Mono Blocks for B&W 801 s3

" I once borrowed a 600 wpc McIntosh tube amp and it was superb".

Are you sure that wasn't a Solid State amp? McIntosh makes some great sounding ones. I have not heard of a 600 watt per channel McIntosh tube design.

Might be late to the party here but OP how handy would you say you are? I ask this because if you are handy then might I suggest building a few Hypex NCore Amps for your setup.

For the price range your shopping in you could build x 4 NCore MonoBlocs to make those B&W's sing like a champ.

I myself have x 4 of these recommend amps powering my B&W 803diamonds and they sound impressive with this much power. I've got x 1 MonoBloc powering each half of each speaker channel and they sound effortless at all volume levels.

One big added bonus to such a configuration is that you can run very short speaker cables (mine are only 2ft) to each cabinet since the amps sit nicely behind each cabinet.

I don't think you will be disappointed doing the same

Replacing a Krell KSA-250 with an Emotiva XPA-1L is similar to driving a vintage 80's Corvette to pedaling a rusty Huffy bicycle! C'Mon Man!!!

I concur, Dayglow. Emotiva does have good power ratings, but the sound is absolutely not high end. More like upper mid-fi at the most.

A pair of Bryston 28BSST2s might be interesting.