ARC Ref 210...tube virgin

I wouldn't rule out a Pass amp. Do your research regarding heat, tube life and cost to re-tube. ARC makes wonderful - great tube amps, but not for me. I'll stick with my Pass amp with a tube preamp. 

adg101 is right. It's usually the norm to use a great tube preamp with any number of SS amps (sticking with mono amps is a good plan). I've had my eye on a Pass 250.8 (stereo) and Pass 100.8 (monos).

@rhljazz - what don't you like about ARC amps?

@cleeds - I initially wanted a speaker upgrade but the opportunity of the deal that was presented unfortunately required the sale of my GamuT M250i mono blocks (I haven't sold them yet) so I wanted to replace them with a good affordable alternative on the used market. I've heard good things about the Ref 210 & always wanted to try tubes.

@adg101 - why don't you like ARC amps?

If an output tube fails would you rather replace the tube and a fuse or send the amp out for repair?  That's what I don't like.  Plus some ARC amps are not user friendly for bias adjustment although the Ref 210 appears to have a user friendly bias adjustment.

To make it explicit, I think rhljazz is alluding to ARC tube amps having the tendency to blow out a resistor and sometimes a capacitor when a tube fails (which they do), necessitating repair after a "normal" maintenance event in a tube amp's life.

I know I sold off some ARC Classic 120 mono's that sounded just wonderful, but I sure got tired of the trip to ARC for repair when a tube went out (and they had a lot of them).  It seems that the ARC design philosophy still allows for this weakness.