Would You Rather Own A Good SET Amp, Or A Great Push Pull Amp?

Meanwhile, I am still heartbroken about losing the amp, and by minutes. Something almost certainly never recoverable from. Eight years of effort, and hope, lost all at once. 

Well, if it’s any consolation, I usually find that when I’ve placed a certain product up on the proverbial pedestal for a long time, I typically end up disappointed when/if I finally experience said product. I bet there was a strong chance you would’ve found fault with those amps in short order. 
 

I’ve still yet to encounter an audiophile system that sounded “perfect,” to my ears, regardless of price. This leads me to suspect there is no real “perfect” component out there either. Tube amps are especially imperfect IME. All of them have some rather significant shortcoming, whether it be noise, distortion level, lack of headroom, dynamics, detail etc… Same can be said for good solid state, but to a lesser extent IME. 

You might be better off with a class A solid state amp like the Pass XA25 or one of the wide heatsink Codas (5.5, 12, 16 etc). These amps do nearly everything better than much of what’s out there in tube form. 
 

@kevn I've experienced any number of sound stages over the decades, this both from my own systems and others. It's been a long term migration towards SET and horns, simply my preference at this time, could change somewhat as I continue to experiment with different amps. 

One should always be mindful that preamps, sources, rooms also greatly affect presentations. My DHT, fully balanced,  transformer volume control pre changed things to a large degree vs 6sn7 and 12 series tube based pre's I previously used. More recently had a Pass XP-22 pre, this made for yet another presentation. And then we have footers, racks, etc, we can alter presentation to some extent here. And then we have subs, adding a pair couple years ago, opened up sound stage to an amazing degree.

Poll Time

1 - Listen to an Audio System or Audio Device added to an Audio System,  making an evaluation based on Experiences had of the Produced End Sound

2 - Assess Measured Data Belonging to a Device/Devices followed by Listening to an Audio System or Device added to an Audio System, making an evaluation based on understanding of Measured Data and Experiences had of  the Produced End Sound 

Add a Category if felt further is required.

Poll Time

1 - Listen to an Audio System or Audio Device added to an Audio System,  making an evaluation based on Experiences had of the Produced End Sound

pindac - Top of the List - I trust my experiences had - I trust some not all with the Math, but don't typically require any data to support what is being produced as a Sound.

I use data especially when matching speaker and amps. For instance, at first glance it would seem any flea powered SET would be fine for my 103db efficient Khorns, but upon closer examination there are two impedance dips down to around 3ohms and 43 degree  phase angles, perhaps not so good for current limited amp. But then we have differences in power supply reserves in amps, any two amps within a tube family may not be created equal.