Crown Amplifier for Advent 300

Crown amplifiers are very hard, sterile and lifeless sounding. They are basically "pro sound" amps sold and marketed to the consumer. While they are built like tanks, they will only reproduce "sound" and not let you hear music. Sean >

Hi Classic: It's me again pushing the Phase Linear 400, it is not transistor sounding as suggested at the other site. It gained a bad reputation because a lot of people used it for PA's in the 70's and 80's and still do today. If you can listen to one you will hear that it has a very musical sound. Sean is right on in regard to the Crown equipment. The better sounding one of the series is the DC75 but it is still not very musical and would not be enough power for the Advents. The old stock Dynaco amps (the 120 and the 400) do not seem to have fared well with age, as the ones that I have listened to at the local pawn shops do not sound as they once did. A couple of other musical sounding SS amps are the Apt-Holman amp (I beleive that he only made one model) and the Hafler 500. Either should be available for $400.00 to $500.00 used. My personal preference would be the Hafler though once again it would depend on the condition of the amp. I did not care for the other Hafler amps, just this model. Citation and Marantz also made nice sounding 60 watt per channel power amps in the 70's but I cannot remember the model nos., I am pretty sure though that they were 60 watters which should narrow it down.

Actually the Advent 300 is very good as a pre-amp, and if the Large Advent tweeters and woofers are in good shape..or if the woofers have been re-coned...both are worth using a more modern power amp with. Check out various Bryston, Classe and others.....

I thought that the whole idea was "classic/vintage audio" which modern amps are not - yet. I am also under the impression that this is to remain a budget system. Are you interested in modern and pricy gear for this project or will it remain a classic reasonably priced system?