I would like to see a higher end mono block
amp that matches the indiviual amps in the
planned 790 amp in performance.

What do you mean by higher end? More power? More features? Gold faceplate?

Just curious.

to start more power and higher SNR

More power is probably going to be difficult in that form factor without forced air cooling.

A lower noise floor could be achieved by ratcheting up the feedback, which has its own set of problems.

An ideal solution for an amp in a "pizza box" form factor would be a digital amp as they are substantially more efficient (~90%) and produce a lot less heat and require less input power for a given amount of power output. The downside is that I haven't seen any "bargain priced" digital amps yet that I'd put in the audiophile arena in terms of sonic quality. But it's only a (short) matter of time.

Cheers,

The M2200 seems to represent something of a sweet spot in monoblock amp pricing and power. A larger monoblock would have a correspondingly larger price tag, and may not be as likely to find as large a market. Of course, the 790 is going to have a price tag somewhere above the 770 and its successor, and the sheer power demands of that amp will require a lot of infrastructure to support (I'm figuring that the only way to fully utilize a 790 is to have two dedicated circuits in place solely feeding the amp), so maybe there is some interest in developing an amp for a smaller market segment.

As for the actual logistics of it, there are a few options. I agree with Ritz that the existing "pizza box" 1U approach would probably become difficult to sustain in a 300W @ 8ohm design. They could do a monoblock in a different cabinet, though. For example, Marantz and others have done monoblocks that are roughly 1/3 the standard component width so that three would sit side-by-side on a shelf. Since the M200 and M2200 are a completely different design than the amp modules used in the Outlaw multichannel amps (both the 770/755 and the planned 790), the 790's amp modules would not be able to migrate to a monoblock without some sort of significantly different cabinet design such as the 1/3-width form factor (which would likely retain the height and depth of the multichannel amps). Even then, I don't know if there would be room for a sufficiently large toroidal power supply in such a cabinet if it has to feed a 300W amp, but I'm just a mechanical engineer so it may not be as hard as I'm imagining. Maybe a half-width chassis? That would even let the amp module rotate 90 degrees and possibly reduce the height of the cabinet. Digital amps may also be an option, but that technology is still in the process of evolving - with Outlaw's fairly extensive array of solid state amps, I doubt they'll enter the market with a digital switching amp until it is a bit more mature.

I would settle for a 3 channel version of
the 790 :-)

How about a two channel 200 wpc amp that could be bridged to 500-600 watts mono?

That's might work - but would need three
of them...

I've never looked inside an M200/2200 (and no pics are offered on the Outlaw website), but it must be difficult to fit a quality power supply in there and give it adequate cooling without forced air cooling. Maybe someone with a 2200 can pop the top and post some pics? For a traditional solid state amp (and w/tube amps as well), the power supplies begin to take over all the available real estate pretty quickly as power levels increase.

For comparison (and not a good one since this unit is a lot more expensive and slightly taller), the Lyngdorf SDA2175 digital amp will do 200wpc into 8ohms and nearly 400wpc into 4 ohms. At maxiumum rated power, it uses less than 900 watts of input power. A traditional solid state design would probably use twice that amount of power since they are about half as efficient (the difference being thrown off as heat).

The other suggestion, having a stereo amp in "pizza box" form factor that can be bridged is probably not possible with the current form factor (or Outlaw would probably be doing it) without forced cooling at the price points us Outlaw consumers have become accustomed to. 8-)

Cheers,

Back to the age-old question:....how much power is enough?