I know the krell700cx is a little old, but dark sounding?, depends what you use for a cpdp, preamps, never liked any of them, seems to dilute the signal,shortest interconnect, speaker cables help alot as well,very extreme high dollar cables at that seem to do the trick!, seems that the ayon 2s cpdp run straight into amp is in a league of its on,this cpdp is a tube player,4 tubes to be exact,doesnt sound tubey, ayon is not known for that,the sound?, stunning to say the least,never had the chance to here the 402e amp yet, look forward to it,the older 402 evolution amp?, I agree with the gentleman earlyer, the fpb700cx sounds more alive, more real,pure class a, not ab, however i have been told the e seris krell is really good,hopfully i will get chance to find out, It all does come down to impeadence matches, and ,well synergy! i must say,fpb700cx dark? you had some very inferior cables, and cpdp.