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My Long List of Amplifiers and My Personal Review of Each!

So I have been in a long journey looking to find the best amplifiers for my martin logan montis. As you know, the match between an amplifier and speakers has to be a good "marriage" and needs to be blend exquisitely. Right now, I think I might have found the best sounding amplifier for martin logan. I have gone through approximately 34-36 amplifiers in the past 12 months. Some of these are:

Bryston ST, SST, SST2 series
NAD M25
PARASOUND HALO
PARASOUND CLASSIC
KRELL TAS
KRELL KAV 500
KRELL CHORUS
ROTEL RMB 1095
CLASSE CT 5300
CLASSE CA 2200
CLASSE CA 5200
MCINTOSH MC 205
CARY AUDIO CINEMA 7
OUTLAW AUDIO 755
LEXICON RX7
PASS LABS XA 30.8
BUTLER AUDIO 5150
ATI SIGNATURE SERIES 6005

With all that said, the amplifiers I mentioned above are the ones that in my opinion are worth mentioning. To make a long story short, there is NO 5 CHANNEL POWER AMP that sounds as good as a 3ch and 2ch amplifier combination. i have done both experiments and the truth is that YOU DO lose details and more channel separation,etc when you select a 5 channel power amplifier of any manufacturer.
My recollection of what each amp sounded like is as follows:

ATI SIGNATURE SERIES 6005 (great power and amazing soundstage. Very low noise floor, BUT this amplifiers NEEDS TO BE cranked up in order to fully enjoy it. If you like listening at low volume levels or somewhat moderate, you are wasting your time here. This amp won’t sound any different than many other brands out there at this volume. The bass is great, good highs although they are a bit bright for my taste)

NAD M25 (very smooth, powerful, but somewhat thin sounding as far as bass goes)
Bryston sst2(detailed, good soundstage, good power, but can be a little forward with certain speakers which could make them ear fatiguing at loud volumes)

Krell (fast sounding, nice bass attack, nice highs, but some detail does get lost with certain speakers)

rotel (good amp for the money, but too bright in my opinion)

cary audio (good sound overall, very musical, but it didn’t have enough oomph)

parasound halo (good detail, great bass, but it still holds back some background detail that i can hear in others)

lexicon (very laid back and smooth. huge power, but if you like more detail or crisper highs, this amp will disappoint you)

McIntosh mc205 (probably the worst multichannel amp given its price point. it was too thin sounding, had detail but lacked bass.

butler audio (good amplifier. very warm and smooth sweet sounding. i think for the money, this is a better amp than the parasound a51)

pass labs (very VERY musical with excellent bass control. You can listen to this for hours and hours without getting ear fatigue. however, it DOES NOT do well in home theater applications if all you have is a 2 channel set up for movies. The midrange gets somewhat "muddy" or very weak sounding that you find yourself trying to turn it up.

classe audio (best amplifier for multi channel applications. i simply COULDNT FIND a better multi channel amplifier PERIOD. IT has amazing smoothness, amazing power and good bass control although i would say krell has much better bass control)

Update: The reviews above were done in January 2015. Below is my newest update as of October 2016:



PS AUDIO BHK 300 MONOBLOCKS: Amazing amps. Tons of detail and really amazing midrange. the bass is amazing too, but the one thing i will say is that those of you with speakers efficiency of 87db and below you will not have all the "loudness" that you may want from time to time. These amps go into protection mode when using a speaker such as the Salon, but only at very loud levels. Maybe 97db and above. If you don’t listen to extreme crazy levels, these amps will please you in every way.

Plinius Odeon 7 channel amp: This is THE BEST multichannel amp i have ever owned. Far , but FAR SUPERIOR to any other multichannel amp i have owned. In my opinion it destroyed all of the multichannel amps i mentioned above and below. The Odeon is an amp that is in a different tier group and it is in a league of its own. Amazing bass, treble and it made my center channel sound more articulate than ever before. The voices where never scrambled with the action scenes. It just separated everything very nicely.

Theta Dreadnaught D: Good detailed amp. Looks very elegant, has a pleasant sound, but i found it a tad too bright for my taste. I thought it was also somewhat "thin" sounding lacking body to the music. could be that it is because it is class d?

Krell Duo 300: Good amp. Nice and detailed with enough power to handle most speakers out there. I found that it does have a very nice "3d" sound through my electrostatics. Nothing to fault here on this amp.
Mark Levinson 532H: Great 2 channel amp. Lots of detail, amazing midrange which is what Mark Levinson is known for. It sounds very holographic and will please those of you looking for more detail and a better midrange. As far as bass, it is there, but it is not going to give you the slam of a pass labs 350.5 or JC1s for example. It is great for those that appreciate classical music, instrumental, etc, but not those of you who love tons of deep bass.

