Experience on B&W N800 with Tube Amplifier

You might try Audio Research 600 or another high powered amp.

hi
I own the 800D and recently added an BW 855 sub. When I did so I thought I no longer need to use ss mono for I have enough bass now. So I tried a pair of Cary 211 Anniversary tube mono, 110W/channel. To my surprise, these amps drove my speakers in many ways better than any ss amps I had tried. The bass was not as good as my ss amps but the mids and highs were much more life like. For myself this is worth switching to tubes, and I also got more resolution and a bigger soundstage.
So if you are a tube guy then I think you should demo your speakers w/ some tube amps. Have fun.
Nick

Thank you rlwainwright for your your feedback.
I think it is not always a good idea to classify a 25w SET amp having a DF of 6 vs a 200w push/pull with a DF of 20. So not all tube amps are the same. But my topic was not to say anything regarding tubes vs SS, or which one is better. To my taste, it is better to use powerful push/pull tube amps with my B&W N800 and I am looking for advice who currently drives 800 with tubes, that is it.
I think biamping with two different amps with different speeds and characters might have a negative impact on the musicality and tonal balance, so one should be careful to match.

Nickt,
Thank you very much, I am arranging a demo with a pair of Cary amps as you suggested, will try. By the way, currently, I use an ARC VT-200. I also tried some SS amps, although I admit they improved the dynamics and impact, midrange clarity, musicality ans sounstage was missing to my taste, so I always kept my VT-200. However, I want to ugrade to mono amps, so I am looking for some alternatives. Thank you for your advice again.

I suggest the CAT tube amps for driving hard-to-drive speakers. Other high powered tube amps that sound good and have the kind of output transformers and power supplies required to drive such speakers include the big Audio Valve Challengers, the Air Tight Reference and the better VAC amps. Audio Research's reference amps will work, but I think they sound like crap in most systems because of the amount of negative feedback they use (they also produce a ton of heat). The big VTL's are too primitive (parts quality, not to mention lousy output trannies -- they are way less powerful than they ought to be), but VTL's new Siegfried is the real deal. The Sonic Frontiers Power 3's will work if you want to do it on the cheap. Just my opinions, folks.

Because of the very high cost of the above-mentionned tube amps, I suggest that you stick with high powered classic Rowland (Model 8, Model 9) or other solid-state amps known to work well with B&W.