Beginner choosing amp help

I’m the same path on upgrading and I have compare a few of few of them , I have try Marantz pm11 , parasound halo hint and finally the Yamaha as2100 , for less than 2300 you can get as2100  and for the moneys you can’t go wrong with it ! Hope this help 

Thanks for all of the advice so far! That Luxman does look nice especially at that deal and purchasing a separate dac isn’t a deal breaker for me. Might be a good thing given the fact that to me that would be probably be the one component that might be outdated in 5-7 years. My only concern with it as sameeyers1 suggested is the power on it and how about hooking up a sub? I spoke with the dealer and he mentioned they also sell Parasoundhint6 but that the Luxman in his opionion is better quality and delivers better performance due to the capacitator being bigger then on the hint6. The Hegel does look like a beast to say the least also. How about the Belles Soloist? No one seemed to mention anything about that. 

Check out the moon ace. 50 watt amp, good phonostage and built in dac and streaming capability for tidal etc. Best wishes.

Greetings TBS!
   I’m a fellow newbie to high end audio, at least by today’s standards. I totally relate to your dilemma!
  I spent countless hours researching and checking out Amps before I settled on what I have. In the end I went with separates instead of an integrated set up.
   I bought the Parasound Halo A21 Amp and the P5 PreAmp and I couldn’t be happier. This set up fit my budget which was 3-4K and sounds really nice with a variety of music genres. I listen to a lot of live Grateful Dead music, classic rock, funk, heavy metal.. my musical tastes are all over the map and the Parasound does well. Across the board.
   In the end the most important thing is how it sounds to you, technical specs, reviews, opinions etc are great but you’ve gotta like the sound. What you love may sound like holy hell to the next person.  Happy Hunting!!

  

I liked the Parasound Halo A21 Amp and P5 Pre-Amp as well.  However, I thought their integrated sounded great too.  I couldn't hear much difference between the integrated and the separates.  I wish I could have afforded both a surround receiver and a 2 channel amplifier when I started out.