B W Nautilus 802 - How much power?


I have been told that the 802's require a lot of power.
I have an Audio Research D300 (solid state) - 160 watts into 8 ohms. Do you think it can handle the 802's without straining?
128x128czapp
Czapp,

I A/B'd the 802's with my Proceed bpa (125 watts) and a McIntosh MC352 (350 watts). Big Difference! Soundstage is much larger w/ the McIntosh but the biggest difference is how the McIntosh took control of the bass. The Proceed sounded OK at first but after listening to the MC352 the bpa sounded flabby (bass, but out of control and boomy). The McIntosh controlled the speakers and let them do what they do! The warmth and control of this amp was an ear opener! Good luck.
The N802s are listed as 8 ohms, nominal, yet actually spec-out at about 6 ohms. More importantly, a significant portion of there LF is in the 3 ohm range (there are significant peaks to 12 and 13, at certain frequencies). As such, your more important amplifier statistic is the 4 ohm power.

Also, an amplifier's 'slew rate': how quickly it can get from one signal to another, is very important: the N801s and N802s are that good.

There are any number of excellent amps out there: the Brystons, Theta Digital, Levinsons, et al. My only recommendation is careful audition anything that could be bright, such as the Krell. For the money, the Bryston is my first choice, either the 14 / 7 B-ST or the 4B-ST (250wpc). The N802s are rated at 91SPL, so you need a sophisticated amp (those named about or equivalent), not necessarily an extremely powerful one.
I currently run a Levinson 335 (250 watts) with my 802s. Prior to this, I had a Levinson 334 (125 watts). There is very little difference between the two amps 95% of the time. The only exception is at very loud volume levels with a lot of bass, and even then the improvement is small. I beleive that more important than raw power is the quality of the amplifier and although I have not heard your amplifier, I'll bet that it would be more than sufficient.