Plinus vs. Burmester amps

i have owned the plinius sa reference for 6 years of non fatiguing sound with my nova utopia focals effortless power and great bass control no fizz in the treble

i have never owned the burmester but have found them ultra-detailed with a tendency to brightness at the two munich shows in which they were featured

some like this, but others prefer the effortless sound from the plinius sa reference 100watts of class a and 200 more of class ab

Hi Falconquest,

At this level, I feel both Burmester and the Plinius amps you are considering are going to have excellent sonics. The bass quality and ability to control the woofer of the speakers (because of its very high damping factor) are specialties of the Burmester amp. I have not heard anything that betters it.
The burmester will be easier on your electricity. I had to turn on my Pass Labs monoblocks at least 1 hour before listening so that they could give their best performance.

Hi Trai,

Which speakers were they using with the Burmester amp? If they were showing with Burmester speakers that might explain the tendency towards brightness as Burmester speakers tend to sound clinical.

I forget the actual topology reason for the plinius to sound a bit like tubes. I remember there was a plinius interview somewhere that I had read.

In my experience, plinius sa amps run well with a certain tube preamp from Cary... The slp-05. It was a fantastic match. Tube pre up top and class a solid state down low.

I used a Plinius SB-301 stereo amp for a year. It was a powerhouse that produced very strong bass and very good dynamics. It sounded just slightly rolled off on top and was not the last word in transparency, so a little bit tilted toward the "musical" end of the musical/resolution axis. I did find it a much better match for my tastes with my Revel Salon 2s than Revel's Harman stablemate Mark Levinson 532H, which was a bit tame.

Although it is considered a Class A/B amp and Plinius does not state any ratings for Class A, the SB-301 is claimed to be highly biased into Class A. I can believe that, as it did run quite warm for me.

It took an insane deal on the Symphonic Line Kraft 250 monos I am using now to knock the Plinius out of my system, otherwise it would still be here. The Kraft 250s are certainly better, but given that they retail for 3X the list price of the SB-301, they should be.