does more power=better quality ?

Assuming relatively sensitive speakers with a fairly benign impedence, my experience is that lower-powered amps tend to sound better, as there are fewer output devices to muck up the signal. More output transistors or output tubes means more circuitry and more transistor rush / more tube rush -- this can be very audible in a revealing system (in the form of lost transparency and detail). This is one of the advantages of simple single-ended amps, which tend to have one (and maximum of two) output devices.

While the comparison is obviously very inexact and there were a lot of factors at play, a friend and I once spent several hours listening to a wide range of music on a potent $200K Krell / JM Labs Grande Utopia system at Singer. We then went into a smaller room and listened to a VAC Renaissance 30/30 (32 watts/channel) power a pair of Meadowlark Blue Herons. The VAC / Meadowlark system embarrassed the Krell / JM Labs system -- we just sat there looking at each other, shaking our heads.

Output transistors run in parallel need to be trimmed to work properly, and they are now up to trying lasers to get this right (Edge), which they really can't. If output tubes are used, they have to be properly biased (or self-biasing), and they are often not at peak bias in practice, thus introducing hum and other discontinuities into the sound.

The more output devices you have, the more collective residual noise you have. This becomes an issue with a system that features highly revealing upstream components, top cabling and top speakers, all fed by a well designed A/C power supply and set up carefully in a good room. Extra output devices are simply not needed if you have the ability to buy sensitive speakers with a benign load impedence. In addition, the more output devices there are, the more one is likely to fail (output tubes are generally easy to replace, but output transistors in well-known SS amps as young as ten years old have been known to go out of production, making the amp a door stop).

I qualified the Singer anecdote thoroughly -- read what I wrote again.

While a monster amp is desirable with inefficient speakers, this is just not the way to go in my opinion -- partnering sensitive, easy to drive speakers with an amp that uses a simple circuit featuring a minimum number of output devices and the very highest quality parts will yield superior sound. High-powered amps have a use -- digital home theater systems, where maximum dinosaur stomping seems to be the goal -- they are a poor choice, in my opinion, in high-end, two-channel analog-based systems. In short, I stand by what I wrote.

PS - My amps run 300B's -- now that's a linear amplifying device.

morbius@attbi.com: My friend, what to do with you.

Cdc: Fair question. I meant to write "match", not "trim". Sorry.

morbius:

A last point ... the experience at Singer was anything but worthless, and I'll give you the benefit of the doubt and assume that you are being handicapped by misplaced reliance on the scientific method in thinking that only a direct A/B comparison between amps on exactly the same system in exactly the same room is valid. Those amps were not designed to be used in the same room and with the same equipment, much as your example of Maggie power requirements illustrates. Further, each amp will favor different types/brands of cabling, making their use with the same cabling an error. One is a Class-A biased triode design feeding speakers through an output transformer, the Krell monos being solid-state designs that are probably Class A up to a point and AB thereafter. Fortunately, Andy Singer is not a physicist, but a hi-fi man, and in recognition of these differences, the amps were set up in different rooms in different systems, to live or die on their own merits. In short, the only worthless comparison would be a direct A/B in the same system -- it would tell us nothing.

PS - Why do I picture you wearing one white sock and one brown sock? Your thoughts about about automobiles, televisions, ice cream, proper comparisons, 300B's, and absolutism were unsolicited and are worthless to me (and I don't need upper-case font like you do to make my points -- how presumptuous to think that I would allow you to address me that way -- how obnoxious you are).

Please don't lecture me on room acoustics. Singer is a good shop and
has its rooms professionally treated in an attempt to smooth out modes
(they also do not put any top-shelf equipment in the square rooms).
While this will almost never take the rooms out of the equation, the
systems to which I refer were set up properly in treated rooms.

My comments about socks had nothing to do with prejudice, which
basically means prejudgment before seeing the facts. They were post-
judgments made after reading your ill-reasoned (not to mention
pompous) comments. Go away.

Nb: My apologies to the author of this thread for where our comments
went (this fellow was really asking for it).

As I wrote, I know the room cannot be taken out of the equation.

In any event, your response was not conclusory and was respectful this time, and I am not a scientist, so I won't be debating you on room modes (if I could only get rid of mine). That said, I continue to question the worth of your viewpoint for the reasons stated in my prior comments, and direct you to John Atkinson's pg. 1 editorial in this month's (July 2005) edition of Stereophile, which, although not this precise issue, touches on the issue of blind testing and its relevance to demo'ing hi-fi gear.

I take this opportunity to return to my original point, to wit, my experience has very much been that lowered-powered amps, assuming reasonably sensitive speakers, tend to sound cleaner and more life-like than mega amps. This is the result of having heard and owned a lot of equipment since 1977.

Morbius:

As for blanket statements, I wrote "my experience has very much been that lowered-powered amps, assuming reasonably sensitive speakers, tend to sound cleaner and more life-like than mega amps." The words "tend to sound cleaner" prevent this from being a blanket statement, assuming a minimal understanding of the English language.

PS - Unlike you, I do not provide my name and profession when posting on public Internet forums, but I will give you a clue as to my profession and say that, should you ever be offered a chance to provide expert testimony in litigation, be it in a matter involving your specialty, hi-fi or anything else, you will definitely want to pass.

I am now out of this insipid exchange.