Uber Amps - Are they worth it?

Oh come on now. Really?

Actually, there was one exception, whose name I forget. A rotund young Englishman with a rather morose demeanor. His reviews were thoughtful and well-documented, but he mostly specialized in headphone gear, which holds a limited interest for me.

I seem to recall he got into a tiff with DCS because he wasn’t complimentary enough of one of their DACs. DCS sent him a flurry of insulting and demeaning emails, then threatened legal action, which of course was the stupidest thing a company could do.

Guess I’ll correct my previous post to "most audiophile YouTube videos are garbage" 

mulveling, top level tube separates is a very different thing because you can come very close to the best sound possible, not forgetting source and speakers, of course, and even cables. But, yeah, that kind of money for just transistor integrated ? Definitely not me even if I could easily afford them. When previous generation of Gryphon integrated, Diablo 300, was $16.5k plus optional phono stage and dac, $5k each, I think, that was reasonable if you wanted excellent solid state one box piece of equipment. Now it is all madness, prices getting out of control.

I probably differ from the received wisdom here in that i believe one should budget the same amount for a power amp as one does for speakers.

To the person who doubts an ss amp can justify big expense i suggest you listen to a Boulder 2160 in a mature system. The improvements are dazzling, mind-boggling even.

Just a thought, but can an integrated ever be accurately described as an uber amp?

@inna I hear ya. When the "IA" commentor say's "from my years of listening" .... I'm SOOOO out. I don't finish the video or consider it's opinion at all.

 When previous generation of Gryphon integrated, Diablo 300, was $16.5k plus optional phono stage and dac, $5k each, I think, that was reasonable if you wanted excellent solid state one box piece of equipment. Now it is all madness, prices getting out of control.
 

@inna Yes the successor 333 is twice the price of the D300. It is slightly better but not enough of an improvement to justify the cost. Imo.