Mid to High End Multichannel Amp. Which One?

[clockwork]

I will soon be moving to a fairly large house with fairly large TV room 80X60 with 10 foot ceiling. My present equipment which is a Yamaha 2095 may not be able to fill up the room. I am thinking of hooking it up to a 5 channel amplifier but what I want is an amplifier that gives clean, warm sound on instrumental music, classical as well as clear vocals. I also would like to use it on home theater half of the time. My usage is 50/50 for music and HT.

My minimum power requirement is 200wX5 and my budget is U$2000.00. I want to keep this amp for a very long time so reliability is also very important to me.

My present gear is the following.

Yamaha RXV2095
B&W 602 S3 Front
B&W LCR 600 S3 for the Center
JBL E100 for the rear
Bose 301 for the front effects
JBL S120PII Subwoofer
MarantzDV8400 DVD player

What would brand of multichannel power amplifier would be perfect for my usage.

By the way, I am in no way an audiophile. I just want a clean, warm, undistorted sound even at higher volumes.

Later on, I will be upgrading some of my speakers to B&W 800 Series if needed. But for now, I will see if my present setup can take my planned amplifier upgrade.

TIA.

[clockwork]

I have been browsing ebay and I have seen a power amp that maybe what I need. The model is Aragon 2005 THX Ultra 2 5X200 channel power amplifier. Anyone familiar with this model?

[topspeed]

Your house isn't just fairly large, it's a freakin' mansion! That's a 4800s.f. media room and waaay larger than an average house. If you're trying to fill that much space you'll likely need multiple subs and there is no way the 602's will fill that much space, regardless of wattage. For vast space like that I would think you'd either need some monsters like Focal/JM Lab Grand Utopia's, Avant Garde horns, or some used Klipschorns at the least.

[clockwork]

It is not actually that big. It is a top floor of a three storey house designated to be the family's media room. The floor is undivided in its whole entirety.

Anyway, so I may have eventually upgrade the speakers but I just couldnt afford that now. Anyway, what would be the recommendations for a multichannel power amplifier for such a space?

[topspeed]

The usual suspects are Rotel, B&K, Parasound, Anthem, Outlaw and Adcom among others. All are purported to be very reliable, especially the Rotel & B&K. I had a two channel B&K that I left on for almost 15 years straight and never had a problem.

If you can go little higher Cary makes a nice 200wpc 5 channel for around $3K and PS Audio is releasing their multichannel HCA in March (hopefully). This is a class D 250wpc amp that is completely modular so you can plug in as many channels as you need, each with its own dedicated power supply. It's supposed to be pretty trick and if it sounds like the HCA2 it will really be something. That amp might come in around the price of the Cary. Check used too, as a friend just bought a NIB 5 channel ss Conrad-Johnson on e-bay for $2K.

Good luck

[magictooth]

It is not actually that big. It is a top floor of a three storey house designated to be the family's media room. The floor is undivided in its whole entirety.

Anyway, so I may have eventually upgrade the speakers but I just couldnt afford that now. Anyway, what would be the recommendations for a multichannel power amplifier for such a space?

Hi!

So are you saying that there's 4800 sq ft on each floor for a total of over 13K sq ft not including basement?

What is the actual size of the floor that you're going to be putting your HT in?

The above poster's suggestions are good. You might want to thrown in ATI and EAD Powermaster. Both are good units and can be bought used for your price range.

[firebook23]

You might also want to check out the 7 channel NAD T973
or the 5 ch silver line by NAD
the NAD S250 It might be a little weak for you though. But NAD always reports on the low side of their power ratings

http://www.nadelectronics.com/ht_amplifiers/index.htm

I am also a big fan of Anthem

[bturk667]

How much money are you looking to spend?