I don’t base my opinion on age alone but in value and sound quality and experience of owning or hearing actual equipment being asked. Should one consider age of equipment... to some extent I guess. I have a Pioneer receiver I got new for Christmas some forty plus years ago that still sounds fine and no cap issues.
I can’t speak for the Belles as I’ve never owned or heard of any but know years of reading audio mags from the 70’s up to today I’ve never heard a negative thing so that speaks volume.
Personally I’ve owned and enjoyed both at the same time the older SWL9.0 SE and the 100.2 and it was a great combination. At the time I was using Apogee Centaurs and the sound was rich with plenty of PRaT. Later I moved to Aerial Acoustics 7B speakers and as good as the modest 100.2 is it just didn’t push the Aerials to their capability so I started bringing home amps to see if I indeed was missing something.
I brought home a couple older ML’s, a current Krell and a ARC HD220 that I could have picked up at great price but returned it as I preferred my 100.2. All the other amps were fine and drove my Aerials a little better as they all had more power but they all seemed thin/cold or just not as musical. Maybe the SWL9.0 and 100.2 was just a match made in heaven but I really enjoyed it. The 100.2 can be played for hours with no fatigue whatsoever; it’s a great amp. Later I scored a Pass X250 which I’m very happy with.
I did run my 100.2 with balanced cables when I later upgraded my SWL9.0 to a LS36.5 which sounded better versus the single ended connection.
Nothing wrong with an old 100.2 as the caps are good quality and would be easy to replace if you ever had to, but I’ve never heard of one yet. One of the few components I probably should have kept. I bought mine used and actually made a little money on the resale.
Hopefully some Belles owners will chime in and share their experiences with you. You probably can’t go wrong with either amp as your Liuto’s aren’t a difficult load.
