Help please choosing AMP wattage for a newbe

Always buy the speakers first. They are the final element of your system and have the job of turning electrical energy into sound waves. The only other component which has a task like this is the turntable. They make far more difference than the amp. How will you know which amp to buy, you can't hear the amp without the speaker? Chose the speaker you like best and then chose an amp that maximizes it's qualities. If your favorite speakers are horns, you don't need 500 watts. If they are Apogee's , then SET is out. The amp is a tool to get the best performance out of a speaker, if you don't know what speaker you are using , how will you know which tool to select?

Stanwal got it right Blindjim.

Although most amps will work with most speakers, few combinations are optimal.

So you buy a speaker (the most subjective and personal component in any system) that pleases your listening preferences and then an amp which is a very close electrical match.

Read and learn.

"Although most amps will work with most speakers, few combinations are optimal."

That's been my experience - and hard learned. To me, putting an audio system together is like trying to build a Superbowl team; there's more to it than just matching the numbers - there's personalities to deal with. That's right! I said personalities. I have no tech knowledge so I use what I know. I wish you luck.

Stanwal
"Always buy the speakers first. They are the final element of your system and have the job of turning electrical energy into sound waves."

Buy the speakers first as they are the final element?

That simply doesn't make sense to me.

Audiofeil
"Read and learn."

“Quid pro quo”, Bill.

... "Buy and try" or better still, "it's what's up front that counts" or perhaps, "All roads lead to Rome".

Here's what I've learned from experience. I've found speakers in general aren't too unlike other components. In fact I believe placing the bulk of the funds into those items in front of them is the better path. This is also my experience.

In a perfect world we would all be able to sample or audition in our homes this piece or that, these speakers or those until we find the ones wwe truly want to live with till God comes.

it ain't... and we don't.

Few if any I suspect lay out immense bucks for their “final” speaker right off. Evacuating the budget and then adding a cjheapie int or amp, source and wires to run them with.

Perhaps we should ask, huh? Just how many folks bought their dream speakers as their first speakers?

But it’s easy enough to point to I guess. It just aint a practical method for many if not all.

I’d rather have any day a great front end and then mid priced speakers than to lay out for mega priced speakers possessing a mid level front end. Always. I’ve seen this proven out time and time again in my home and at dealerships.

It’s also a safer way to go as well.

Thankfully, we live in a world which allows us to proceed at what ever rate or in whatever fashion we choose.

Even if your aim was at buying the best speakers your budget allowed for, then placing the remainder into the front end, I’d still disagree that plan equates to better or the best sounding system.

When it is proven to me that superior transducers overcome inadequacies in a systems electronics then I will have learned something else. So far however, I’ve not seen it as the case in fact.

FWIW, I'm in the Audiofeil, Stanwal, Phaelon camp: choose your speakers first.