I'll give you my experience with my 30.2s from a decent amount of experimentation mixing and matching from different systems in my house, FWIW:
Audio Research REF 40 (pre) + REF 75 (stereo amp) was OK. Not great. Too much of an understated sound for my tastes, even though I adore that ARC gear on lots of other speakers. Needed real volume to unfold and bloom.
NAD M33 was noticeably punchier and, for the first few days, I liked it better. But there is something that bothers me about this amp, on any speaker. Hard to nail it exactly, but there is a certain unnaturalness, or artifice, to that amp. And the Harbeth's do not mask anything, so it bothered me most of all with the 30.2s. I now have it connected to the much more romantic NOLA Contender 2, and that's a better -- albeit imperfect -- pairing.
Prima Luna HP Premium Dialogue integrated was OK. Occasionally hard and bitey. And with some glare. Especially with KT150s.
D'Agostino Progression integrated -- match made in heaven. Love it. Been riding this combo the longest. All the usual platitudes, which I'll spare you for now.
From that very limited sample, I might agree with the comment about favoring SS over tubes. Even though the 30.2s stay in the 6 ohm range most of the time and have no big dips, for some reason they seem to get more expressive with more current. But making sweeping conclusions based on hearing approx .02% of the world's amp offerings is always kinda dumb. What I am more comfortable saying is that I'm not surprised so many reviewers use Harbeth in their reference systems; they really tell you what's upstream. A really impressive speaker. If you actually want to hear differences between cables, cartridges, DACs, etc, use those speakers. But unfortunately, I think that means one needs to try quite a few amps to nail the particular sound you're looking for. (On that note, I suspect what Mr Shaw's real position on amps is not that they all will sound equally GOOD, but that the Harbeth's will be equally REVEALING of most amp's personality. Two very different propositions.)
Audio Research REF 40 (pre) + REF 75 (stereo amp) was OK. Not great. Too much of an understated sound for my tastes, even though I adore that ARC gear on lots of other speakers. Needed real volume to unfold and bloom.
NAD M33 was noticeably punchier and, for the first few days, I liked it better. But there is something that bothers me about this amp, on any speaker. Hard to nail it exactly, but there is a certain unnaturalness, or artifice, to that amp. And the Harbeth's do not mask anything, so it bothered me most of all with the 30.2s. I now have it connected to the much more romantic NOLA Contender 2, and that's a better -- albeit imperfect -- pairing.
Prima Luna HP Premium Dialogue integrated was OK. Occasionally hard and bitey. And with some glare. Especially with KT150s.
D'Agostino Progression integrated -- match made in heaven. Love it. Been riding this combo the longest. All the usual platitudes, which I'll spare you for now.
From that very limited sample, I might agree with the comment about favoring SS over tubes. Even though the 30.2s stay in the 6 ohm range most of the time and have no big dips, for some reason they seem to get more expressive with more current. But making sweeping conclusions based on hearing approx .02% of the world's amp offerings is always kinda dumb. What I am more comfortable saying is that I'm not surprised so many reviewers use Harbeth in their reference systems; they really tell you what's upstream. A really impressive speaker. If you actually want to hear differences between cables, cartridges, DACs, etc, use those speakers. But unfortunately, I think that means one needs to try quite a few amps to nail the particular sound you're looking for. (On that note, I suspect what Mr Shaw's real position on amps is not that they all will sound equally GOOD, but that the Harbeth's will be equally REVEALING of most amp's personality. Two very different propositions.)