200 Watt versus 300 to 400 Watt Amplifier Comps

It would depend on the type of music that you are listening to, the size of your room, how far your listening position is from the speakers, what the given spl is that you are using as a reference, etc... Having said that, so long as the quality remains consistent, more power will never hurt you. Given the that quality costs money, i would rather have an amp that was of slightly lower power and higher bias than higher power and lower bias. A "good" amp should remain in Class A for at least 5-6 watts ( at the very minimum and preferably more like 8 - 10 watts ) before switching over to Class B for the high power sessions. As such, it is possible to move backwards in quality as one goes up in quantity since many "reasonably priced" power amps that are quite muscular are not biased this high. Big amps with high bias typically cost a few pennies more. Sean
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In my experience moving up in amp quality provides much more than volume. I don't listen any louder than I used to listen, but the level of detail and other benefits make the better amps well worth the money. I really think there are very few people who actually push their amps and speakers anywhere never their limits. One of the biggest benefit of the higher powered amp in the power reserves.

As for the issue of power handling; your speakers are rated at 200 watts continuous. An amp that is rated at 200 watts will certainly peak much higher, but for the most part you will not even begin to approach those levels in the real world. Unless of course you are a wildman.

Nrchy: driving low impedance low sensitivity loads, 200 wpc @ 8 ohms is a drop in the bucket. Since most amps do not "double down", you might end up with about 350 wpc @ 4 and 450 - 500 wpc @ 2 ohms in many cases. I do have amps that double down and are rated at 200 wpc @ 8 ohms. I also have several speakers that can take everything that they can deliver and cry for more. It is all a system by system situation and there really is no "right" answer until everything is factored in. That's why i said "so long as quality does not suffer, more power is never a bad thing" ( or something like that....) Sean
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Appreciate all of the feedback so far. It would certainly appear that more is generally better, with the caveat that the longer the amp maintains itself in class a power the better. I have looked through my owners manual for the Classe 100 watt amp, (using as mono @ 200 w) and see frequency response, sensitivity,input imedence, S/N Ratio, and rated output. The only measure I have even a rudimentary grasp of is the rated output. Where/How can you determine how mamy watts any given remains in class a before swithching to B?

I wish there was an amplifier & pre-amplifier for dummies book that would explain all or at least the most critical technical jargon in layman terms!

Matt: I don't know if you are bridging the amps or running them in vertical bi-amp mode. When you bridge an amp, it effectively sees half the impedance of the speaker. As such, an 8 ohm speaker looks like a 4 ohm load. As such, an amp that runs in Class A up to 6 watts at 8 ohms is only going to run in Class A up to about 3 watts at 4 ohms. In plain English, as impedance is halved, so is the amount of Class A power that is available ( in an AB amp ). As such, the higher the bias at 8 ohms, the better off you'll be at any impedance. After all, most speakers are not very stable when it comes to impedances as they tend to vary across the frequency range.

As to what your specific amp is biased for from the factory, give them a call. You'll probably get a pretty generic answer but it will at least give you some type of an idea. Sean
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