Ultimate Amplifier for the next 20 Years


Hello all!
Well, you I am again on the amplifier merry-go-round after my last digital amp(noname mentioned!) let me down in the dumps after a comparison with a Halo A21 amp. I had a keen ear friend who reviews for Stereo Times and he felt the same. Musical instruments more real sounding with better decay. Man was I surprised after thinking that the digital amp was my last! BTW, the most important part, my speakers are a pair of Apogee Studio Grands in beautiful piano black!! Now the digital amp is on subwoofers in which it has ALOT of punch! The perfect(but not cheap) subwoofer amp! High damping factor, runs cool, dual posts to run four(4) subs if you choose to and never runs out of juice!!

Anyway, I want to keep it under $5000 used or new. Prefer 2 channel amp and maybe monoblocks. Amp can't run too hot(very important)! My pre/pro is a Lexicon MC12B.
Here are my amps that I'm considering in order:

Classe CA2200- Runs class A up to 60 watts! Right now I have a dealer making me a killer offer. Probably the one I'm going to buy...

McCormack DNA500- My big second choose!

Theta Dreadnaught II- Since I have a 8.4 sound system but don't need alot of power for the other speakers, this would be the perfect multichannel amp for me(remember the .4 is powered by my digital amp). One BIG problem, it runs tooo freakin’ hot!

NuForce 9.2- Hearing great things.

Krell FBC300Cx- Jason Bloom ran only krell amps with Apogees.

Please add your thoughts on any comparison on these amps or a new one that you think are superior. I want this to be my last amp purchase for a long time! Right.... ; )

THANK YOU FOR ANY HELP ON THIS MATTER!!!
Best,
Paul
ptheo
Warnerwh-thanks for the reply. I have actually have owned in the past both the RM40's & Innersound amp. The only reason I sold the speakers is the Apogee's! Regarding the amp I bought it when I had a pair of Siverline speakers. It sounded to dry and not enough body with them, so I sold it. Coda does make great amp though plus they are located about 5 miles from me! I have read that there class-A amps run hot. The new Classe Delta amp seem to be the ultimate:

http://www.soundstage.com/revequip/classe_ca2200.htm
http://www.classeaudio.com/reviews/reviews-pdfs/DeltaSeries-TheAbsoluteSound-July05.pdf
http://www.stereotimes.com/amp051205.shtm
Hi Ptheo -

True Class A at 60 watts per channel is defintely not cool-running. Are you serious about needing a cool-running amp? If so, may I be so bold as to suggest that the best deal in the world on a product that does't meet your requirements may not be such a good deal after all.

Warnerwh's suggestion of the InnerSound ESL amp is an excellent one. That's a killer little amp, stable into a .3 (that's "point three") ohm load as I recall. I used to sell them, and have one customer who used InnerSounds on Apogees and several who used them on Sound Labs (a different but still difficult load). You might even stumble across a pair of ESL 600's or Kilowatts, either of which are very very powerful amps.

I'm a dealer for Nuforce, but wouldn't be confident in recommending a NuForce to drive Apogees. You can try it and it might work, but if possible arrange to have the option of returning the amps if they don't work.

I'm also a dealer for Jeff Rowland. The 501 is a very powerful cool-running amp, but doesn't like very low impedance loads (below 2 ohms). I mention this in case you were leaning in their direction, as my experience would suggest you look elsewhere.

An amplifier that I'd be confident hooking up to the Apogees is the Parasound JC-1. In low bias setting, the first 10 watts is Class A (25 watts in high bias setting), so while I wouldn't characterize them as "cool-running", they're a heck of a lot cooler running than the Classe'. I have used JC-1's for years on hard-to-drive speakers. My impression is that the larger InnerSound amps are more powerful, but at least compared with the InnerSounds I'm familiar with (mentioned above) the JC-1 is a better sounding amp. But like I said, I wouldn't call it "cool running", except in comparison to something that really runs hot.

Best of luck to you.

Duke
I'm also using a pair of Apogee Studio Grands. They are really a great pair of speakers. The good news is that the Studio Grand ribbons are a pretty benign load. They come in around 6 mostly resistive ohms with little variation across the audible spectrum. They are very different from the early Apogee models such as the Full Range or Scintilla with 1 ohm impedances.

That gives you a wide choice of amps to drive them with. I'm using a pair of Pass Aleph 1.2s which sound great on the panels, but definitely violate your low heat requirement. You might consider some of the Pass X series - they sound pretty good and run pretty cool. Even tubes should work if you're so inclined.
Put some tubes on those Apogees, I'm running my Duetta Signatures with Rogue Audio monos for around a month now. Let the digital amps do the subs.

Dave