Axiom Home Page Forums General Discussion Home Theater Amplifier choices, I want your opinions

Mark - Since you will be using a Yamaha as a pre-amp I would avoid Parasound, and Adcom since they emphasize the "grain" on the top end on Yammies. Sunfire is an excellent choice along with the ATI mentioned, and I'll throw in B&K to boot for it's warm tube like sound. I'm currently running 7 B&K Reference 220M's in my theater, but also have a 2220, and a pair of ST 125.3's. Matched up with the M60, VP150, and QS4's it is a huge leap from any receiver I have heard. Be sure though to audition any amp from a reputable dealer in your theater first since that will be the only way for sure you will know what to go with.

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Are you really sure you need 300W/per channel even? That is a TON of power.

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There are times when one may actually need that sort of power. I run Magnepan speakers which are planer speakers which are rated at 4ohms and at 86db sensitivity. I power them with a Bryston 4B amp which is 250w at 8 ohms and 500w at 4ohms. Last night I was listening to the Dallas Wind Symphony Orchestra at loud level...not screaming levels in a 16x11 room(not big at all) and the Bryston red clipping light went on about 3 times during certain passages. Right now I could use one of those 300w per channel or more.

Saturn

I can't imagine needing an amp. The 2400 puts out 120 watts/channel. Of course it's debatable how much it can continuously put out on all channels simultaneously.

However Axiom speakers are quite efficient. The M80s are 91db (anechoic) and 95db (in room). As others said, anybody who has used a receiver/amp with power meters on fairly efficient speakers can testify the needles hardly budge off the pegs, except under extreme conditions.

Years ago I had an old Sansui 8080 receiver with front panel power meters. It drove efficient Pioneer HPM-100 speakers (bass reflex design). 0.05 watts was listenable, 0.1 watts was loud, 1 watt was extremely loud. Over 5 watts was punishing -- entire room would shake, and you could hear it outside two houses away.

If you want to make a real difference you'll hear, put your money into a nice SACD/DVD-A player and invest in high quality multichannel material. E.g. whether anybody can hear amp differences in a controlled double-blind test is often debated. But anybody can hear the difference between a stereo CD of Pink Floyd Dark Side of the Moon, and the 5.1 SACD version played on your system. The difference is simply vast, and likely not simply because of the high resolution sample rate. Rather doing a quality re-mix, quality transfer and going from 2 channels to surround makes the difference, at least when properly done on fitting material. You've described a nice system; I'd suggest getting material that fully utilizes it.

Likewise room acoustics can make a big difference. For the money you'd spend on amps you could do some acoustic treatment. Depending on your room, this could make a profound difference.

If you already have good room acoustics and lots of quality multichannel material, I guess you could get the amps if you like them.