Is Odyssey Power amp Stratos better than Krell?

I sold my Stratos and bought the new Krell 400xi integrated amp. I'm not going back. The Odyssey was "fine". Not outstanding in anyway. But it proved to be unstable when pushed. My Krell is a monster, controlled, balanced, detailed and clear. Not as warm as the Odyssey.

i also sold my odyssey monoblocks recently along with a classe preamp and went with the dk design vs1 integrated. imo, the odyssey sounded more musical (less harsh) than any of the krell amps/integrated amps that i have auditioned, including their recent amps. the odyssey's and the dk unit power ineffecient totem mani 2 speakers and they both do/did a fine job.

I owned one had a few other SS amps inc krell and BC At the same time the oydessey with upgrades is a good SS design but not better than the fpb 200c krell .The krell was much better everywhere and it should it cost about 3-4x as much the BC had better in mids. The oydessey had good bass extention a detailed mid but a wee bit of glare in upper range.I do perfer Tube amps so my bias might show here.They are worth the cash and well built good looking product, keep up the good work Klaus.PS how about a 25 watt pure class A mono block design for us SET guys? Something that maybe you could hang on the back of a loudspeaker? Just a thought if you use my idea I expect a pair at cost.lol

I know nothing about Krell, except hearsay: "detailed", "harsh", "great", "terrible", etc. Will plead ignorance on that.

However, I absolutely love my Odyssey Extreme Monoblocks, which replaced my venerable B&K ST140. Wow! I think they are fabulous, detailed and not harsh. Maybe not as mushy as tubes, but I like a little BASS, so...

A dealer friend of mine who does NOT sell Odyssey (duh, they're factory direct!) helped to confirm my suspicion that I had stumbled onto a fabulous product. He said, based on his knowlege of the Symphonic Line, that these are one of the top 20 amps in the world--and this is a person who does NOT mince words; if anything would have an incentive to slam the product, not praise it. Even said it was better than a lot of what he sells, which is really high end stuff (won't name any brands, but it's the niche stuff--smaller companies for the most part, etc.). He doesn't carry Krell.

Klaus has been personally available, pleasant and informative each & every time I've pestered him on the phone with what most would consider annoying and unanswerable questions about his Lorelei loudspeakers. A great (and patient) guy.

Klaus: Yes, your extreme monoblocks are reasonably priced (in high end audio terms, anyway) and indeed provide a great bang to buck ratio, but that doesn' mean that they are in any way "mid-fi". For example, how many other power amps at ANY price have 360,000 microfarads of total capacitance????? (I saw a "Bear Labs" pure class A with 500K microfarads a while back, but retail for that is about 14000...)

The man referred to above is a true veteran, knows what to listen for, is a "2 channel guy", likes tubes, and is an absolute STICKLER for smoothness. Even though Odyssey is a "competitor", he had nothing but high praise for the amplifier (he was unable to comment on the Tempest preamp and had not heard the Lorelei speakers). He feels that the Odyssey Extreme Monoblocks are the strongest component of my system, and has basically suggested rebuilding AROUND them, even though he sells some very fine high end amps.

Klaus rocks!

It is possible that some people prefer "tube based distortion generators" to SS based equipment that tries to reproduce the input signal with a higher level of linearity. If one doubts that this is possible, try taking a look at this link to a post that Steve Eddy made over at AA. Many of the makes and models are products from very highly respected and well reviewed manufacturers.

What does all of this tell you? It tells me that it all boils down to either listening skills and / or personal preference. In this modern day of massively over-priced and under-designed "high end" audio, i think that more people demonstrate a penchant for personal preferences due to their lack of listening skills than those that have actual listening skills and put them to use. Then again, that's just my "personal opinion", so take it for what it's worth. Sean
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