Do Amps matter.. in an Amp?

In theory, an amplifier with high current output capabilities is less affected by either the speaker or the music played before, but even this measurement can be greatly misleading. Is it peak current? Sustained?  Equal across all frequencies or only in the bass? 

I’m stuck on amperage. Most product tout wattage, which I find misleading since the highest wattage amp I own has the least satisfying sound. My favorite amplifier claims >60 amps of current, and a few manufacturers state this measurement. But most don’t. Is it significant?

@dain Don't be stuck on this! 'Amperage', as @kuribo points out, has nothing to do with the power the amp can make. But I should point something out here!! Power (Wattage) is Voltage times Current. IOW, current cannot exist without voltage and so cannot exist without Wattage.

When you see enormous amperage ratings like you mentioned, usually its a rating of how much current will flow if the main power supply is shorted out for 10milliseconds. IOW really a measurement of how much energy is stored by the power supply capacitors rather than how much power (or current) the amp can actually into the speaker. 

Here's an example of what I'm talking about:

Maggies are 4 Ohms. If you had a 1000 Watt amplifier, the power formula states that the resulting current present when 1000 Watts is present is only 15.81 Amps!

Its not a bad thing that the amp might store this much energy. Our MA-2 amplifier, which can make 200WRMS into 4 Ohms, has a current rating of 80Amps. That's because it stores a lot of energy in its power supplies- but I would not want to be in the room if they were shorted out for something like this!

IMO/IME when manufacturers state numbers like this without any information explaining what is meant by them, its not a good sign and clearly causes confusion (which IMO is the goal). It certainly says nothing about how the amp will sound (which is caused by the distortion it make BTW). Put another way, you may be liking certain amps over others on account of their distortion. You can get lower IMD by increasing capacitance in the power supply. This is because at higher power levels, the power supply is more impervious so its voltage remains more constant and interacts less with the amplifier circuit.

However you can get around this a bit if you use enough feedback in the design! IME most amplifiers don't have nearly enough. So adding filter capacitance is one way to reduce intermodulations.

What does max amperage mean compared to the damping factor or the wattage change into different loads? Seems like an easy engineering question but I don’t see it discussed very often. 

If the speakers dip down into low impedance somewhere in the frequency range, then enough current is a good thing.

If it was 8 ohm from DC to daylight, then ho much current does one need?

I think that the Saunders amps are usually the “go to” with some of the Maggy range.

You've tried dozens of amplifiers? Literally dozens? How do you manage that? I'm jealous...and curious!

@kijanki and @atmasphere very knowledgable replies thank you! So if I follow, there's many 'dials' one can change to design an amplifier. Some have significance as measurements, some do not. I thought of this question when looking at power supplies that were all 5v but got more expensive as the amperage went up. Or as you say "These numbers might reflect good power supply, but have nothing to do with reality."

Or to say in another way, this measurement was into a shorted load - speaking of which I did trash one of these high average amps, and indeed, just like an arc welder it melted the circuit board! But as to if this means anything to making music fun to listen to.. I wonder, if you have a tube amp, even 3 watts should be pleasant enough to listen to, do these have other numbers like amperage and power supplies and damping and such to consider? I guess I just see certain numbers all the time but no real context as to why they are important, and why they do seem to have some percievable effect. At least on cost!