Mark Levinson 333.5 vs Emotiva XPR-1 Monoblocks

Levchappy,

It sounds like you have some time, thought and money invested in your system. Just a personal opinion, but I feel that replacing a Levinson with Emotiva units would be a step backwards.

If I had to sell the Levinson, just to try the Emotivas, I wouldn't do it.

What are you looking for? More power?

Tonyangel;

I tend to agree with you. I enjoyed our ML-2 Monoblocks and thought they were the best. Then came the 333.5. It killed the ML-2's.

With the XPR-1's, I thought more efficient Monoblocks with twice the power and good technology would give certain attributes common to great Monoblocks as compared to a dual monaural design. However, my heart says the 333.5 is a world class unit in the top 5% of amps.

Also, we wanted to replace our 3 Acurus theater amps with a Sherbourn PA 7-350. It's funny, my friend snubs his nose at "high-end" names while you and Mary and I snub our noses at lesser quality. In audio/HT, we do not enjoy 90% as good for 50% less cost. It's like wearing slightly scratched glasses for a cost of 50% less. We need to compromise a bit of HT multi-channel audio to have truly high-end 2 channel audio.

Compare the 333 with Pass Labs 0.5 series and you understand how poor a ML really is. You must be a fool to use it. In focus and in depth it is quite poor. I do not Judge about sound, but sound realism they do not understand at Mark levinson. I never heard a ML win an a-b comparing with a Pass labs amp. Only people with less knowledge are people who could buy it!!

Zero chance I'd replace a Levinson with an Emotiva... especially the 333.5.

No chance what-so-ever.

I would keep the ML.
Emotiva is good for HT but they still have a long way to go in pure 2ch.