Amps for Avalon Osiris CAT JL3, Boulder 2060, Dart

Bart,you have a superb sense of what you are about,in an audiophile way!I cannot offer anything that would be useful to you,as you seem to have a good feel for what you want to do.That's a really good thing.
You're comment about "variety" is very astute!I do believe this is true,and may be one reason why so many folks have more than one cartridge/arm,or multi components.
My Ascents are underpinned with REL Stentor sub(dedicated room)coming in very low in freq,and with very little gain.This gives me a superb blend,and one Lucien did not feel would work,but definitely does.It really allows the Ascents to be moved out into the room where they stage incredibly well.I simply cannot find a reason to replace them,based upon my listening tastes,and room size.My system is highly modded,and I am quite satisfied with performance.BTW,I am a fanatic about equipment care,and my speakers look about two weeks old.
You're Osiris is another story,altogether.A really stunning product that is really of heirloom quality.The Avalons of that era were voiced to blend well with the Rowland and Spectral stuff,but I have heard Avalon products(from that pedigree)work well with a variety of amps.The sky is the limit for you.
I was fortunate enough to be invited to Jonathan Skull's home a few years ago.He had just gotten rid of his Ascents,for the wonderful JM Labs Utopias.
He had a HUGE NYC loft,and I asked him "how could you get the Ascents to fill such a space",where the Utopias really opened up,quite well.I mean the room was gargantuan in size,and I did not believe the Ascents could possibly be a good match.His response was that they "liked Power",and he used a 400 wpc Forsell amp on them.According to him,they filled that room,but I simply cannot get around the thought.BTW,how did your Ascents perform in areas of dynamics,volume etc when pushed?
To me,the power thing may be important(my room is 22.5x8x13,and not too large),but the TONAL BALANCE,and HARMONIC PURITY of music is what I look to,in voicing my stuff.The best tube set-ups excel here,but some SS designs are no slouches in this area,as of late.You owe it to yourself to hear the ASR!All SS,and not hot running.Very ergonomically appealing for long term pleasure.
I do wish you the best!

Sirspeedy, this may surprise you but I thought the Ascents got slightly hard sounding when driven very hard. I suspect that the amp was the cause of that not the speakers. I was running the amps in full triode. I have only recently discovered they sound much better running in tetrode and it is too late to know now (the Ascents were sold to a friend)but it probably would have been fine at high spl's if I had run in tetrode. I paid special attention to Johnathan Skulls reviews, I thought his sonic values were similar to mine. Now that you have recommended the ASR, I will make a point of auditioning it. I am trying the Nuforce 9 SE's next week. They have a thirty day money back guarantee so it will cost me nothing if they are not keepers. Check out the review on ultraaudio.com. So now on my shortlist of amps to hear are the CAT JL2 Sig, Dartzeel and ASR Emitter. I'll keep you posted and thanks for the advice. Maybe we can meet at the next NYC home entertainment show (It will probably be next year). Bart

Thanks Bart,best of luck!!

I sold my Radians in order to buy a pair of Ascents Mk2 about one year ago. After that I sold my ss amps (monos) and bought a pair of Fourier OTLs (Pantheres). Quite a few members of the audio community were quite negative because Fourier has a bad reputation. My amps proved to be reliable however because the caps mounted are of Japanese origin instead of those that are from India. Pre amp is still solid state (cello). The sound is very detailed with spectacular dynamics. If a small Ongaku amp can drive these speakers a 200watt OTL has no problems at all I assume. Even digital classical records prove to be listenable now. I hear plenty of bottom end (is there any sub that will mate with an otl?). I think the Osirus could also be a good match for such an otl. I read that even newer Avalons with a more difficult load work well with Atma- Sphere. Does the Osirus also have minimum load of 5.5 ohm? Can anybody describe the difference between a Cat and an otl? Has anybody similar experiences?

Hodelrecords, it's good to hear your Fouriers are doing well. They are good sounding amps, maybe a bit on the dark side. The original power supply high voltage electrolytic caps were a brand called Binda, sourced from India, so it sounds as though the previous owner replaced them, probably a good thing.

I don't have any experience with CAT vs. OTL amps driving speakers like yours, but I am familiar with both driving Sound Lab ESLs. While I probably can't offer specific insight into which would do a better job driving big Avalons, I would generally recommend Atma-Sphere MA-2s as a minimum if you're going the OTL route; it may be only a matter of time before the Fouriers fail when driving loads that dip below 8 ohms. Avalon can give you an idea of the impedance. CAT amps should drive the speakers well; you'll have to audition them side by side with OTLs to see if you give up some transparency for the sake of control.

Brian