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
WC,

The journey continues, as it must for you (to our great pleasure watching and learning from your travels).

The price of this is letting some really great components go to others to enjoy.

No one can afford to keep the many killer pieces you have had the pleasure of auditioning.

Like many I suspect, yours is one of the very FEW reviews I trust implicitly as it is all on your own dime for the most part.

Keep on Rockin

Rick
@viber6

I had to go back to my comments to see why you might think that I want Constellation sound but can't afford it. I was specific in saying I'd like to hear Constellation, along with Soulution, but I do not want to purchase it. I have very fine equipment but am not here to talk about it, I'm here to follow WC.
This is a tough crowd.  Sheesh. 

I figured my attempt to be humorous would get deleted but that was fast.  I have had private requests to resurrect that post which I may do on another thread although I will revise it so that it is hopefully offensive to no one.  It was designed to poke fun at the typical audiophile (myself included).  It is indeed funny to see the lengths that audiophiles will go to for the sake of musical enjoyment and WCSS's journey is as extreme an example as any.  Nonetheless, it has been enjoyable to tune in every so often when I have found the time. 

Generally, when watching a movie, we're all rooting for the hero to "get the girl" at the end but with regards to WCSS's journey, I'm not sure what I'm supposed to be rooting for since I don't know where WCSS is going with this.  It seems the goal isn't for WCSS to find his end-game setup but just to keep the thread going as long as possible and try as much gear as possible.  If this is the case, then so be it.  Comparative evaluations are valuable and WCSS's blunt honesty has been refreshing to read.

I'd like to apologize to Viber6 as I meant no offense (although he makes himself an easy target, lol).  I actually have much in common with his musical preferences (at least 75 percent of what I listen to is large orchestral or chamber music) although our priorities differ (and that's ok).  It has been said that the most difficult thing for an electronic audio system to convincingly portray is an unamplified human voice.  In any situation, if you close your eyes, you ALWAYS know when you're listening to a live human voice versus a recorded one.  Not far behind is an unamplified acoustical instrument and so unamplified acoustical performances are the most difficult types of music for an electronic audio system to faithfully reproduce.  If I listened to Adele or ColdPlay all day long (and I do enjoy listening to this music), I know I could get by with a much simpler setup and would probably have very satisfyingly reached my personal end game long ago.

Having said that, it's important for each of us to understand our priorities as we embark on our individual audio journeys since no one can have it all.  The ideal amplifier would have infinite open loop gain, infinite input impedance, zero output impedance, infinite bandwidth, and zero offset voltage.  Such an amplifier would be truly transparent (i.e. invisible) but unfortunately, such an amplifier doesn't exist.  Likewise, an ideal cable would have zero resistance, zero inductance, and zero capacitance which would make it completely transparent and while superconductors approach this ideal, such cables do not exist in the audio world.  Consequently, audio at any level is fraught with compromise and so audio wisdom is about knowing which compromises to value over others and this is a very personal thing.  In my case, my priorities are very simply transparency and resolution.   

I prefer to evaluate amps (and other gear) like the Olympics evaluates figure skaters.  Each amp gets a "technical performance" score which includes all the performance characteristics that are generally objectifiable.  Speed, dynamics, transient response, bass control, treble extension, midrange clarity...you name it.  With regards to any one of these individual qualities such as speed or transient response, most of us can agree when we hear something that is fast or agile.  If you use specific portions (10-15 seconds) of select tracks that you know well, it becomes fairly easy to test for these qualities even at audio shows under suboptimal conditions. 

Like in figure skating, each amp also gets an "artistic" score and this can be more difficult to assess and ultimately, may be the more important score.  This is obviously a more subjective quality and reflects our preferred proportions of all of an amp's qualities.  This can take time to assess and, in my opinion, is the reason to try and bring the amp home so that you can hear it in your system.  This is where "musicality" fits in although musicality means different things to different people which is why I am more inclined to know what WCSS means when he says his Constellation has excellent bass control than when he says that the Luxman sounds "musical" or "organic" or "natural."  One man's "warm" is another man's "neutral."

