Is 50 wpc SS NAD enough to power Spendor SP1?

Good to go. No prob.

The Germans have a great word for that.......jain. Yes and no. Drive yes, will you fall in love with the sound, no. These speakers really like very heavy stable current. You throw something really solid behind them and they wake up and show you the micro dynamics and imaging. Otherwise, un-involving comparatively.

Find some really good power and be happier.

Celtic66 nailed it.

To do your Spendors justice, look to a better integrated amp.

For example the last two audio expos I attended had Spendor speakers driven by EXPOSURE electronics and VDH cables .

The EXPOSURE integrated amp will smoke the NAD. I've personally owned the C370 in a prior "B" sytem and know its signature sound, warts and all.

+ 1 to the Celtic66 prompt to look elsewhere.

I owned SP!'s for a long time. You really need a minimum of 100 watts/ch of high quality amp to do them justice.

Neal

SP1 will just work fine. NAD has soft clipping so it can potentially perform as more powerful amp.
None can assume weather you'll like the sound or not till you will try it and see for yourself. It's not hard to sell amp for upgrade when the mean time passes by.

might work fine but they'll never reach there full potential.

I never want to run nothing "less" than 125 watts a side...quality power really is noticeable.

if these are rated at 87db i would think you need more juice, in whatever brand you choose. obviously nad is more affordable so perhaps a larger nad would do.

Show of hands: How many in this thread dissing the NAD have actually
heard NAD's current BBE line of integrated amps? High current? Fie, they
can go all day into 4 ohms. Also, NAD amp designs are all about the
headroom, so whatever their power rating, their ability to hit clean peaks will
make them sound more powerful than their RMS ratings.

I auditioned my Maggie 1.7s driven by the 150 wpc C 375BEE and it made
them sing. I had a bit of tweaking and swapping with my gear at home to
match the resolution I got at the demo. It eventually took a handwired line
stage feeding a vintage Perreaux.

I recently installed the 80 wpc C 356BEE in my neighbor's system, replacing
a Cambridge 640 integrated, and the sound was so luscious and dimensional
the owner could tell the difference from his upstairs office and came running
down the stairs to see what happened.

The Spendors are rated at 88dB at 1w input. In many cases, the power
required is going to depend on room size. Since you like NAD (for good
reason) but worry about power delivery, why not bump up to the C 356BEE
at 80 wpc? It's about $250 more but worth it for the bump in power and
resolution. It's an Absolute Sound Editor's Choice, and I can definitely see
why. It's a real sleeper among affordable integrateds.

I'll take that Johnny...I owned various nad amps and i liked most of them. My point is simply that an 87 db speaker and a 50 watt amp is not the greatest match out of the gate. Thats why i recommended the same approach as you, up the power of the nad.

All depends on room and how loud one listens... Personally I think the Nad would be sufficient in terms of power...most Spendour owners are not Hi volume rocker folks...however... The Type of sound seems to be in question...but try but that wasn't the original question... Fwiw... I have had several Nad integrated S over the years...they are known driving 4 ohm loads and deep "reserve power"... Don't let the 50 wpc spec fool you

+1 phasecorrect. i briefly owned the sp 1/2s and 2/3s and never found 'em particularly hard to drive (they're 8ohm nominal); nad if nothing else can drive challenging loads easily despite their very conservative power ratings. i personally don't buy nad anymore because of bad luck with reliability, but they sound good and oomph was never a problem.