I feel it is time to upgrade my 1977 system.......

If the OP has a preference for solid state, perhaps a First Watt might fill the bill and be dynamic enough for the Altecs. Even a 30.8 seems like overkill here. An XA25 is very often described as highly transparent. I am partial to the Pass products, with some Class A power, and their service is exemplary. I would buy used and update if necessary.

I don't have experience with Sugden, but I'd be happy to give one a listen.

worth a watch - sugden a21 vs pass int25

bear in mind he is quite a discriminating listener but is using his single driver high efficiency speaker with a small diameter driver, so one can imagine it does not make full use of the pass amp’s superior bass control/damping factor

https://youtu.be/0N85N6g3FXc

I would like to personally thank each and everyone of you for your thoughts and recomendations for a new system.  I think I will be leaning toward a tube preamp and still pondering about the amp.  I am trying to schedule a audition for McIntosh C8 and MC830 and Pass Lab has sparked my interest.

So many great ideas from you and even I am curious as to what direction I will go.....

Altecs here as well. Mac MC40 tube monoblocks rebuilt for power and a Audio Research SP8 for a preamp. It may all be old but boy does it sound great. New stuff never impresses me, I just shake my head at the stupid prices and smile everytime I turn my system on.

BillWojo

So in the last few months, I've demo'ed the following tube amps with my Model 19's:

• Coincident Frankenstein monoblocks (8 wpc)... very nice sound, but not enough power to generate adequate bass
• Consonance integrated with four 300B's (approx. 18 wpc)... not enough power and overall sound was too tame
• Chinese SET integrated with 845 tubes (23 wpc)... wonderful sound quality, but ground loop hum and noise from transformers were show stoppers.  I really wanted these to work as the sound quality was impressive.
• Quicksilver Mid Mono's (40 wpc)... bass was inadequate and dynamics were too tame
• Quicksilver KT Mono's with KT150 power tubes (100 wpc)... Finally, I've found amps with enough power to properly drive my 19's.  I never thought I'd need amps this powerful to drive speakers with such a high efficiency rating.  So far I'm about 75 hours into the break in process, but once they reached the 50 hour mark, I knew these amps were keepers.  Excellent dynamics, plenty of drive and very transparent.

I initially used a Music Reference RM9 MK2 (125 wpc) with the 19's and they sounded very good... but based upon the 19's high efficiency rating, I wanted to try some lower power tube amps.  Little did I know that the 19's high efficiency did not necessarily translate to being able to use low powered amps.  So... based upon my experience, my takeaway is that Model 19's need some power to get them to open up.   YMMV.