Extracts from The Absolute
Sound Golden Ear Awards 2000
by JONATHAN VALIN
Gamut D200, Krell FPB 650Mc, Audio Research Reference 300 amplifiers
Well I simply couldn't decide which one of this trio of superb amplifiers was
"worthiest" -ergo, the tie. The funny thing is, none of these three
top-contenders sounds similar; each has its own "character," it own
set of virtues and its own set of flaws.
Let's begin with the Gamut, far and away the least expensive of the bunch and
the best value for the dollar. This $5,000, 200-watt-per-channel, solid-state
stereo amplifier from designer Ole Lund Christensen may not look like much,
but looks, in this case, are deceiving. If your loudspeakers present a reasonable
load and don't demand oodles of juice, this plug-ugly from Denmark will prove
hard to beat for the money. Indeed, in some respects, it's hard to beat for
any amount of money.
First of all, the Gamut D200 has the best soundstaging I've yet heard from any
amp, fully equal to the worldclass, $30,000 Lamm ML-2s that won one of my Golden
Ear Awards last year - superb width, depth, focus, and layering that makes other
amplifiers, even far more expensive ones, sound as if they are slightly constricting
musical space. Second, within its 200-watt power rating the Gamut is extremely
dynamic and extremely discerning. You generally get superior clout or superior
nuance in amplifiers; this one gives you both equally - dynamic resolution that
puts it in a class by itself at its price and power rating. Third, the D200
is an extraordinarily neutral-sounding device, reminiscent of the Burmester
979/980 transport/DAC (for which, see below); until it is pushed near or into
clipping, it almost sounds as if it isn't in the circuit, with only a hint of
leanness in the way of "character." Fourth, it is one of the most
detailed amplifiers I've auditioned. The Lamm ML-2, ARC Ref 300, and Krell FPB650
excepted you simply hear more things more clearly through the Gamut than through
any other high-powered amps I've tried.
So where's the downside? Well, at $5,000 there isn't much of one. The thing
does become progressively less neutral, brighter and edgier, as you use up its
power supply and push it toward clipping (and it seems to reach or get near
to clipping quicker than its 200-watt-per-channel rating suggests). Although
it has world-class bass definition and air, the D200 doesn't have the mid-bass
slam or weight of the Krell or the Audio Research monoblocks (both of which
give you more power, more unstintingly; but both cost many multiples of the
price of the D200). And while the Gamut isn't thin in tone color, it isn't rich,
either. The Krell and the ARC amps will "round out" images a bit more
fully (and realistically) than the Danish amp will, both in terms of three dimensional
"body" and the fullest articulation of the harmonic series. Finally,
the D200 is not, as noted, the amplifier to use with loudspeakers that present
"difficult" loads or are unusually power-hungry. With everything else,
it is just dandy.
Speaking of difficult loads, for speakers such as the Sound Labs M1s or anything
else that thrives on current, the Krell 650Mc monoblock amps are well nigh unbeatable
(review this issue). To give you a quick précis: The 650s have seemingly
unlimited power; an extraordinarily low noise floor when used with their companion
preamp/CD-player, the KPS25sc, in Krell's CAST hook-up; exceptionally good tone
color (unusual for a solid-state amp); superb bass and treble extension; and
transient speed rivaled only by Ole Christensen's Gamut and Ralph Karsten's
Atma-Spheres. They are also very close to being the most detailed amplifier
I've heard -just edging out the Gamut and the ARC in this regard - and possibly
the most neutral.
Now this question of neutrality, which I address in my review, is a thorny one.
The Krells are so extended at either frequency extreme (and so without grain
or color of their own from bottom to top) that they may not please everyone.-Some
may think them too bright or aggressive (I do not); some may think them too
dark (maybe just a little, although it's hard to tell whether they're "dark"
or ,just plain quiet - i.e., whether they're just not filling silences and overlaying
the soundfield with the usual bright, sandy, thermal grain of pentodes and semiconductors).
They certainly seem to fare better with difficult loads like the M1s (a match
made in audio heaven) and can't be beat, as HP has noted, as a subwoofer amp
(although you may think $24,000 for subwoofer amps a mite excessive). What neither
the Gamut nor the Krells will give you is what the ARC Reference 300s provide
par excellence: the fullest measure of instrumental bloom. These $26,000 monoblock
amplifiers are the best pentode/tetrode designs I've ever heard. They are gorgeous
in color (so, too, are the Krells); terrifically and seemingly Inexhaustibly
powerful (like the Krells); unusually fast-sounding (especially for tubes);
exceptionally good at recovering low-level details than the Krells, which focus
the stage and instruments a bit more tightly than the ARCS, but somewhat less
good than the Gamut); and just plain unrivalled by any amp when it comes to
reproducing what I've called instrumental "action." By this turn of
phrase, I mean the way instruments change in presence as the music changes in
pitch, duration, and intensity. When, in life, a trumpet plays full-bore, it
can knock you on your rear with its power. You "feel" the fortissimo
like a blow to the chest, and you hear it as a change in presence. The ARC amps
are the best I've heard at capturing the way instruments can "leap"
from the background into the foreground when played all-out. That said, the
ARCS are not as free of noise and grain as the Krells (about on the par with
the Gamut) or as extended and well-defined at the frequency extremes, and are
probably not the best amplifiers to use with "difficult-load" loudspeakers
(although they too fare well with the Sound Labs). Best to mate them with something
like the PipeDreams or the phenomenal Kharma Exquisite Reference 1Bs, assuming,
of course, that Pipes and Kharmas are still in your budget after you get done
paying for these drop-dead-gorgeous-sounding things. (If not, there is always
the Gamut.)