 It is articulate sounding too
Krell 7200: Plenty of detail and enough power for most people. i found that my rear speakers contained more information after installed this amp. One thing that i hated is that you must use xlr cables with this amp or else you lose most of its sound performance when using RCA’s.

Krell 402e: Great amp. Very powerful and will handle any speaker you wish. Power is incredible and with great detail. That said, i didn’t get all the bass that most reviewers mentioned. I thought it was "ok" in regards to bass. It was there, but it didn’t slam me to my listening chair.

Bryston 4B3: Good amp with a complete sound. I think this amp is more laid back than the SST2 version. I think those of you who found the SST2 version of this amp a little too forward with your speakers will definitely benefit from this amp’s warmth. Bryston has gone towards the "warm" side in my opinion with their new SST3 series. As always, they are built like tanks. I wouldn’t call this amp tube-like, but rather closer to what the classe audio delta 2 series sound like which is on the warm side of things.

Parasound JC1s: Good powerful amps. Amazing low end punch (far superior bass than the 402e). This amp is the amp that i consider complete from top to bottom in regards to sound. Nothing is lacking other than perhaps a nicer chassis. Parasound needs to rework their external appearance when they introduce new amps. This amp would sell much more if it had a revised external appearance because the sound is a great bang for the money. It made my 800 Nautilus scream and slam. Again, amazing low end punch.

Simaudio W7: Good detailed amp. This amp reminds me a lot of the Mark Levinson 532h. Great detail and very articulate. I think this amp will go well with bookshelves that are ported in order to compensate for what it lacks when it comes to the bass. That doesn’t mean it has no bass, but when it is no Parasound JC1 either.
Pass labs 350.5: Wow, where do i begin? maybe my first time around with the xa30.8 wasn’t as special as it was with this monster 350.5. It is just SPECTACULAR sounding with my electrostatics. The bass was THE BEST BASS i have ever heard from ANY amp period. The only amp that comes close would be the jC1s. It made me check my settings to make sure the bass was not boosted and kept making my jaw drop each time i heard it. It totally destroyed the krell 402e in every regard. The krell sounded too "flat" when compared to this amp. This amp had amazing mirange with great detail up top. In my opinion, this amp is the best bang for the money. i loved this amp so much that i ended up buying the amp that follows below.

Pass labs 250.8: What can i say here. This is THE BEST STEREO AMP i have ever heard. This amp destroys all the amps i have listed above today to include the pass labs 350.5. It is a refined 350.5 amp. It has more 3d sound which is something the 350.5 lacked. It has a level of detail that i really have never experienced before and the bass was amazing as well. I really thought it was the most complete power amplifier i have ever heard HANDS DOWN. To me, this is a benchmark of an amplifier. This is the amp that others should be judged by. NOTHING is lacking and right now it is the #1 amplifier that i have ever owned.

My current amps are Mcintosh MC601s: i decided to give these 601s a try and they don’t disappoint. They have great detail, HUGE soundstage, MASSIVE power and great midrange/highs. The bass is great, but it is no pass labs 250.8 or 350.5. As far as looks, these are the best looking amps i have ever owned. No contest there. i gotta be honest with you all, i never bought mcintosh monos before because i wasn’t really "wowed" by the mc452, but it could have been also because at that time i was using a processor as a preamp which i no longer do. Today, i own the Mcintosh C1100 2 chassis tube preamp which sounds unbelievable. All the amps i just described above have been amps that i auditioned with the C1100 as a preamp. The MC601s sound great without a doubt, but i will say that if you are looking for THE BEST sound for the money, these would not be it. However, Mcintosh remains UNMATCHED when it comes to looks and also resale value. Every other amp above depreciates much faster than Mcintosh.

That said, my future purchase (when i can find a steal of a deal) will be the Pass labs 350.8. I am tempted to make a preliminary statement which is that i feel this amp could be THE BEST stereo amp under 30k dollars. Again, i will be able to say more and confirm once i own it. I hope this update can help you all in your buying decisions!


128x128jays_audio_lab
eziggy
137 posts
 
Jafox, totally get where you are coming from.  Was just asking since a friend and I were listening to a well recorded album on my MLs with all AQ cabling (speaker + interconnects) and we literally thought someone walked in the room since the sound had such a 3D soundstage.

