Also keep in mind that no 2 companies rate power the same way. If you took a bunch of amps all rated at the same amount of power and measured them all the same way, there's almost a 0 chance that 2 or more would put out the same amount of power. Sometimes the difference is small, but in many cases, the difference can be huge.
integrated watts or amp watts
Most "Stereophile recommended" integrated amps only have a rating of about 50-70 watts (creek, exposure, croft, arcam). Others like the Anthem and NAD have more, but separates (amp+pre-amp) seem to have more watts. I was told that for a budget of $1500 for this, I'd get the best bang for the buck with integrated vs seperates. The question I have is 2 fold..
1) Does Stereophile only "recommend" these lower powered integrateds because they're the ones with phono stages (which I don't care about)?
2) To have a really dynamic accurate loud system do I need gobs of power assuming the speaker is in the avg. 8ohm range with avg. 91db efficiency (not an electrostat, etc)
How much money do I need to spend? Is a 70 watt integrated only good for a small bedroom system, and separates needed to rock towers and the whole house? Just curious.
1) Does Stereophile only "recommend" these lower powered integrateds because they're the ones with phono stages (which I don't care about)?
2) To have a really dynamic accurate loud system do I need gobs of power assuming the speaker is in the avg. 8ohm range with avg. 91db efficiency (not an electrostat, etc)
How much money do I need to spend? Is a 70 watt integrated only good for a small bedroom system, and separates needed to rock towers and the whole house? Just curious.