Rockford Fosgate Power T600-2

A two channel amplifier from the Power series with a cast chassis and many proprietary Rockford Technologies. It features large squeeze terminals for up to four gauge power cables that are fastened by inserting a screwdriver in the top of the panel via a hole. The same method is used to affix speaker cables and the switch-on wire. There are RCA inputs and a set of RCA pass through outputs for use driving another amplifier. Three lamps on the top indicate either ‘power on’ or ‘thermal’ warning or ‘protect’ mode. The inputs and connections are all on the front drop of the amplifier as is the socket for the Punch EQ control which is an optional extra. You get a single Punch EQ control on the amp as well, with gain and frequency potentiometers showing through holes. You can set the crossover from all pass to highpass or lowpass. In lowpass, only the low EQ can be accessed and in highpass only the high 12kHz EQ is available. Both work at the same time in ‘all pass’. The chassis is a casting and the design allows for heat to be spread evenly across the casting. It was tested on a Sony MEX-DV1000 playing a stereo SACD as well as some conventional CD material.- Class AB (71% efficient at 4 Ohms, 68% @ 2 Ohms
– 2 x 200w RMS @ 4 Ohms (ours measured 231w/ch)
– 2 x 300w RMS @ 2 Ohms (ours measured 369w/ch)
– 1 x 600w RMS @ 4 Ohms (ours measured 746w)
– 1 Ohm x 2 stable; 2 Ohm x 1 bridged stable
– CAST Aluminium heatsink with shiny black finish
– 4Ga. Power Terminals with crosshead screw driven compression sockets
– Punch Equalisation 0 to +12dB @ 12kHz with 0 to +18dB @ 45Hz
– Adjustable input sensitivity 150mv to 5.0V
– RCA Input and throughput
– Stereo & Mono operation
– Frequency response 20Hz to 20kHz +/-1dB
– Signal to Noise Ratio 105dBA
– Lowpass/Highpass Filter 50Hz to 500Hz 24dB per Octave Butterworth
– Fuse Rating 150A x1 NB Not Built In
– HxWxD(mm) 55 x 207 x 195mm
– Mass 5.51Kg/ 12.15Lb
– PEQ Socket for use with knob supplied separately
– CEA 2006 Compliant
Review by Adam Rayner
Rockford Fosgate have been developing ever yet better car audio amplifiers for a fierce long time now and have worked out a lot of stuff to do with the thermodynamics of hardcore car audio use. Now, it looks as if they have done some serious things with the basic sound quality as this year’s crop of Power series amps have whacking great specs for signal to noise ratio.
Best of all, the amp is a CEA 2006 compliant model, which means that Rockford’s claims are backed up to the hilt as fact rather than marketing puff. Rocky were always on the moral high ground on this one, so it’s no surprise to see them embrace this system. You still get a Performance Verification Certificate and it’s named to the person who tested the amp. You also get the amp’s serial number stuck in your manual as well, which makes the whole package seem more serious and ‘engineeringy’. The look of the amplifier is gorgeous with dark shiny panels you�ll really want to keep properly dusted once installed and the cast heatsink looks chunky and appealing, with none of that ‘squeezed out of a tube and sliced off’ look like so many extruded ally heatsink amps.
I hooked it up to the Odyssey battery and the Sony MEX-DV1000 DVD/CD/Every Sorta Disc You Can Think Of player and stuffed in the ancient but awesome recording of Pink Floyd’s Dark Side of the Moon. The Original Hippy ‘can you hear that in the background?’ album of absurdly high production standards, it was remastered 30 years after they made it and even layered to 5.1ch and two channel SACD which is higher resolution than CD and makes a scary reference for revealing how well an amplifier works.
I could hear the production hiss on the album and every other little fiddly bit with utter clarity, the detail sounding very like the way the disc sounded on my B&W LM1 near field monitors on the Genesis ST100 Talk Audio test bench amp. However, this was on the surprisingly good and well enclosed set of horn tweeter ovals I use and rather than the polite and restrained performance the B&W’s raised, I was able to push the levels a bit as apart from the greater cone area of the ovals than the B&Ws, the Rockford has some serious power.
I resisted launching the cones of the test speakers as the power on tap was well over the true half kilowatt mark and knew they wouldn’t cope with mad drive. But what the greater than 200 damping factor and the fabulously fast rise time of the amp’s workings, the headroom was amazing. The bass end was vast and well gripped and with no ‘hang’ at all.
Full, rich and sweet, I have never heard these ovals sing like this and became even more amazed at how good some stuff the ill-fated-in-the-UK Vieta brand actually was! The amp didn’t break sweat as a large part of the R&D-created proprietary features are about things like, ‘prolongs output device life span’ and ‘more power capacity’ improved heat dissipation. So they are tough under real world spankage conditions. It just sounded delicious and above all, really, truly High End. You could drive Morels on these but I reckon you’d want to run Rockford Fosgate Power components and drive them with vigour, too, in order to really use all the power on tap.
And there’s bags of it.
I know that posh costs but I do think that the optional PEQ knob could be included at the necessarily high product price. The real circuitry is in the amp isn’t it? Although the older Punch Bass Remote and Para-Punch Remote won’t work with the 2007-on models, the PEQ knob simply says 0db at one end and 18dB at the other of its decal. Seems a shame to have get another bit to feel complete and it did affect the features score. When you have one and it’s plugged in, it overrides the Punch EQ knob on the front panel.
The Punch EQ remains the single best thought out boost in all car audio. Emulated but never successfully copied, Jim Rockford’s original car cabin acoustics research still obtains and I loved the richer sweeter feel to the sound when it was applied. It is of course directly car-cabin transfer function related but it is still a treat and not nearly as blunt and brash as all the other bass boosters out there.
So, a real power house that can do posh and subtle and then give you a proper biff in the kidneys. A classic slice of Rockford Fosgate for the Noughties and a deserving carrier onwards of the illustrious Power Series’ reputation.
Overall 8.4
Sound Quality 9
Power Output 10
Features 7
Build Quality 9
Value For Money 8