Mwilson: The earlier B&K amps were noticeably warm and smooth. The later models, which made of four numbers in the model name rather than three, are noticeably brighter sounding. Not near as bright as some others, but brighter than their older models.
As far as Classe' goes, their biggest models are noticeably soft up top. The smaller models are definitely lean and bright to me. I had a Classe' 70 for a bit and was going to let my Dad use it. When i brought it over to his house and hooked it up, he offered to hold the door open for me while i carried it out to the trash. In his system, with a metal dome upper mid and ribbon tweeter, it was "earbleedingly bright" with no warmth at all. Obviously, a lot of this "game" is about matching for best results. I will say that this amp could drive whatever you threw at it. As such, so long as the tonal balance was a match for the rest of your system, you'd be good to go.
Eldragon: I think that the Pass Aleph series do sound relatively warm and smooth IF they are fully warmed up. Then again, your suggestion of the Monarchy's would probably be an even better match for a metal dome. In some respects, i would say that some might even consider the Monarchy's slightly "dark" sounding, but obviously, that is both a judgment call and system specific. The little 70's are good amps, especially the Pro's with their bigger power supplies, but probably not up to driving something like a crossover heavy speaker like a Paradigm. The 100 SE Deluxe should work really well for something like this though. Good call. Sean
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As far as Classe' goes, their biggest models are noticeably soft up top. The smaller models are definitely lean and bright to me. I had a Classe' 70 for a bit and was going to let my Dad use it. When i brought it over to his house and hooked it up, he offered to hold the door open for me while i carried it out to the trash. In his system, with a metal dome upper mid and ribbon tweeter, it was "earbleedingly bright" with no warmth at all. Obviously, a lot of this "game" is about matching for best results. I will say that this amp could drive whatever you threw at it. As such, so long as the tonal balance was a match for the rest of your system, you'd be good to go.
Eldragon: I think that the Pass Aleph series do sound relatively warm and smooth IF they are fully warmed up. Then again, your suggestion of the Monarchy's would probably be an even better match for a metal dome. In some respects, i would say that some might even consider the Monarchy's slightly "dark" sounding, but obviously, that is both a judgment call and system specific. The little 70's are good amps, especially the Pro's with their bigger power supplies, but probably not up to driving something like a crossover heavy speaker like a Paradigm. The 100 SE Deluxe should work really well for something like this though. Good call. Sean
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