Odyssey Kismet Reference series.

I had the opposite experience with the Magtech and Kismet--granted I had an early version of the Kismet and am not sure they were biased properly.

However, the Kismet would strain at around 75db on my Magnepan 3.7’s. The Magtech sounded much more natural. The Kismet may have had slightly more micro-detail though.

For reference, I also have a HT-3 Extreme ++++ and thought it sounded the same as the Kismet in Stratos monos that I had.

I am driving GE Triton 1 speakers, soon the Triton Reference and it sounded much better than the Magtech amp.  However, my speakers aren't power hungry panels and my speakers have a 1600 watt subwoofer amp in each cabinet.

I was able to try a magtech with my 3.7i's and it had no problem driving them, and sounded good, although a bit on the bright side.  Remember that the magtech is pumping out 900 watts at 4 ohms into Maggie's.  However, it's not always the wattage but the current when driving inefficient speakers.  I was just listening to a 4 month old Stratos Extreme with the Symphonic line caps and Groneberg wiring (80% of a Kismet) that I picked up here on Audiogon and I'm really loving it over the magtech.  And I'm only running about 270 watts compared to 900.  But I'm putting out about 70 amps of current.  Very, very pleased.

pts

Do your homework, as I’ve found one of the the mono blocks can't remember which one, were just bridged versions of the stereo amps.
And there is a price to pay when bridging amps, you get more watts yes, but at a big hit in other areas like damping factor, distortion, ect.

Cheers George

Gkr,

What volume do you listen at?