New amp with tone controls

I’m sure someone will come along to say that you don’t need tone controls, but as Chebby as mentioned elsewhere you might want salt and pepper to compliment your meal which I think is an apt analogy.

I always use “Source Direct” when absolutely possible but there are times when it just doesn’t do the job. What the heretics don’t understand is that sometimes you need to “tweak” the sound to overcome awful production, mastering, etc., so I’ll leave you to argue amongst yourselves.

Anyway, I’m watching Dragons Den so…. I’M OUT!

Which Alpha do you have?

Personally I'd look at Nad 326, Arcam DIVA range as a god starting point. 

Take a look at the Rotel RA 12 as a more powerful version of the RA 10 with in built DAC thats 

as good as any stand alone dac under £200.

Another Arcam would be the obvious choice.

Re. more 'oomph' in the bass department, a more powerful amp will more likely than not, tighten up any bass if the speakers were not controlled properly in the first place. This may seem like less bass, but be more 'punchy and tight'.

For more bass, you are better off looking at a speaker change.

I've been really happy with the sound archived from my current set up for years, a Roksan Kandy CD player, Arcam Alpha 2 played through a pair of Mission 757's. It's a great sound but the amp is knackered. I tried a pair of MissionMX5's but it sounded awful so really just want a new amp that will re-create my current set up. Less bass would be a concern but with about£600 to spend might be able to buy a new amp and new speakers. I listen mainly to prog rock like Rush, Genesis, Yes, ELP etc with lots of heavy stuff like Foo's QOTSA Killing Joke as well as Queen Sabbath Led  but also have a huge classical collection and Rat Pack, but I do like tone controls for listening to the likes of Queen.

I picked up my Arcam A85/P85 combo (not together) for around £500.

Can't fault it for that price and recommended if you don't mind trying your luck with second hand gear. Obviously, you won't be able to hear beforehand, but the beauty of buying second hand is that you shouldn't lose much, if anything, should you want to move them on in future. 

I have to say I like tone controls too, and always think that the frankly daft idea some people have of using very expensive interconnects to act as some sort of tone contol arose as an indirect result of many hifi amps losing the real thing...