One other thing to consider:
With many manufacturers, in a line of variably-priced items (in this case, amplifiers), as the designers have more money to work with, they often times put higher quality or performance in the higher priced items. With power amps, the high powered ones, which command a higher price sometimes have better performance or features.
Back in the day (over 30 years ago), I'd say that many of the then high-powered amps did not sound that good at much lower power levels. But I think that's a thing of the past. I suspect that most "class a/b" amps today run in "class a" up to a watt or two; if you have efficient speakers, might be listening in "class a" much of the time.
With many manufacturers, in a line of variably-priced items (in this case, amplifiers), as the designers have more money to work with, they often times put higher quality or performance in the higher priced items. With power amps, the high powered ones, which command a higher price sometimes have better performance or features.
Back in the day (over 30 years ago), I'd say that many of the then high-powered amps did not sound that good at much lower power levels. But I think that's a thing of the past. I suspect that most "class a/b" amps today run in "class a" up to a watt or two; if you have efficient speakers, might be listening in "class a" much of the time.