My musical journey is nowhere as extensive as WCSS's but we share some things in common.  In 2017, I owned a pair of Martin Logan Renaissance 15A hybrid electrostats.  They were beautiful sounding and I enjoyed them but typical of line source speakers, they cast a giant ambient sound stage but they focused poorly.  No matter how I positioned them in my room, the image always seemed unnaturally tall and overly diffuse.  The transients were too soft for my liking and so I found myself spending tons of time, energy and resources trying to get them to image more succinctly.  As I had easy access to Pass Labs gear, I went through a gamut of their gear (INT-60, INT-250, XA100.8, XA200.8, and X350.8) although I never tried anything in their xS line in my home.  While Pass renders a beautifully rich tone with very satisfying bass weight, I found bass to be bloated and not well controlled and transients to sound too slow and soft for my liking and this is not something you realize until you start doing side by side A/B comparisons.  Nonetheless, I found that a soft amp did not do favors for a soft sounding speaker, at least for my tastes.  Transparency was not very good either.  One test I have for transparency is upstream cabling and components.  In my most transparent setup, if I change USB cables, it's very easy to hear differences and often, these differences are quite stark.  When WCSS says he hears a greater difference between DACs with the Rowland than with the Constellation, I already know which amp I would prefer.  When I had Pass Labs gear in my room, I could change cables, DACs, servers, etc., and hear differences, but they were considerably more subtle.  On the one hand, with Pass, you could get away with less than stellar upstream gear and still get beautiful sound but for someone who values transparency and resolution, this just drove me nuts since I knew that a Mac Mini should not sound as good as a purpose-built server.  Unfortunately, I had the same experience with McIntosh gear. 

I also tried the Merrill Thors and very briefly the Veritas and while these amps sounded "clear" and "accurate" and were better resolved than the previous amps, they lacked the dimensionality of the very best amps that I auditioned and sounded flat and almost too damped where decays didn't linger as long as they should have.  My experience was similar with Devialet but also with a pair of Kii Three speakers I had in house.  To date, I have not tried anything from Rowland or Bel Canto but thus far, class D has not been my preference.

I then moved on to the Luxman M-900U/C-900U and I found it to have nearly the same harmonic richness as Pass but considerably greater performance resulting in greater transparency and resolution.  This was the first time I heard my Martin Logans really come to life.  I found even better transparency and resolution from D'Agostino, Soulution, and CH Precision and while I could have lived happily with any of these amps driving the Renaissance 15As, I found the best synergy with a pair of CH Precision M1 monoblocks.  I think CH Precision and electrostats are a match made in heaven.

Ultimately, I came to realize that line source speakers aren't for me.  From my Renaissance 15As to a good friend's Sound Labs to my brother's Maggies and most recently, with the Alsyvox Caravaggios that were playing in Munich 2 months ago, I struggled with an overly diffuse image and soft transients.  I understand the appeal and love how you can recreate the ambience of Carnegie Hall with these kinds of speakers but they're just not for me. 

And so I switched back to point source speakers and this time to stay.  I had previously owned romantic sounding Sonus Fabers and I already owned single-driver, crossover-less Voxativs in my other listening room so I thought I might like Magicos in my large listening room to complement the Voxativs.  I even took the Magico tour in Hayward, California and was thoroughly impressed by the tech that goes into these speakers.  I auditioned a pair of S5 Mk2s in my home but preferred the subtle sweetness brought forth by the M3s.  I tried Devialet with the M3s and I liked the dynamics but the pairing didn't sound natural to my ears and I felt the DAC used in the Devialet could be more resolving.  The M3s powered by a Constellation Inspiration Stereo amp sounded underpowered but that was the best Constellation I could get my hands on at the time.  I was very impressed with a D'Agostino Momentum Integrated driving the M3s but the best that I heard the M3s sound was with a Soulution 711 stereo amp and 725 preamp.  I'm sure the 701 monoblocks would have been even better but I did not have access to these amps.  Ultimately, however, I struggled with bass output from the M3s that I felt was too weak for my large room (I didn't have subs at the time) and a presentation that still sounded a touch too clinical for my tastes.  

