Amp for Nautilus 801

Ali,

Mcintosh MC 501

A pair of Bryston 7bsst monoblocks will give your 801's everything they need.

I recently replaced a Levinson 331 with a McCormack DNA-500 driving my Aerial 10Ts. The DNA-500 produced an exceptional improvement in dynamics, slam and transient response. Very musical!

Tubes are always at the top-of-my -list.The CJs should be a good choice,and are becoming more affordable.

The Nautilus 801 is a very difficult speaker to drive and decent shops that sold it bi-amped it with expensive, truly high-current solid-state amplification such as Classe Omega, Levinson, Krell FBP or Rowland.

Unless you limit yourself to chamber music, the c-j tube amp would be totally inappropriate on N801's, as would all but a small handful of tube amps.

N801's also need to be used in a big room with lots of placement options so they don't boom, as they produce prodigious bass. They are also not shelved down in the treble and thus tend to sound bright, especially with digital sources (because most recordings are bright and most CD players still can't do treble). In short, they are hard to use properly and thus not very practical -- are you sure they are the speaker for you? If 90% of what you listen is full-scale symphonic music and rock, if you have a big, well-damped room and if you own megaamps, then okay, but otherwise, there are a many alternatives that are better choices.