What amp is best?

Keep Canada green, buy Bryston. No. I am not related in any way to that concern, save and except as a satisfied customer. Good day!

Since you have the B&W setup, I'd recommend you to look at a Sunfire Cinema Grand - the Nautiluses do like to be "fed" properly, and the Sunfire is up to the task, while also giving you the best of both worlds (or at least a decent compromise) for HT and music. You can keep your current amp for the rears and the budget relatively low.

I absolutly agree with Aboldor and his recommending the Sunfire Cinema Grand!!!! I had a budget of 9 grand and wanted to go with something like Proceed,Pass,Krell,EAd or some monoblocks for my Aerial 8b,cc3,7b combo. These were all listened to at length. Of the bunch the Ead was best with pass second only due to price. Then I listened to the Sunfire and could not justify spending more. I had listened to several of the cheaper amps like Meridian Classe ATI and B&K and for one reason or a nother was not happy. The sunfire has everything except the big price tag and weight.

Owning four different Sunfire amps and five different Nelson Pass built / designed amps, i would not consider the Sunfire to be in the same league. Mind you, the Sunfire's do have their strengths and can hold their own quite well ( especially if purchased used ), but i would not call them the most revealing or musical. They are however a very solid and reliable work-horse that have no problem cranking out massive amounts of clean power hour after hour. In terms of ultimate performance levels though, Nelson's amps are in a whole different league if you ask me. Sean
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I have the N802s and an HTM1 up front in my HT (SCM8s for surrounds).

I use an AMP5 for the three front speakers, bi-amping the N802s. I have been very happy with the results.

I can cleanly drive the speakers with zero distortion at volumes far larger than I would ever listen to for an extended period of time.

NOTE: I originally had the AMP 5 running all 5 channels, as my L/R were originally Naut 804s. When I made the jump to the Naut 802s, the AMP5 was a weak link. After bi-amping, all is good. I point this out because a HPA3 may also provide similar results, and allow you to have similar amplification to your front 3 channels.