From McIntosh to Yamaha

Interesting!  I recently purchased a McIntosh MX119 as I rebuild to a McIntosh system I had a few years back.  I'm replacing a Pioneer Elite SC25 Receiver that sounded pretty damn good playing a pair of Legacy Focus 2020's (circa '03) with a Sony 300 multidisc cd changer. 

Your story has me thinking now. I guess I will find out when I get amps to go with the MX119 and a better cd player.

You should try a PROPER 2-channel amp from Yamaha, Luxman or Accuphase. You may be surprised that some of these integrateds especially the higher range models can match or surpass the performance of costlier pre/power from other amp manufacturers.

Which speaker connections are you using on the MC202? 4ohm? Your speakers show 4ohm,3ohm minimum. Maybe that might be an issue?

I had them in the 4ohm terminal i never thought to play around with that.

my end goal is to find a system where I can listen to singer songwriter, jazz and standards enjoying the depth and all the bells and whistles of a great system BUT at the same time I wanna blast RUSH or Zeppelin without popping tweeters.  Which I have done many times with the Thiels.  I have been toying with just adding another pair of speakers say bookselves that can crank, many a used vintage pair of something or other not hung up on brand just want to be able to play the music loud with lots of dynamic's.  But in the end it looks like I do need to sell my McIntosh which really sux.  Damn COVID!!!!