Jmacinnis, The issue here is how the amp will drive the speaker if it has no feedback. This article will explain what is going on:
http://www.atma-sphere.com/Resources/Paradigms_in_Amplifier_Design.php
IMO/IME amplifiers that operate without feedback are more musical as they make less odd ordered harmonic distortion. Since our ears use odd ordered harmonics to figure out how loud a sound is, this is arguably one of the more important human hearing rules! The use of feedback violates this rule.
However the audio industry does not like to talk about this, and is something that separates the high end audio community from everything else; we talk about it occasionally instead of never :)
Ultimately you have to be more careful of your speaker choice; this is doubly important because a speaker that requires the amp to have feedback will never be able to sound like real music- it will at best sound like a good hifi.
http://www.atma-sphere.com/Resources/Paradigms_in_Amplifier_Design.php
IMO/IME amplifiers that operate without feedback are more musical as they make less odd ordered harmonic distortion. Since our ears use odd ordered harmonics to figure out how loud a sound is, this is arguably one of the more important human hearing rules! The use of feedback violates this rule.
However the audio industry does not like to talk about this, and is something that separates the high end audio community from everything else; we talk about it occasionally instead of never :)
Ultimately you have to be more careful of your speaker choice; this is doubly important because a speaker that requires the amp to have feedback will never be able to sound like real music- it will at best sound like a good hifi.