"Can You Lift Yours?"

I have a Conrad-Johnson Premier 1B and I couldn't lift it to save my life. If it didn't sound so great, I'd trade it in for some monoblocs.

In my 60's, and very seriously handicapped, I have big Macs and giant Krells. I pay my sons' tuitions. I fear only the day they graduate.

Nothing wrong with big and heavy as most audiophiles know it represents good sound. But if you considered more efficient speakers you wouldn't need big and heavy to that degree. Most folks on this website are older and there is a correct way to lift heavier objects without injuring yourself. Look into it before lifting.

Any correlation of sound quality to weight has to be predicated by amplifier topology. Traditional tube amplifiers probably have the strongest correlation here, because the size of its transformers (power plus 2 outputs) generally dictates how much power can be provided at reasonable distortion levels. ~ 1 pound per stereo watt is not uncommon. Of course the raw power itself isn't a perfect correlation to sound quality, but the weight (transformers) is definitely a big factor in distortion and bandwidth. This is how people got an inking the Carver amps weren't on the up-and-up about their power ratings (only 19 lbs for 75 stereo Watts is a red flag).

Next is high-bias class AB and class A solid state amplifiers, which require large amounts of heat sinking and still a very large PSU (power transformer). I'm a tube guy but I'm still quite fond of some of these. 

Then you have class D which can be made extremely light relative to their power output, and the correlation becomes very weak. They can sound good! I don't hate them; they're just not my thing.

My Bottlehead DH/SET 2A3 mono blocks weigh approx. 12 pounds each.

However, accessing them (bottom shelf of a rack located in a hallway linen closet) is not an easy task for me.

My pilot SA-232 clocks in @ around 20 pounds as did my old Mac 30 mono blocks (per unit).

My Dynaco Stereo 70's weighed about the same as a case of wine (30 pounds?).

The only heavy gear I've used were Altec VOTT's in the mid 70s (after a friend built new plywood cabs for them  they became unbearably heavy and I returned them to my cousin to use in his bar/restaurant).

It took 5 of us to hang them from the ceiling in the bar area and the other 4 guys were as strong as Oxen (I connected the chains;-).

DeKay