Amplifiers weight

lordrootman:  Now you have me intrigued.  I bought the Parasound A21 because I thought it was just beautiful with the top panel removed (specs were good too, but it was the looks that got me).  Now I have to check out that Anthem STR you are drooling over!

Thanks everyone for inputs 
I learn a lot
so is not always about the weight

Excellent. In return for putting up with the ribbing here's more good solid info than you ever dreamed there was on this subject. Or so I humbly submit, etc, etc.

Mass matters. Don't take my word for it. Put a phone book, dive weight, bag of sugar, anything heavy on top of a CD player, DAC, preamp, whatever. You will hear a difference. Or in case you don't, even better, you can now save yourself a ton of time and money from now on just buy cheap and good looking.

But probably you will notice the sound did change, the bass got fuller, and if it was something soft like the sugar then it also got fuller with warmth but if it was solid like a rock then it got deeper and tighter. And not just the bass but the midrange, and treble is more dynamic.

So mass does matter. Stiffness does matter. Damping matters. Just not at all in the way you were asking, which is why you got so much static. Of course weight does not matter, per se. To be totally honest nothing matters but how it sounds. Take any design, any technology, does not matter. There's tube amps that are tight and etched and grainy and there's solid state amps that are full and liquid and warm. None of these tech things you are so focused on means anything. Only how it sounds. Go and listen. You will see.

I don’t really need more power than A21+ for my current set up just to cover future upgrade 

No one needs more than about 30 to 60 tube watts, or about 100 solid state watts. No one. If you think you do all that means is you made a mistake somewhere. Most likely you got sucked into some hard to drive speakers. Happens a lot.

Number One with a bullet thing to keep asking yourself when shopping for amps: If the first watt isn't any good, why in the world would you want 200 more of them? 

The preamp looks amazing though for 4K

If you say so. What looks amazing to me for $4k is the Raven integrated. For $4k you get a preamp, and amp, with all the power you need. 30W. PLUS with that you do not need another power cord, interconnect, fuse, cones, shelf, or any of the other stuff which if you cut corners on will insure you never, ever get the performance from that preamp and amp that you paid so dearly for.

My guess would be, just to give you some idea, you are looking at well over $10k in separates to match the performance you will hear with the Raven Nighthawk or Osprey. Well over.

@millercarbon says,

" Mass matters."

The designer of my new amplifiers, SMc Audio, agrees and added their new "Gravity Base" to each of my new monoblocks.  The Gravity Base is basically a heavy brass plinth that anchors key components within the amplifier and serves as the base.  They proclaim the difference is not subtle.

It’s like cooking. Things such as transformers, caps, transistors ... are like ingredients. They establish an upper limits. And of course how good you are as a chef determines the final finished products.  Mr. Pass probably won't be able to do much if he could only use some tiny little transformers.  

The weight of an amp results from the philosophy of the designer. If the goal is to have an amp that will linearly increase its power into low impedance loads then it's likely to be heavy. In addition, if the designer prefers Class A bias then that will also add to the weight. For example, I have a Krell KSA 300S that provides 300 watts @ 8 ohms, 600 watts @ 4 ohms, and 1200 watts @ 2 ohms. Very few amplifiers will do this. There is also a automatic biasing feature that causes the amp to run in Class A mode up to high wattages. It weighs 185 lbs.

So why do I need all that power into low impedance loads? Because I run Thiel CS6 speakers that have low sensitivity (87db) and their impedance drops to below 3 ohms for parts of the audio band. This is a brutal load for an amplifier. For a speaker load like this the amplifier's capabilities will make a big difference in how the speakers sound.

Your Klipsch speakers are on the other end of the spectrum compared to my Thiels. They have 102db sensitivity which is very high. You would be fine with an 8 watt Single Ended Triode tube amp if you wanted to go that direction. Because your speakers are easy to drive you have a virtually unlimited selection of amplifiers.

If you had a bias toward tubes (pun intended) then you could go with any number of beautiful tube integrateds or separates. You don't need any more than 30 or 40 watts to shatter the windows unless you have a very big room.

If you are smitten by the appearance of gear then I have a word of warning. Don't look at the Line Magnetic LM-845 Premium integrated amp. It's necessary to see it in person to get the full effect (by the way it's really heavy). It's a little fat for your price range but you may sell the dog and take out a second mortgage to buy it. It wouldn't run my speakers but it's perfect for yours. The LM-845 may be the most beautiful piece of gear I've ever seen.