From the Magicos, I decided to try Wilsons and to cut to the chase, I have stopped looking.  If I could afford them, I would buy a pair of Wilson WAMM Master Chronosonics and feel it would be money well spent because I have yet to hear Mahler's 8th so convincingly portrayed to scale than by these speakers powered by a pair of CH Precision M1.5 monoblocks.  Instead, I have settled on the Alexia 2s and while they're not WAMMs, they have near the balance of transparency, resolution, and naturalness of the WAMMs that I find so appealing but at a much more affordable price point.

It should come as no surprise that while a great amp will always be a great amp, the best amp for one speaker is often not the best amp for another speaker and that is the whole point of this post.  Beyond transparency and resolution, there is synergy to consider and synergy or lack thereof is difficult to predict.  With the Alexias, I tried Pass Labs once again (X350.8 with XP-22 preamp) and it was not a great pairing.  Same thing with a pair of McIntosh MC611s.  Just too slow.  I know the Luxman L-509X has received much love on this thread and so I bought one to try out and all I can say is don't waste your money on this intregated.  It cannot do the Alexias justice.  The Luxman C-900U/M-900U is an excellent combo with the Alexias and I actually prefer the M-900U in stereo form as opposed to monoblock form because I hear better subtlety and nuance with the stereo version, especially at low volumes.  I thought the Hegel H30 fronted by a Soulution 520 preamp was very good.  Even better is the Soulution 511/520 that I currently have in house but the very best pairing I have heard with my Alexias thus far have been the VTL Siegfried II monoblocks with 7.5 III preamp, D'Agostino Momentum Integrated (I have not yet tried D'Agostino separates), and CH Precision L1/M1 monoblocks.  As previously stated, I have not tried anything from Rowland but I do have a Merrill Audio Christine and Element 114 coming my way shortly.  

As for active preamps, I agree with WCSS on this one.  As someone who values transparency, to insert another gain stage to the signal path is a step in the wrong direction but for certain speakers, I find them to be necessary evils especially since I only have one digital source and I don't spin vinyl.  If you notice that with various manufacturers, whether it be VTL or Soulution, as you go up their line of preamps, what you typically gain is transparency.  Active preamps can be very transparent but unfortunately, this transparency can be very expensive.

I apologize to WCSS for hijacking his thread with such a long post but not to worry, this will probably be my only post here (unless it gets deleted again, lol).  Hopefully, the contribution is helpful.
Awesome journey Viber7. Great writing. I was there picturing your amp and speaker choices.


The Wilson Alexia 2s is like a Tiger waiting to be tamed. Good Luck. CH Precision OMG. I just a poor boy listening to my Vintage Krells. Can't wait to hear future endeavors with the Wilsons.
Excellent post viber7. It was well documented and loved the way you “crawled” through different gear until you found what you were looking for. 
As far as the 15a, they are great speakers and do so much right for the money. Yes I know they lack dynamics and I can see why you said they didn’t image well. You actually found gear that sounded awesome with them and that’s the journey I’ve been through as well with my Neoliths. Remember, the Neolith IS THE SPEAKER that the rest of the Logan models aren’t which is a dynamic panel, huge imagining and tons of air. They capture what the smaller siblings can’t. 
I was listening to CH precision last Friday and it didn’t move me for some reason. I felt it sounded sterile, cold, analytical like boulder amplifiers. Maybe it was the weird speakers? As a matter of fact I have a great opportunity to get the C1 ch dac for a good deal but it just didn’t convince me when I heard it. Again, I don’t know what it was. 
Luxman has a special place in my world and it will always be my go to brand if I decided to “downsize” at some point. Constellation remains imaging champ in my book. Rowland is awesome as well but it can be somewhat “picky” with the rest of your gear. I will articulate more on this at a later time. 
Lastly, yes it’s about the synergy and just because one amp sounds good doesn’t mean it will sound just as good with another speaker. I’ve had the Neoliths for 8 months now and they keep impressing me. 
Outside of that, they are one impressive looking speaker that keeps people wondering what they are. Once my room is done, I suspect that each time someone enters the room their eyes will immediately go to the Neolith. It’s just that type of speaker and now that I’ve been dialing things they are far better sounding than when I first got them. 
Rowland will continue to be with me and for now I’m not sure what will I try next in the near future. I’d love to try a full gryphon front end but that is a hard acquisition for me. I also want to try soulution or a full agostino front end, but who knows when that will be.