Help Wanna Buy Amp Tomorrow : ARC VS BAT

They are both excellent companies with excellent products. The BAT's you are interested in are quite a bit more expensive than the arc's you compare them to: $16,000 vs $11000. I think the BAT SE equipment is more transparent, but ARC equipment seems to have a fuller body and sense of power. Speaking of, the vt100 has 100w vs the bat at 75w. I know my vt100 has been able all my speakers quite well. Excellent dynamic drive for a tube amp.

I think the BAT SE preamps are much better than the ARC's. I have not heard the new ls25m2 though.

I'm running a vt100m2 with a bat vk-5i to great result. I'm going to put some NOS tubes in it and see if that improves things further. I put some svetlana kt88's in the vt100 and they give it a little more transparent midrange and warmth.

I think your choice of speaker, Utopia will be better with BAT. All balanced connection and design also adds performance. The ARC, even high-output ones tend to have more 'cardboard' cut-out sound stage, very wide, but short of depth. BAT has believable depth, and the extra richness in instrument timbre.

BTW, I have owned the best sounding ARC, which is the Classic 30, very low power though. Also own the ARC PH-3. I have also tried BAT VK50SE, and right now keeps the VK5 (big difference in money obviously). I go with full balanced in my system. ARC product until you go to the 'Reference line', are 'balanced connected', but the circuits are not true balanced design.

I'm also using the LS25mk2 and VT100mk3 combo and must say it's quite enjoyable.Have owned ARC equipment for nearly 20 years and probably allways will.For me,they do the job.Whatever you're decision is,you'll find that tubes sound more like real music.Good luck........