Amps that don’t impersonate space heaters.

@helomech i haven't heard the Parasound, but I think I get good slam and depth from my Coda. I suppose speakers, cables, and everything else play into that. 

I also thought I was getting good “slam” from the Coda until I swapped my Yamaha 2100 back into my system, and subsequently the Parasound A21. That experience really highlighted for me the power of expectation bias. 

Apparently bass strength is a common sacrifice with amps employing little to zero global feedback. 

However, I don’t think the OP would notice much, if any reduction in bass going to Coda from low power Pass Labs. The Coda 8 essentially sounded like a Pass XA25 in my system, just with more power and a little more bass extension. 

I recently moved my Coda #8 v1 into a new cabinet that has glass doors on the front, but with an open back. I was worried about heat building up around the amp so I placed a digital thermometer next to it, it reads in the mid-70’s F even after hours of play. I have not heard any complaints about this amp, might be a good choice. 

“Slam” is a very interesting attribute. What does it mean? Do you hear this “slam” when listening to live music? Is this “slam” an accurate representation of what’s on a recording or is it emphasis of particular frequency range that one component features over another? In most cases, “slam” is not real. Accurate reproduction/presentation is what I value in my system. This includes dynamics, tone, focus, layering, separation, soundstage. Coda is balanced pretty well in that regard. Imo

My take on slam is that it is one of the first and easiest attributes of a high end system to detect. It is the very abrupt wave of bass high energy from, say a kick drum on a recording. But in general it is not real. It is typically an artifact of high power solid state amps and often is accompanied by a leaness in the adjacent midbass or midrange, making it stand out more… a very fast rise and fall time. The difference for me was simply striking when I went from a Pass x350 to an Audio Research Reference160 amp. The bass sounded astonishing real and nuanced, like what I heard in a concert… a wave of bass that washed over you, extended in time and nuanced, instead of a single quick thump that disappeared quickly. So, no, I don’t hear slam in the real world and at least for me, I was incredibly happy to trade it for a much more realistic and nuanced sound.