Parasound A21 vs Bryston 4bsst 2

"Not sure what the OP has for gear or cables, but by saving some on the A21, I'd suggest getting some good cables, I've purchased from Audio Advisor and they are pretty knowledgeable."

No offense at all, but I really disagree with that statement. Cables make a nice difference, but I would never get lesser active components so I could spend more on cables. Not only that, but if you pick good components and match them well, it makes cable choice a lot easier.

"I listen to contemporary Jazz, and my priorities are soundstaging, imaging(front to back placement), and as close to neutral as possible without brightness."

If that's your main goal (not to say that you don't have others, as well), you need to build a system, not buy an amp. Your source and preamp components are at least as important. They all have to work together.

"Now I've decided to slowly build my system...the amp is just the first step. If I get the A21, the P7 will be the next piece, followed by a new source, and finally cables."

I don't know if I did a good job explaining my point in my first post. You list some specific qualities that you want your new amp to have. Setting goals is excellent on your part. Very few people actually do that. I'm just questioning how you are going about this. When I say you need to build a system, I don't mean that you need to buy everything at once, but just have a clearly defined path. At the very least, you need to hear your speakers with the A21 and P7. Otherwise, its just a coin toss. Its more work, but I would say that you really need to hear the combo before you purchase.

One other thing I see from reading your posts, is that you seem to be favoring the amp as the more important piece, as opposed to the preamp. I won't tell you what to think or how to spend your money, but I would highly recommend you treat the preamp as the more important of the 2. As long as whatever amp you get has enough power to drive your speakers properly, the preamp should make a bigger difference in terms of sound quality. If you skimp on the preamp, you're just going to start fooling with cables, tubes and other various tweaks. By the time you figure out what's going on, you'll have spent a lot of money. Not getting the right preamp has to be the biggest and most common mistake in audio.

"The amp is just easier...determine how much I want to spend and find something that has adequate power that doesn't distract from the music."

"my priorities are soundstaging, imaging(front to back placement), and as close to neutral as possible without brightness."

This is kind of what I was talking about. The amp plays a pretty big role in bringing forth those qualities. While Parasound and Bryston are both great products, I don't think they are particularly good in those areas. I'm not saying they're bad, just average. If you are willing to consider amps other than the 2 we're talking about here, I would look at Ayre, Theta, BAT and Pass. They all make SS amps that do a much better job of going beyond adequate power and deliver a higher level of SQ. Its just something to think about. I've heard Aerials many times with Pass and thought it was a great combo.

"Name a great amp that can be had for the same price of the A21."

You can probably find a Pass Aleph, older BAT SS and maybe an Ayre V-3 in your price range.

"09-30-14: Milpai
Zd542,
I think you need to compare the A21 with Pass Aleph while driving the Aerial 7T. The Pass would probably do great with high sensitivity speakers, but might not sound good with the Aerials. Ricred1's room is also not a small one, so the Pass would not help there either."

Sorry. I was in a hurry when I typed that out and couldn't go into too much detail. I've heard the Pass Aleph's many time with Aerial speakers. Its true that the Aleph series didn't put out that much wattage. That said, they were extremely clean. I had several models myself. For example, I took my Aleph o's, rated at 40 watts/ch and drove a pair of B&W 802s3's with it. At the same time, I also had a Krell KAV250a. Power wise, you could hardly tell the difference. The Krell, of course, had better bass, but beyond that, there was very little difference as to the amps ability to drive the speakers. If you looked at those 2 amps on paper, they are vastly different. The Parasound is an excellent all around amp. Its a really hard amp to screw up with. I just brought up some alternatives given the qualities that the OP said he was looking for.

Since we're comparing amps, I think its worth noting that while most people would pick the Bryston over the Parasound, there's really no guarantee that the Bryston will out perform it. Its entirely possible that some may prefer the way it sounds for any number of reasons. Just because its a more expensive amp doesn't always mean its better in every way. Overall, I see both amps appealing to the same type of person. If you like one, you'll probably like the other.

"10-02-14: Zkzpb8
Yeah Dave - I was the subject of a test recently, with two amps playing, one a .5 dB louder than the other. Needless to say that almost everyone liked the louder one (including me - I had all kinds of great things to say about it). It was pretty educational, to say the least.."

Were you told what the test was for before you took it or did they say it was for something else and then bring up the volume issue after the fact?