Power, Musicality, Soundstage

Lots of heat

For the price it can't be beat. I tried the Acurus A200 and the Arargon 8008 ST. Both seemed very bright. For almost $1500.00 less than the Aragon it is a no brainer. Save your money and buy some good speakers or a good preamp. As for the Acurus A200 I would listen to it and the Adcom and compare. After all my ears and yours my hear two different things. Remember, your amp is only gonna be as good as the rest of your system. A bad preamp or speakers will make a good amp sound bad! One more thing. The reviews below about the power switch being a problem. I have my amp plugged into a Adcom ACE515 AC enhancer and have no problem at turn on.

Similar Products Used:

Adcom, Acurus RL 11, B&W 801

I have owned my 5500 for about 1.5 years. When I purchased it I was using a top of the line Sony ES series Amp that sells for 3 times the amount.The 5500 is much cleaner and it has pleantly of reserve power. When I first pluged it in I couldn't believe how much better the sound was. It was amazing, it made the ES Amp sound muffled and uncontrolled. I don't think you can beat the sound quality of this Amp for the money.

I recently bought the GFA 5500 and I was not disappointed. I was just about to buy a $1500 amp until I auditioned the 5500; this amp is smooth and sweet. Infact I got the 6000 multi amp in the living room, the 545II and 5500 in the basement of my home. Adcom spells good product!

I just bought the 5500 with a GTP-450 preamp and am totally blown away. My Paradigm 9se's never sounded so sweet. All I can say is, put on Donald Fagan's
Kamakiriad or Cowboy Junkies' Lay it Down and STAND BACK.

I owned the budget breaking GFA555 mkII when the GFA5500 was introduced soI had the luxury of comparing the two and since I was ready for a upgrade
I decided to give Adcom a chance. Well even with the new mosfet configuration
it still was overall an in your face Amp. One-thing about the Adcom amps
from the 555mkII to the 5500 the bass was nice and tight. I hate the new
power button and I also found that the new Amp made a popping noise when
turning it off unlike my 555mkII. Over-all I felt Adcom really didn't do
the job.

Recently I stopped by to visit my friend George to listen to his new Adcom GFA-5500. I was impressed by this amplifier. George's stereo system is goof mid-fi stuff: Design Acoustics PS-10 bookself speakers (really nice), Musical Concepts CD player (a modified Marantz CD72 which I sold to George when I got my Philips LHH1000), NAD single well cassette deck, B & O turntable, first generation Sony Mini-Disc player/recorder, Scott dual cassette deck, NAD CD player, Toshiba hi-fi vhs vcr, a pair of horrid Energy speakers (which his flat-mate won't part with), and an Adcom 600 preamp/tuner and another Adcom preamp with phono stage. The power and transparency of the Adcom GFA-5500 is quite impressive. A poorly produced/engineered CD sounds lousy and a well produced/engineered CD sounds heavenly. Even though I am a Carver fan (Carver amps are the mid-fi creme de la creme), I was suitably impressed with the Adcom. Would I purchase one? Probably not as my next amplifier will be a valve amp; however, I could live happily with the Adcom GFA-5500. Overall, after two hours of careful listening, my impression of this amplifier was that it was revealing, analytical (certainly not romantic), fast and dynamic, crystal clear and clean. It is smooth, but still has a hard edged sound which I associate with solid state componenets. When playing a mini-disc, the digital hardness smacks one in the face and is a bit fatiguing. Still, I especially appreciated the overall transparency of the music--I could hear the layers of the composition and could pick out the placement of the instruments in the bands (I was listening to some jazz and to some rock 'n' roll) that I heard. For the money, the Adcom GFA-5500 is pretty good. I'd like to compare it with the contemporary Carver 250 watt a side amplifier which is in its price bracket (1000 or less). This is an amp that I could happily live with (until I could afford a fine tube amplifier). I give the Adcom GFA-5500 a fine recommendation. This is a good choice for above average amplification at a fair price.

Crystral Clean POWER! Quality chassis and overall construction ...everything is heavy duty.

None! I've owned the Adcom GFA5500 & GFA5503 for almost 3 years WITHOUT a single problem. They do get a little warm, but that is because of the type of components they use. Adcom was after a "tube like" sound.

I am 100% satisfied with this Amp and it's companion, my Adcom GFA5503! LOTS of crystal clean power!

My system.....

Speakers:
2 Klipsch KLF30 (Front l/r)
1 Klipsch KLF C-7 (center)
2 Klipsch KSP S-6 (Rear l/r)
1 Klipsch KSW 15 (sub)

Amps: Adcom GFA5500 & Adcom GFA5503

Tuner/Preamp:
Adcom GTP600 (will be upgrading to Adcom GTP760)

DD-Processor: Dennon model # unknown (see Tuner/Preamp)

CD Player: Adcom GCD700

DVD/LD: Pioneer DVL700 (soon to be replaced by ?????)

TV: 1993 Sony 46" bigscreen (soon to be replaced by Mitsubishi HDTV or Pioneer Elite HDTV)

Other than my TV, DVD/LD player & Tuner/Preamp I am 100% pleased with my system! My Adcom amps ROCK! I purchased my Amps in 1998 and have had EXTENSIVE use NOT had a single problem with them! In my humble opinion, my Adcom amps were the "best bang" for the buck!

Similar Products Used:

Adcom GFA5503 Amp

Plenty of power and headroom,unit is built well.

None as of yet.

This Adcom 5500 has been an excellent power amp.Very powerful,great dynamics.From blues (my favorite)to rock,jazz and home theater,I could not ask for anymore from a power amp.I almost bought the Parasound 1500A,which is a nice sounding amp also,(Great Warranty 10 Years),but came across the Adcom at Hi Fi buys here in town at a close out for 699.00.Went there to audition a B&K power amp,could'nt resist the Adcom price and I liked the sound of the Adcom better anyway.Im running it through a Dennon AVR-3300 receiver for two channel and home theater.Could'nt be more pleased,THANKS ADCOM.

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It replaced an old Phase Lenear 200 series

Clean, unadulterated sound. Damping factor you can hear.

Should have signal detector to power on, or some type of remote power on. Power switch has strange, unsophisticated feel. Needs alot of room for heat dissipation.

This amp rocks, plain and simple. It is very quiet, detailed and clean at low level, and can drive my Definitive speakers to insane volume levels. Besides simply power advantage over an AV receiver's amplifier is the noticeably tighter bass (I assume this is due to lower output impedance resulting in improved damping).

The construction at this price level is simply outstanding, the power switch being a minor exception. It is painted with a durable, scratch resistant powder coated black, the top is a heavy gauge aluminum plate, perforated for heat dissipation. The amplifier is modularly partioned with separate glass epoxy circuit board for the pre-amp and the left and right power amps. A large torroidal transformer sits on the heavy gauge aluminum bottom plate. Power supply voltage, while unregulated, is smoothed via 4 large capacitors (80k uF I think). ADCOM did not skimp.

I have minor criticisms; this amplifier lacks features. For example, I don't like having to manually power it up/down. Provisions should be made for this. Additionally, voltage gain is fixed at 29db and variable gain would be nice (I don't need it with my pre-amp, but others may). Finally, a bridgeable design, not available here, could be useful to those looking to drive a sub with this amplifier (for home stereo, there are few applications requiring bridging two of these to drive a stereo pair).

If the minor feature omissions are acceptable, you cannot go wrong with this amplifier. It has been reliable and performs flawlessly. There are many good amps out there and this one is certainly one of them.

Similar Products Used:

Have reviewed Classe, Aragon, Accurus and B&K. All similar performance. Accurus and ADCOM are best values I think.