Why the facination with integrated amps?

bac2vinyl we are a Parasound dealer and the A21 is an excellent amplifier for its price, howerver, a $6k Coda intergrated sounds far superior, then the A21 with the P5  preamp, which would be a $3,500 package, as we demoed that combination vs the Coda CS 1b, and the Hegel and Luxman Integrateds  we had at the time and those pieces, still sounded clearer, just because you have a heavy weight product it has nothing to do with sound quality. 

The A21 and 21+ will deliver a lot of clean power for the price point the higher end gear is more expensive due to parts quality, a Coda CS 1b uses a 3kv tranfomer, vs a 1.2vk transformer in the A21+, that is just one reason why it sounds better. 

Josephep, congratuations on the T+A PA 3000 HV it is an extraordinary integrated amplifier, love to know the rest of your system?

Dave and Troy
Audio Doctor NJ 

audiotroy I really like your take!  I started out with receivers, Pioneer, Technics and Onkyo then went to the NAD 3020 integrated when it first came out and really though it was pretty darn good. After that I wanted to try the seperates route. I had Adcom, Cary SLA-80 w/ Audible Illusions Modulus preamp and Blue Circle. pretty nice stuff but still had that hankering for a good integrated and I've been "integrated" since. I've had an Audiomat Arpege, C.R. Developments Kalypso then a step up to C.R.'s Romulus. I then went to SS and tried a Sonneteer Campion which I still have but wanted more power and now have a Primare i30 which is very good match to my speakers so I'm pretty pleased these days.

Here’s my phisological take on this.
Esoteric F03-A

After 35 years in this hobby, I never thought an integrated could sonically match (and exceed) a stack of reference tube electronics that it replaced in my system. This is a feat that would never have been possible for any integrated 10 years ago. 
I have been so impressed that I have no desire to go back to separates. Not in my lifetime!!

Full disclosure....Speakers are Verity Audio Parsifal Anniversary although the Amadis S would mate a little better with this amp but hey, you can’t have everything.

Just the perspective of someone who struggles with the design trade-offs, both technical and the big one **COST**.
The unsaid part here is that everything is a compromise of what we want to do, against what we can afford to do - in design, mechanical, parts quality and quantity, etc. I think the original poster, who was assailed for having a "technical" perspective was simply aware of some of these trade offs that in the end, limit sound-for-dollar. I mostly agree with them. No matter either way.

An integrated amp reduces spend on several very costly parts that don’t contribute directly (yes indirectly) to sound quality - chiefly among them one chassis vs two. The big ticket items in almost anything are the chassis, heat sinks, transformer, and trim. Electronics are fairly modest. Heck, the packaging (cardboard box, etc.) often costs more than the circuitry itself. And you cut that in half too.

So the cost can come down faster than the quality.
There are issues with integrated amps, some noted above, but what has not been noted is that with some effort and money they can be overcome. Chief among them is the power supply compromise. I’ve done a couple of integrated designs, one as a contract, and i simply did not make that compromise - easy as that. Spend the money, build multiple idealized supplies. QED.

So the theme is valid - reduce cost, hopefully with a less-than-proportional reduction in sound quality. What will be lost?:

• -- flexibility to have different power levels or to change them
• -- chassis isolation of the low level from high level circuitry (a big deal IMNSHO)
• -- flexibility to locate amps near speakers and pre-amps near the listener (another biggie to me)
• -- stuff i wont go into.

At the end of the day most people would be well served by a truly great 30W integrated. More money could be then spent on DACs/timing/speakers/vinyl reproducers where the differences are larger and the laws of physics sometimes conspire to make bigger better.

In fact I just slapped my own circuitry in a vintage integrated chassis from [fill-in high quality 1970’s Japanese manufacturer here] for my bedroom. And yep, i built three power supplies and somehow wedged them in :-)
G