b&k amps

Love my B&K 200.1 monoblocks. I'm running with the B&K ref 5 preamp with Legacy Focus 20/20 speakers. There's more to the system , but I'm no longer listening to the system. The true weak link now is the recording itself & how it was micro-phoned. Time now is spent enjoying music.BTW, Krell KAV300 CD player, Denon DP72L Turntable w/Shure V5 micro ridge, Tara Labs Balanced interconnects between pre-amp & amps, Heavy gauge Signal wire, bi-wired at speaker terminals & Audioquest interconnects.

I bought the whole evolution rig to see what Krell was up to with their new designs and I was not happy at all. The sweetness, liquidity and tonality of the gear is gone in favor of a greyish, smoothed over brittle character. Parts are now off the shelf, parts count on the amps is almost doubled and NOT Class A anymore plus they chose to impose AC filtering into the amps (no choice for the end user). Only the Evo One and Two stuff is true class A biased anymore. FPB was Krell at their best.

Dave - Can you explain your comment on Krell abandoning their principles in favor of euro guidelines. Thanks, Andy

Talikin? I meant talking of course and they are built well in the USA!!

Love my B&K Reference 4430 200w 3channel. Very neutral. Mates very well with Klipsch speakers(KG4's and RF-63's). Built like a bomb shelter. Cool running. Very good used prices. Built in the USA.

Bill

Were talikin value here, not absolutes. For the money you can do a whole lot worse and be hard pressed to find their better for the power they offer.

I'm not familiar with the 200.1's but would expect them to rate well. I've had many of the older B&K units and a few of the newer ones (early 2000's) and like all of them. I still have a pair of M200 Sonatas and haven't found anything as good for twice the price.

One thing you get with B&K is bulletproof build quality and top grade support and service. As with all electronics, sound quality is in the ear of the beholder. They tend to be pretty well balanced/neutral sounding. Not boomy, not bright, sort of on the warm side.

I had a Ref 220a stereo SS amp from BK... took it back after two weeks... bought a krell kav 250.... sold that off as well.

That was nine years ago this winter... perhaps the newer ones are better. Neither amp sounded refined or intently musical... the BK was thin and strident, and the Krell was just a big brusier and far better suited to HT than to music... they both, very likely would have been lots better if paired with a tube preamp.... but that was then....

had the older B&K 200mono's and thought they were excellent.

In my opinion, I would give them the nod as the go to value for amplification now that Krell has abandoned their design principles in favor of euro industry guidlines...in other words, the new amps suck! The B&K stuff was born out of some former Krell guy's ingenuity. The amps are well built, musical and a stone cold bargain.

haven't heard them myself but i do have a 202+ amp. if thats any indication of the sound, i would say they would be just fine. nice clean,smooth sound without the big price tag. if the price is right, you couldn't go wrong