2. amps-preamps
  3. 181457-176871

Pure Class-A Amp under $2000 (USED)

Hello everyone,

There are so many brands out there that I couldn't catch up with, so I opened a thread about Class-A Amp for discussion. My budget is around $2000 for a Stereo Amplifier (No need for Pre), could you guys help me to suggest me some?

- DAC: Exogal Comet

- Pre/Amp: Yamaha Intergrated A-9 (My current, but want to update)

- Speaker: Sonus Faber Venere 2.0

- Cable: Acrolink (Power, Interconnect, Speaker)

=> I think the wattage range between 30-60WPC for Class-A is powerful and popular. The production date of amplifier should not too old, I think after 199x is nice.

darkknight8586

Showing 1 response by helomech

helomech
1,769 posts
 

Most “class A” amps are not “pure class A” because they are extremely inefficient and get very hot, even with massive heatsinks. They are basically space heaters. 
 

Even amps like the Pass XA25 (50 watt class A envelope) are not pure Class A for this reason. 
 

Also, it’s my experience that even high efficiency speakers can really benefit from the headroom afforded by higher power, >100WPC amplifiers. It isn’t so evident in a vacuum of course, but power a 90db sensitivity speaker with 50 WPC, then power it with 250 WPC and this truth becomes very evident, especially at lower volumes. Just food for thought. In many cases one is better off using an amp that is heavily biased into class A, for a dozen watts or so. 

More to discover