NHT 2.9s - what amp is for me w/small/med budget?

I have the 2.9's and use a Bryston 4BST and it sounds great.

I owned NHT 2.9 speakers for several years and had good success driving them with a Classe 70 so I know you don't need enormous power. Try to find a Plinius integrated. I bet you can cover your needs for under $1200. No need to mess with bi-amping or even a separate preamp.

i used to own a pair of 2.9's years ago. they were on the bright side so i matched them with the macintosh ma-6500 integrated amp with the sa-3 sub amp. nice combination for a small medium room. i would only use the sa-3 amp if you have a small room so you can adjust the bass seperately. since the 2.9 need a lot of power to get them to sound their best, this doesn't work in a small room. in a small room, you can adjust the bass so you cn hear it even if you have a low volume on your preamp. if you don't want to biamp the speakers, look for the classe cap-151, macintosh ma-6900, or a used dk design mk II. any 1 of these will have the power to control the lower octaves. IMO, i would not use a 50 watt integrated with these speakers (unless you biamp with 150 watt monoblocks for the woofers), not enough power. the ma-6500 with 100 watts was not enough and i had a small room.
good luck

I have a set of the 2.5's also. Audio Refinement Complete, Little Creek & Music Hall, I'm not familiar with but will look into. I've hear of the Jolida's - but they might be stregthing the budget a little far. Thanks.

Affording bigger Pass amps is not easy. But they sure do sound good. :-)

I have the 2.5i's and have found that a quality 50 watt integrated bested a 140 watt bi-amp configuration. Audition an Audio Refinement Complete if you get the chance. A little Creek or Music Hall may also work well. At low volumes an inexpensive tube amp from Jolida sounds wonderful. If you have a little bigger budget try a YBA integrated.

If you want to bi-amp you need no special active crossover or anything. All of that is built into the crossover of the speaker.

Good luck!

Haven't heard the Rotel RB-991, but will look into that. Power sounds plenty for the NHTs. Thanks.

Correct budgets are relative - I would like to see if I can find an amp for under 2K. Then I would still need to get a pre-amp. But I do like the idea of biamping. I think these speakers would benefit from that. They seem to be power hungry. Thanks.

Thanks - I like the idea of biamping. hmm, i'll look into the SA3, which I'm not familiar with. I guess though with the biamping you need to get some sort of control for the bass and treble. I'll have to investigate how that is best done.

Get a Rotel RB-991 or the newer RB-1080. Each has 200 watts per side. These will drive them quite well and they are alot of amp for the dollar.

Budgets are relative. Can you give us a dollar amount?

I really recommend biamping these speakers using the NHT SA3 bass amp for the bass (it has a volume pot so it is easily integrated with another amp) and then a sweeter amp like the Pass Aleph 30 for the mids and highs... Using the SA3 gives you a lot more opportunity to play with lower powered amps.
The SA3 is no longer in production, but can be found here or on eBay (you could also use a pair of SA2 instead; these are more common).
Good luck

Sounds like you just have to find a bigger Pass amp that you can afford. Aleph monos would be ideal.