From Pass X250,5 to 350,5 : what to expect?


Hi
I am planning on going up from my 250,5 to 350,5 but first decided to ask if it is worth it.Are there any sonic benefits in upgrading to a more powerful amp in a ,5 line?As far as i know in the previous line (250,350)going up meant actually downgrading sound because 250 amp was sonically superior to 350 one.I do not really need more power but i heard that 350,5 is way better soundwise than 250,5.Is that true?Thanks for your insights on this matter.
overhang
You need sufficient power for dynamics, but your speakers determine whether or not a certain number of watts is a lot or a little. More power tends to corrupt the signal with more wire, parts, and complexity - so if you have sensitive speakers with benign loads you can take advantage of the inherent quality of lower-powered amplification. But yes, you do need enough power - no question, but that is a relationship between amp and speaker - with my speakers, 30 watts is a lot of power, with some speakers 100 watts is too little.
250 watts and the current drive into low impedances would seem to be plenty of power to deafen you with the Revel Salons, unless you have a really big room. I would think 110db would be plenty loud, the 350 would only increase the output to 111-112db, I would think you would be running out of the room before you could tell the difference. Again this is assuming the 250 and 350 have the same basic circuitry, dam[pening specs, and drive into dipping impedances.
Given the impedance curve and sensitivity of the Salons, you have all the power you need.
I have a X250.5 and driving Wilson Sophia 2 and didn't even think about upgrade to X350.5 ,which will not yield any significant sonic benefit IMO. However, new XA.5 class a series may bring you ultimate class A experience even with more difficult speakers since new XA series doubles output when load drops to 4 ohm.