As Viber mentioned, MLs are probably some of the most unforgiving speakers I have heard.  Hit it with an amazing setup and source, and it can be unreal.  Bad source = generally bad experience.  But I have never heard Maggies to compare with which are also supposed to be fantastic.
viber6
2,438 posts
 
eziggy,
Right.  You could say that ML stats are accurate, which is the same as unforgiving.  I just wouldn't go so far to say that bad source = bad experience.  On my Audiostatic 240 stats, I can certainly hear the flaws of a particular recording, such as 1980's digital.  But I love the overall clarity and just ignore the few moments of digititis, so it is still mostly a good experience.  I prefer this situation to one in which I am listening to a forgiving system where even though there are no nasty moments, everything is mediocre and boring.  I want audio to be exciting.

WC, another woman analogy for you.  A famous model of 20-30 years ago (Cindy Crawford?) had a mole near her left lip.  This became her unique trademark.  You would certainly enjoy being with her and forget about her mole.
jafox
1,444 posts
 
@zprrI have no experience with Wireworld products.  A few months ago I saw what looked like a most impressive Wireworld speaker cable pair on consignment at a local audio store.  I was very tempted to try them out, but I needed to stay focused then to try different amps with my basement speakers and to also find longer pairs of ICs.  I am now set with the amps as I fired back up the CAT amps and found much success with an RCA Transparent Audio cable this weekend.  But I am already eager to try the next TA model up the line.  

I shuffled furniture, moved pictures on the walls, removed a bookcase, removed a rug off a wall, and now the room is more lively than before.  So perhaps after I tame the room a bit, I will be ready to try speaker cables, and perhaps the Wireworld products.  As for Nordost, I heard a friend's system with all the Valhalla and I did not like it at all.  Ultimately he abandoned that too and created his own cable line.  That was the top Nordost product at the time and I feel that if I do not like a company's top product, the designer(s) and I have a different set of preferences and so I typically move on to audition other product lines.  So it is highly unlikely I will audition Nordost unless someone came over and insisted I give them a try.
jafox
1,444 posts
 
@eziggy,
I try to be careful with the words I use when I describe component or system auditions.  Some words off limits for me are, accuracy, transparency and truth.  A favorite word used by many is synergy but this can be more seen as a means to compensate one component's flaws with those of another.  Two products might have wildly different tonality but when mated together result in a "neutral" or "accurate" system result.  I experienced this mistake when I had a cable designer visit my home 10 years ago and one by one we replaced each cable in my system with one from his line.  When we got to the final IC, and inserted his IC, the sound took a goofy turn for the worse.  But upon putting his speaker cables in, the sound came back into check.  It was very clear that I had done a mighty fine job to mix products with serious complimentary flaws to result in "system synergy".  

In 1981 I heard the outstanding Accoustat 2+2 speakers at a so cal dealer.  These are the 8-feet tall doubly stacked flat panels that were 2 feet wide as I recall.  Oh my, this was impressive.  I few years later I heard the ML CLS at a Tucson dealer and the impression was not at all the same; it was very disappointing.  And then a couple years later, I heard the Stax electrostatic speakers at a Phoenix dealer.  Oh my, that sound too was incredible!  These were 5-6 feet tall, maybe 2 feet wide and flat panel.  Was the curved panel design of the ML the culprit of my conclusions?   Maybe, but I clearly was not anti-electrostatic speakers.  It just showed me that not all electrostatic speakers are created equal.

I used the word, sterile when I heard the ML speakers line in Minneapolis 15 years after that.  To me a sterile sound does not imply accuracy, but rather it describes that the minute I hear music from that system, I have no feeling that I am at a live event; there is no emotional connection maybe because of fatigue, dimensional flatness, compressed dynamics, unnatural tonality, etc.  

Isn't what we all seek here is to sit down in front of our music system and escape to believe even for a short time that we are listening to the real event? The ML experiences did not bring this on for me.  If this is what people describe as truth, they can have it.  And the Minneapolis dealer was using his top ARC products at that time.  I do not recall the source.  But a change to the Magnepans, and yes, some exaggerations with bigger images than reality, but for me, there was a pull for me into the performance.

And then in 2005, I heard the huge SoundLab U1 and A1 models.  Never before had I experienced an electrostatic speaker as this.  And surprise, surprise, it was curved but it was tonally coherent, most impressive clarity and dynamics (with the CATs) and had outstanding portrayal of space.  I truly was unprepared for what I heard and this has everything to do with why I own these today, for over a decade.

Perhaps the latest ML line addresses the concerns I had with their products years ago, but I have no desire to change what I have unless I am ready to significantly downsize my speakers or systems.
avcr79
20 posts
 
Very interesting post !
i personally think the new ml line is far better than previous models. 

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