What’s in a watt

Thanks for all the replies. 

Elevik, you were right about the OPPO’s volume control. I went to fixed and started controlling from the Mac and I actually do seem to notice a difference. Just a little bit more vibrant at mid to high volumes. 

Crazy. Thanks for the heads up. 

Glennewdick I haven’t checked into the Lyngdorf offerings. I will definitely research them tonight. Not looking to wait too long to make a move. The techie in me says go Naim, but the sensible part of me says the Anthem is the better piece of kit. 

dracule1, what you state is what I’ve always believed. I did some very unscientific testing today and measured where, approximately, the low end Unity would run out of steam based on the meter positions on the Mac. It could get pretty loud, but at around 40ish watts it wasn’t so loud that it made me uneasy. When I think about cranking the system and working around the house, 40 ‘Naim watts’ might not cut it. 

The Lyngdorf is interesting. The only major advantage I see over the Anthem is the HDMI option. That add on puts it at the same price as the Anthem, but the Anthem has way more power and a lot of the Lyngdorf add-ons are already built into it. 

The Lyngdorf is rated at 170 watts at 4 ohms. The Anthem is rated at 200 watts at 8 ohms, and up to 550 down to 2. Seems like no contest there. It also already has USB and analog inputs at no extra cost, as well as bass management in addition to its own room correction software, ARC. 

From a value perspective alone, the Anthem seems to be the better bet. The HDMI in/out on the Lyngdorf would be nice, but not really necessary. The real question, though, is how do they sound?!

Not familiar with the ‘house sound’ of either, if they even have one. 

Both nice looking pieces of kit, though. 

@hybrid81 - It seems like you are really focused on the features of an "all-in-one" solution.  One thing I would like to caution (again) is to pay more attention to component matching.  The Anthem STR integrated is a very good piece, but it is going to be very fast and high resolution.  It is definitely not warm or laid back.  The same goes with the Lyngdorf solution.
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I heard a set of mid level Focal Be speakers at RMAF.  They were driven by a very high resolution set of Classe Delta monoblocks.  While it was not bad, per say, the high resolution amp really revealed that the Focal sounded a bit thin in the midbass and midrange.  This tilted the emphasis to the highs and caused the speaker to be somewhat bright (bordering on harsh).  So, with your Focal speakers, component matching is definitely important.  (unless you don't care about this).
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I have a set of Focal speakers that I use as surrounds.  They are driven by a stock Parasound A21 amp.  The result is very good.  However, the stock parasound amp does not do well with my B&W D3 speakers and it ends up sounding too warm and veiled.  So the Focal speakers really need a warm and very full sounding amp.  When I try to bump up the amp resolution with the Focal speakers, they become a little hard edged and I lose body / volume.

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I don't know what your feature requirement is, but another "jack of all trades" integrated you could look at is the Parasound HINT 6.  It does not have Apple Airplay (like NAIM) or room correction like Anthem, but it has a crap load of inputs/features and may be a better sonic match to your Focal speakers.  
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Personally, I would avoid higher resolution integrateds such as Anthem, Lyngdorf, Classe, Hegel, etc.  But in the end, it depends on what your priorities are. lol.
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If you did end up choosing something like Anthem or Lyngdorf and found it became bright or harsh, then your solution would be to add as much gold-plated elements as possible to "slow down" the fast integrated.  This includes stuff like Isoclean or Hi-Fi Tuning "Cu" gold-plated fuses, gold-plated spades/bananas on pure copper speaker cable.  Gold plated plugs on power cords (such as Audioquest solid-core - an excellent.  And take out all silver or silver-plated elements.

Very insightful stuff, Auxinput. I agree that Focals, at least the Electras, can be harsh and or lean with the wrong amplification. Found that out when I paired them with an Emotiva at one point.

Im starting to think that perhaps just replacing the OPPO would be a better way to go. DAC/Streamer combo that runs into the Mac might get the job done.

So many options. I really like the idea of room correction, but I’m pretty happy with how the system is dialed in right now...for the most part. Except that wifey would prefer one box to rule them all. Ugh. 

Does the HINT do everything you need?  Seems like a good recommendation.