RB1080 for 803D?


My current system consists of B&W 683's driven by Rotel RB1080 amp. Considering upgrading to the 803D's. Is the rotel enough amp to drive 803D's? Any first hand experience is greatly appreciated.
foster8699
I currently own the 803D. Sorry, I have no experience with Rotel amp, but I have found that you don't need heaps of power to drive the 803D to very high levels. This is based on my experience with using a pair of Marantz SM17SA (60W per channel) over a year. I briefly tried the Marantz SM11S1 which has an accurate power meter - 99% of my listening was less than 5W!!! The highest power that I noted was for the occassional rock - 45W! I have recently upgraded to a pair of Cambridge Audio 840W that are very smooth and detailed. They are rated at 200W per channel, but again it is the quality, not quantity that counts.
The diamond tweeter is extremely revealing, the Rotel will stand out with speakers of this caliber.

Purely my suggestion, and of course I don't know your budget, but any vintage of Classe Audio amp would be a vast improvement over the Rotel.
While Rjhalla is right your Rotel is more than enough to get the speakers playing great. Get the speakers... think about amps later. The speakers are 90% of the equation.

I have auditioned both the 803D and 802D on the RB 1080 back to back with Classe' CA-2200 (200 watt amp), in the same room same wires... The 1080 was more than enough to get both sets of speakers moving (I listened at 80db) and sounded pretty good (I would have been happy with the combo). The classe' brought more punch to the bass (slam). Maybe a little more openness to the midrange. I did not notice any difference in the highs (bad source?) I am 27 years old with good hearing (check every 6 months at work...).