For decades Dan D'Agostino has been engineering some of the most advanced high-performance amplifiers the consumer market has to offer. Several years ago when D'Agostino formed his latest venture — Dan D'Agostino Master Audio Systems — the veteran engineer produced the acclaimed Momentum Amplifier.
Stepping up to improve the Momentum Amplifier, D'Agostino has developed the company's new Momentum M400 Amplifier. According to the Ariz.-based company the work on the M400 began as an engineering exercise before resulting into a complete project that resulted in a number of design improvements to the Momentum Amplifier.
“I am thrilled to be able to improve on the best amplifier design of my career,” notes D'Agostino, chief engineer and designer. “Even more exciting is that we can offer thse upgrades to original Momentum amplifier customers.
The foundation of the design improvement lies in a new, ultra-quiet 1,800VA linear transformer (a 20 percent increase in size from the amp's original transformer). D'Agostino coupled this new transformer to a new output stage design that includes a number of design improvements that helps to increase the new M400's output to 400 watts, which represents a 20 percent increase in power over the original Momentum Amplifier.
Describing the redesigned output stage D'Agostino Master Audio Systems points out it is now a complementary design with individual transistors employed for the positive and negative halves of the audio signal. The company says this nearly doubles the current drive necessary to maximize the potential of the output stage. The increase in current helps to drive the open loop gain by a factor of two, and the company says the amp now sounds, “more authoritative, richer and more expansive.”
Explaining the upgrade of the original Momentum Amplifier that D'Agostino alludes to, the company is also offering factory upgrades of the original amplifer, D'Agostino Master Audio Systems adds the M400 utilizes the same chassis as the original with a small change to its copper aesthetics. The amp's meter is also reflects the differences in power between the two products.
D'Agostino Master Audio Systems says the cost of the factory upgrade is $15,000 per pair to original amplifier, and consumers must work through their dealers to ship the amp back to the company's facilities in Cave Creek, Ariz.
If you enjoyed this article and want to receive more valuable industry content like this, click here to sign up for our digital newsletters!
