wattage

^It seems as though many audiophiles find reality pointless.:-)

it always depends.

in this case it depends on how loud you need to go with various recordings and assuming speakers are capable of doing it in your room without strain or compressing.

Generalizations may apply but generalizations seldom yield exceptional performance.

The devil is always in the details.

I have a 60 w/ch integrated running lower efficiency spekaers in a large room and the results are fine up to a point but are limited compared to essentially the same but somewhat larger speakers in another large room running off similar but 500w/ch amps. There is no comparison of overall dynamics and musicality at realistic listening volumes but at typical modest volumes both do similarly fine.

Brauser - you are exactly right. The amount of power (watts) needed to give the impression of adequate sound pressure levels is less than you think. If the signal applied to your loudspeakers is not phase coherent, it will seem to lack "punch". If the listener then turns the volume up to achieve this "punch", it is only an attempt to compensate for the incoherent signal. What you end up with is a louder version of an incoherent signal. If you have a coherent signal then the "wattage" becomes more efficient. In other words if you have 2 systems, one coherent and one with phase or time domain errors, driving them both at exactly the same measured wattage, the coherent system will sound noticeably louder (at least 3+ db). Timing is everything.

Roger

Signal applied "not phase coherent"?. Do you suggest that amplifier somehow shifts phase in the audio frequency range causing reduction of perceived loudness ???

Yes it does. See the white paper on distortion.
There is a link at www.h-cat.com

The "punch" is diffused by very small changes in velocity.
This spreads the energy of a percussion event over time.

Roger