On the other hand some old school amps look nasty inside too, it really depends on the design and components used. Is very hard to tell by looking, at least for me. The new alpines made in China some have four layer boards like a PC and lots of SMD, but hard to repair. They are made mostly by machine. IMO how fast they break is about the most important factor.

Is it 4x150RMS@2ohms? A lot of 2x120rms at 4 ohm amps have the same number of transistors as that, but it depends on how good that parts are as to what they will take.

 

The manula says 100 x 4 at 4 ohms, I got it hooked up over the weekend, I think its alittle under powered which is what i was hoping wasnt the case, it puts out clean power as far as I can tell. i was hopping to get it benched but dont have all the gear I need to, to do it. I might send it off to the guys at Zed to get it benched if I have the time, or I might just sell it.

I moved my DLS nobelium 8.2 active with it and I am not getting the 8" to move as far as before or have as much output, considering it was runnign off an old school Kicker zr240 which is probably putting out 90-100rms per channel thru the passives.

All in all I think its a decent amp for the price. I will probably not end up using it as its not up to the standards I am used to with the expensive amps I usually run.

 

Sorry to hear that. The construction looks pretty cheap, but sometimes you can still get a good amp. Cosmetically it's beautiful. I'd buy a couple heat sinks and drop some nice boards in them.

 

Ya I guess that the way it goes sometimes, i kinda figured it wouldnt be what I was used to, but there is always wishful thinking

Im probably just gonna bridged it and put the passives back in for now and that should help out alittle, or I might just toss the zr240 abck in till my Zuki gets here.

 

I just bought a rack of resistors to test properly but not got it going yet. I've found that with other cheaper amps, they just rate them on fire. If you get one that is larger than you need (more or less) then they can work well. A lot of them sound good, though some freak out more when they go into distortion like my kicker does...and I was told kicker was middle of the road not junk amp. I don't like it whatever the case (for my use) but then again my favorite amps were likely more expensive. A better amp tends to be you can use all of its power where cheaper ones you can't. I do have a 2x200rms super cheap amp I'd like to try in my car though, but its huge. I bought it slightly used for <$40 tmd! I think it was rated 2000 peak and 1x500rms bridged. Where this SS here has 4x2 outputs/ch this has 2x6 output transistors. I find only the larger class AB have 2x6, also have a hifonics 600 zeus and an giant ultra linear like that. Given transistor qualities vary, that is only a very basic way to judge an amp's capabilities. In fact I have a SS 880 that is larger yet but I'd rather use class D for subs not sure that would work well for highs and again its huge. Really cheap amps can have other issues too like misbalanced channels and noise floors, etc., even brand new. Hard for me to test for that kind of stuff but have seen obvious examples. That said I have used lots of cheap stuff with success over the years, kind of fun IMO but a lot of trial and error and some things you just can't like say an external xover or EQ, or likely a HU. Most of those put noise in and you lose out. If I have enough 12v power I've just kept some of these amps around to test when get the time.

 

I'd say it would be good for ~75 watts x 4 @ 4 ohms based on the parts count in the amp assuming it has the "typical" parts used.

 

Thats what I was thinking, it defiently deosnt feel like its putting out 100 watts per channel but I wouldne venture to say it 50 watts either. I am gonna bridge it on my midbass and see what she is like.

 

The Lil Wonder III LW4.620 puts out 80 x 4 @ 4ohm and supposed to be the same board and the Rubicon? SS rates the Rubicon at 100 x 4 @ 4ohm.

 

ya the refs are suposed to be better than the old ref, dont know exactly what will be better, maybe just the power supply? I will pick one up on wishful thinking when they are released.

I wouldnt have cared that the rubicon I have makes less power than stated, if it wasnt stated as more

I am going back to my DLS amps for now, and will try a ref when they are available.

I think I am gonna sell the rubicon I got, if someone is interested.

 

does anyone know if the Stealth series is going to be class a/b or full range class d?

 

also, the only thing good that came out of the S, SX amps was the 1002.

 

ahh the stealths are A/B
http://www.soundstream.com/manuals/2009/SS09 web.pdf

 

BeatsDownLow, how much do you want for the 4.600? I'm looking for an amp to run a set of ID components in active mode (front channels running the tweeters and rear running the mids).

How do you think it would do in that role?

Ryan

 

pm'd

 

That is news to me, I didn't know that PPI was a part of Soundstream.

 

I talked to the main rep at ces, and he stated to me that soundstream will be coming out with an old school class a/b that is built in the u.s. He said it ain't gonna be cheap, but would be worth it. None of the products at ces are what he was referring to. just my .02 about the matter

 

WOW....new refs better than old ref??? I cant wait to see that....I hope they put nuts on the rca jacks to prevent rca inputs from getting broken...thats one of my quirks..I hate stressing a rca thats held on by a tiny screw into a plastic post

 

I was just thinking the last amp I saw with those RCA was an audiobahn intake, how strange is that. I tested a few and they seemed to work good, but never used one in a car. Yeah, they had to be repaired too.

Old SS are great amps. I ran a little early 300 rub on a few different singe 12s, man that thing put out.

 

Nice to read that they are trying to return their designs to top notch levels.

 

The '09 catalog is posted to look through. Keeping my eye on the Human Reign Unleashed...another nice looking looking amp.
http://www.soundstream.com/manuals/2009/SS09 web.pdf

 

For me, please restore PPI to were they should be and I will be a very happy camper.

 

hmm...I liked the specs on some of them.....wonder if they are going to materialize...