Ignore all the wife frilly nilly stuff...
Opinion: Since looking at amps, Ive heard a lot of input from both sides of the fence on brands, and the worthiness of separates in general. It's a pretty passionate subject (seems about as bad as Onkyo vs Denon
), and while I don't attempt to be an audiophile (lord knows I'm anal about video), I am still able to note differences. Since buying the Klipsch towers, Ive always loved the horns, but they were harsh to me in the beginning. As I grew accustomed to them I enjoyed the level of detail, and how they could be played loud, but still felt in scenes with a lot going (treble) some of the sounds felt especially squished together.
Tonight we watched Jack the Giant Slayer in 3D, and I had her cranked, about as much as I could stand. I noticed a change in general in how my setup usually sounds in the loud scenes. IMO, the center has more presence, and the fronts were more clean in scenes with a lot going on. What I mean is, they were still the Klipsch horn sound, and maybe a tad harsh, but all the detail was there and I didn't feel it was being squished. When those action scenes would take off from 0-100, it was loud, all the minor sounds and details amongst the more loud action seemed to still be there and defined. I can't really find the words to describe it, I'll just say that in loud action scenes, the lighter detail sounds (like armor clanking) seem to be well defined, and not lost in the other sound.
Of course this will take a lot more evaluation, but my initial impression is that when pushing the system, this amp is an improvement over the Denon 3312ci.
Fact: After the 2 hour movie, the Denon X4000 which was being used as a pre pro, is more hot than the UPA-500
