I’m thinking about upgrading my setup which includes a McIntosh MC205 5 channel amp. I like the amp quite a bit for what it is, but am wondering if I would significantly upgrade with the Stellar amps. Specifically I’m thinking about pairing three of the M700s for the front 3 channels with a S300 for the rears and balance the differential power with DSP. Or maybe even 5 separate M700s, but that might be overkill. I have a pretty good hybrid system, but I use it for 2-channel 90% of the time so that’s where my emphasis is. So what do you guys think? Has anyone done this?
I have not tried this specific test in that kind of setup, but can tell you that it is certainly not going to be overkill. It is exactly what I have recommended to several customers. M700s for the front three, S300 for the surrounds. It’s also one of the reasons we carefully gain matched the S300 and M700 series so they can seamlessly integrate with each other. You’d be surprised how much headroom helps in a HT setup. I routinely play loud in my theater and wish I had more headroom available from the 12 channels of Emotiva I use. I am already in the process of upgrading to Stellar M700s for this very reason.