I'll take a stab at answering your question, if I may. I am an Edge dealer and still personally own the Levinson 390S CD player and 20.6 monoblocks and have listened to the 331 thru 333 series many times and it's successors the 334-336 series a number of times. I have heard Classe and Pass Labs a few times as well - but hopefully someone else can jump in here who knows them better than I.
The Edge is very smooth (there is a natural flow to the sound, that, combined with the speed, lets any and all PRaT thru to the speakers), very fast, and very detailed with just a very slight touch of refinement and NO solidstate artifacts/glare.
The Levinson, by comparison, is slow, omits details in order to try to sound smooth, and still has solidstate artifiacts that tend to give one a headache after some length of listening time.
The Pass Labs I have heard are refined (like there is a golden glow applied to each note to make it sound better - but no where near as much as say Rowland), more so than the Edge, but again not as fast and nowhere near as detailed and have a solidstate glare that is about the same as the new levinsons (maybe a little less?).
The Classe I have heard are like the Pass Labs, but with more solid state artificats and less refinement and probably the least detailed of these all.
The NL12 has more power than the NL10, more than just the difference in wattage might suggest - so if your speakers are at all a difficult load the NL12s will be worth the extra expense.
Hope this helps.
-Mike (Audio Federation)
The Edge is very smooth (there is a natural flow to the sound, that, combined with the speed, lets any and all PRaT thru to the speakers), very fast, and very detailed with just a very slight touch of refinement and NO solidstate artifacts/glare.
The Levinson, by comparison, is slow, omits details in order to try to sound smooth, and still has solidstate artifiacts that tend to give one a headache after some length of listening time.
The Pass Labs I have heard are refined (like there is a golden glow applied to each note to make it sound better - but no where near as much as say Rowland), more so than the Edge, but again not as fast and nowhere near as detailed and have a solidstate glare that is about the same as the new levinsons (maybe a little less?).
The Classe I have heard are like the Pass Labs, but with more solid state artificats and less refinement and probably the least detailed of these all.
The NL12 has more power than the NL10, more than just the difference in wattage might suggest - so if your speakers are at all a difficult load the NL12s will be worth the extra expense.
Hope this helps.
-Mike (Audio Federation)