I don't want to beat a dead horse but I'm bugged.

@holmz  I do not have the Benchmarks, but would like to try them… Or the new Atmasphere Class D.

I believe that this move would please you very much.  Go for it. If I were to make a change ( Primarily to reduce box count but retain superb sound quality) it'd be either Aries Cerat Genus or the Viva Solista. Both are what I believe to be excellent SET integrated amplifiers. 

Charles 

@sns 

I contend all audio reproduction components have colorations, with neutral being our closest conception to what would be accurate. But then one person's perception of what is neutral may not correlate with another's.

I think that is both true and false. With all the variability in humans I have to expect we each have our own unique frequency response. I have to expect that varies even more with speakers where our body can play a part.  Our frequency response is not the same as the person putting the music together for us. The system they used to do that has a frequency response.

I can agree that frequency response tuning to personal preference is as much about personal preference as it is for compensating for unknowns.

Non-linear colorations, distortion and noise, are artificial colorations. I have no basis to disagree with Mahgister that some level of noise may assist in hearing detail when our listening levels are typically below live levels. I am at a loss for distortion. This appears to be purely a pleasant artifact, though I can accept Atmasphere that this could assist in masking worse distortion if that was to occur.  Purchasing an amplifier without these "worse distortions" is not difficult or expensive now. 

I notice no takers on the accurate contention some objectivists maintain is optimal. How would this so called accurate system play with these recording colors? And that's a simple question to answer. Accuracy contentions in audio reproduction is a meaningless term. Prove accuracy is colorless, and further prove an accurate component or system is absolutely accurate. With some measure of critical thinking you'll find it impossible using objective analysis and/or reason.

@sns 

Well, I was out of town yesterday...

Its not exactly clear what you mean by 'color' but if you can accept the idea that the original performance has color and that the recording thereof also has color, then an accurate system will convey that color.

A less accurate system will convey additional color not present in the recording... two opposite example: the brightness of a system employing solid state amps or the excessive warmth of a system employing SETs.

The problem here might be the terms used, since 'coloration' is usually a bad thing in the context of getting as close to the musical event as is possible. But instruments have tone 'color'; one must be careful to not conflate the two ideas!

This is a quote from a review of the Audio Note UK Cobra.

https://highfidelity.pl/@main-1173&lang=en

If I am not mistaken, this device was created as a result of engineering efforts to achieve the best possible parameters, and later it was almost completely reworked as a result of listening sessions. This initial DNA is still present in its sound, it is actually its basis. However, it was brought to the point where one can no longer just say that it is a technically correct device, but rather that it is refined - musically and sonically.

Most important part of the review:

However, when we connect it to good loudspeakers and feed it with a signal from a quality source, we will hear magic - real magic with it. Seemingly inconspicuous, musically extremely musical. 

In acoustic and psycho-acoustic no scientist use the term "color" in the same pejorative way, like some subjective EXTERNAL quality added to a sound which must be eliminated because the sound must be only "accurate"...This is completely wrong...

Like just said atmasphere: instruments before the recording own their own timbre or colors...A good audio system must be able to CONVEY that and our room acoustic must TRANSLATE that for our ears pleasures...

"accurate" in electronic design is not "accurate" in acoustic , but yes they are related through the human ears evaluation with psycho-acoustic science and listening experiments taking into account what we know about hearing ...

This way to speak about colors in a dismissive way by some, has NO MEANING in acoustic... Why?

Because what is color in acoustic is described as a complex acoustic phenomena which is "timbre" tonal playing perception...

Colors could be unbalanced and perceived like a an indesirable artefact but it is not this way that this UNBALANCED color effect must be characterize not like something EXTERNAL to be eliminated but like something pointing to a design flaw in the gear or to an acoustic room problem, then pointing an INTERNAL problem,  then colors are the  symptom not the disease itself... ...

"Accurate" here in acoustic if we speak of timbre accuracy implicate at least 5 characteristics:

«

1. Range between tonal and noiselike character
2. Spectral envelope
3. Time envelope in terms of rise, duration, and decay (ADSR, which stands for "attack, decay, sustain, release")
4. Changes both of spectral envelope (formant-glide) and fundamental frequency (micro-intonation)
5. Prefix, or onset of a sound, quite dissimilar to the ensuing lasting vibration »

Observe that these characteristics to be relatively "accurately" perceived , because there is no absolute in timbre perception , it is a relative acoustic phenomenon, implied also ANOTHER dimensions than only and mainly electronical measures of components and their potential to relay information or/ and affect it at the same time....This perception of colored tone playing timbre is also essentially a speakers/room acoustic and psycho-acoustic phenomenon...

Then dismissing colors as an added deceiving illusion or an indesirable artefact

is thowing the baby with the muddy waters...

Audio electronics AT THE END and TO BEGIN WITH is explained by acoustic not the reverse...Why? because we dont understand right now all there is in the ears/brain relation...