mono versus stereo ampflication

If you give an audio engineer $3000.00 and ask him to build a stereo amp and then ask him to build mono blocks of the same design, most of the money will be spent on the TWO chassis and the extra power cord, etc.etc. etc. when building the mono's, so actually you can afford to put better parts in a stereo amp. Hope that made sense?

I think that there are far too many variables involved to be able to generalize as to whether monoblocks or single-chassis designs will be better.

Gammajo, it sounds like you need lots of power. What is the max power rating of your speakers, and would you want to future proof your selection by making it powerful enough for possible speaker upgrades in the future that might be able to handle more power?

I have no particular experience with amplifiers in your price and power range, but based on what I've read I'd certainly look at the offerings from Pass Labs, Plinius, and possibly Ayre if their lower priced models provide enough power.

Regards,
-- Al

If I had monoblocks I'd put each near its speaker thus reducing the need for exotic speaker cabling. Even if you still thought that necessary the cable runs would be as cheap as possible. On the downside in such a scenario I'd want the monoblocks fully balanced so to use XLR cables on the longer interconnect runs.

Usually the builder offers mono amps as the very top offering in the line. Usually they DO offer the best parts and represent the very best effort of that builder - if offered.

I know that the power supply in my mono amps will not fit into the stereo version. That is just one example.

So contrary to the rather strong comment above, mono amps are often times the best effort available by a given company. The extra chassis does cost more and that is but one reason mono amps do cost more. Seems rather a simple question to me.

If it is just a matter of all the same parts in one amp vs splitting them up into two, then the improvement would come from better isolation of parts, less crosstalk etc.
But again, usually you get double the power supply and we all know that is where LOTS of an amp's improvement can come from.

These thoughts have been mentioned, but- I'd like to agree: Having two separate power supplies, and being able to place the amps much closer to the speakers(shorter cables) are two big advantages to using mono blocks. One would only need balanced interconnects if the system were in a high RFI/EMI environment, and then only if the interconnects needed to be fairly long.