Thiel 7.2 - Classe, Krell or Bryston?

Hi pops,

I bought my DR-25 new but had coveted the older DR-9 for years afterward with all of the positive press re: it being the sweet spot among all A/B amps of the time.

About 18 months ago, I saw three for sale @ $1000 each and scooped them all up. Haven’t seen another for sale since. The positive press of the day was true and a reminder that power specs don't rule in audio.

I could be accused of living in the past, but I don’t see anything significantly "new under the sun" re: SS A/B amplifier technology since.

Dave

Kevinaudio, I haven’t heard the Classe pre you are using but have read good things about it.  I also have used Thiels 3.6 and CS6 for many years.  I have always used a tube linestage which added a little midrange “heft” for Thiels.  Have you considered that?  I believe your input impedance is high enough on the Classe to make it versatile with various tube preamps.

Dave, I saw those amps!  I considered grabbing one myself!  My Classe is easier to drive in terms of gain than my Mcintosh mono’s at 10K.  I am living in the past a bit myself with CJ/Classe/Thiel/Meridian.  The only components I have kept consistently updating is my analog front end - has kept me plenty busy!  Why mess with success?

pops
I have the serious listening and home theater system combined. I used to have a nice BAT tubeamp and my theater processor hooked up together (L and R through the BAT) it created too many problems with 2 preamps and also watching tv put a lot of hours on the tubes.

I scraped that approach and researched the best I could find that would work for HT and 2 channel analog and came up with the Classe ssp-800. 

If I ever go to two separate systems I think I would use the manley steelhead as the preamp - any suggestions on reasonable priced speaker cables for the Bryston and Thiel 7.2. I bought the Bryston balanced interconnects to try instead of my RCA Nordost Quatrofils.

Speaker cables - I use Straightwire Maestro II.  I have run the gambit on speaker cables and found the SW's to be the most balanced in terms of clarity, transparency, and tone top to bottom.

Kevinaudio

Have you made up your mind yet? Which direction did you go?