Amp upgrade for Revel M20 speakers


For the past several months, I've been slowly upgrading my two channel system. Prior to that, I hadn't touched it in over 20 years. For all those years, it was: Denon DCD1520 CD player, Nak SR4A receiver, Spica TC-50 speakers. Today, with latest upgrade of speakers to Revel M20s, the system comprises: Arcam DV-137 (transport for CD, SACD playback), PS Audio Digital Link 3 DAC, Audible Illusions L1 pre, B&K Ref 2220 amp driving the M20s.

I'm pretty happy with everything at this point. At least I think I can finally stop the hunt for the right speakers - at least for a while. BUT....I can't help but think I can do better with my amplification than the B&K. The B&K is very nice but I think the M20s deserve just a little bit better.

There are two aspects of the current system's performance that I am looking to improve with a change in amplification: 1) wider, deeper soundstage and 2) more dynamic transients (I believe the B&K is a bit sluggish though not bad at all)

I have two options that I'm considering and am looking for input from people having experience with the M20s (or very similar). The two options are: 1) change out the B&K for another power amp (budget would be about $800 for used amp), 2) swap out the AI pre and B&K amp for a high quality integrated (budget would be about $1,200 for used integrated).

As far as amps to replace the B&K only, I really am looking for suggestions for something that would mate well with both the AI pre and the M20s and provide a significant improvement in performance.

Integrateds that I've looked into include: Creek Destiny, Nait Naim 5i-2, and Simaudio i-1. Any opinions on these or others in my price range that would give me the performance enhancements I'm looking for would be appreciated.

Thanks in advance for your suggestions.

Jon
jblack16

Showing 1 response by rlwainwright

The Revels are medium-low efficiency (87 db) speakers with a 6 ohm nominal impedance that drops to 4 ohms at some frequencies. They would most likely perform best with a 100+ watts/channel amp and would really shine with 200-250 watts/ch.

Emotiva make some well-respected amps in that category - the XPA-2 and the XPA-1L come to mind. The XPA-2 is currently on sale for $799 and a pair of XPA-1L monoblocks are also on sale for $1198.

Both come with a 30 day in-home trial and a 5 years warranty:

http://shop.emotiva.com/

-RW-

PS: I have and Emotiva XPA-5 amp and it really does sound quite good in my system - it sounds quite clean and fast and has a very good bottom-end. All in all the Emo amps are a very good value...