Actually, I’m not paying $10k...but can get a really good deal on Sonus Farber (that’s not a typo; it’s Sonus, not Sonos) Olympica II speakers. I’ve never been an audiofile, but am fast becoming one having recently purchased Sonus Farber Lumina III floorstanding speakers a few months ago. They sound awesome at times run thru the Sonos Amp -- but it’s kind of hit and miss. I listened to the Olympica’s at the dealer’s shop with an AMP, and they sounded great there. But is it asking too much of my Sonos Amp to think it can drive the Olympica’s well enough to make the purchase worthwhile? I
Is my Sonos Amp worthy of fancy $10k Sonus Farber speakers?
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Ultimately, only you know what sounds “best” (to you).
There are a bunch of grumpy audiophiles who have discovered that AMP sounds better than they expected. There are two opposing camps. One camp insists that all quality amplifiers sound the same if the demo is properly setup. The other group is incredulous, claiming that the difference is so obvious that you don’t deserve the ‘audiophile’ handle if you disagree. You’ll need to decide which camp you belong in and wear your badge proudly.
It’s more difficult to compare amplifiers than most people expect. In any A/B instant comparison, the louder unit wins, even if the level difference is hard to measure. Many times we use a switching system to facilitate the comparison. This has always amused me because the reviewers debate about this wire or that wire and never seem to debate about the switching system. My own experience, along with the experience of my associates, has been that the equipment differences are much harder to perceive when a switching system is involved.
Some of the differences are technically easy to explain. A few respected high end speakers are difficult to drive because they have an impedance dip below 4-Ohms that causes obvious performance issues for some amplifiers. Some of the expensive, over designed amplifiers are really designed to handle 1-Ohm loads and will deal with the problem speakers with ease. The speaker and amplifier sales brochures rarely mention this and the audio community must empirically discover that some pairings don’t work well together. Soon the amplifier will be stamped “audiophile” classic quality if it can deal with a popular nasty speaker. I’ll note that AMP can deal with these nasty speakers with ease.
I recommend that you setup a (careful) comparison between AMP and a claimed “audiophile” grade amplifier and decide for yourself if one sounds better than the other. Don’t let anyone sway your opinion by claiming some sort of audiophile grade credentials. I’ll again state that valid comparisons are difficult to setup.
With these specs I’d be leaning to a higher powered amp, something in the 500 Watt range hooked to a Sonos Port to give you the ability to drive them to their full potential while staying well within the amplifier’s capability.
Rated for 50W – 250W with 88 dB SPL
I used to be interested in getting the best possible sound and did a lot of expensive experimenting and to my ears there was very little difference in the sound of high quality (that does not equal expensive, some of which sounded bad) units. Where I heard the difference was in the power levels and it was quite obvious when something ran out of power. I’d say double the size the speaker manufacturer recommends is a good spot to shop. And, yes that does give you the opportunity to blow up your speakers but they will sound bad long before they are damaged.
If you are doing any audio manipulation like dynamic expansion or using a low frequency enhancer, like the dBx Sub-harmonic Synthesizers then you might want to double your power again. Although I’d think with the fairly small drivers in the Sonus Farbers they won’t tolerate much enhancement beyond what is on your source.
Now I’m old and my ears are bad and Sonos is good enough, inexpensive for what you get and simple to operate.
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