Concur, I still call the THX 789 a baby Phonitor lol. As stated above, I think that for solid state amps, it is diminishing returns and usually just better tech put into it or features…or in the case of the Fidelice, I look at it as a piece of “art” that people pay a premium for the name and look of it.
Nuance is another thing, I think that I described this on another thread…but I’ll post again here that I relate it to after learning more about photography…sRGB and AdobeRGB are two color standards in the industry, sRGB has been around since the 90’s I believe, and is the standard across majority of media screens (tv/monitors/phones/etc) but it is limited in the number of colors it can represent.
AdobeRGB is a newer and higher color count standard that allows for “better” color representation. So you would think everyone would use AdobeRGB for color editing their photos…well true…but it kind of doesn’t matter that much as majority of the audience for those pictures is viewing them on an sRGB screen so they can’t even see the missing nuance in the AdobeRGB color photos, also a lot of people can’t even tell the difference between the two standards as they don’t know what to look for… I’m still learning so even I have a hard time.
So, back on topic now that you know my reference/comparison point. I think of these amps (in general, not just the THX/Phonitor) sometimes as the sRGB compared to the AdobeRGB, if you know what to listen for you can spot the difference…this may seem ridiculous but I’ve known people to identify specific tube brands blind (which is crazy to me) or I guess even lookup milk testers…they can tell you all about a cows diet and where it’s from by tasting the milk…I know a couple of people that can identify DAC chips by listening to them blind, which is also crazy because I’ve only really begun to be able to somewhat kind of tell the difference between my DACs… (I prefer AKM and BurrBrowns lol).
So with that being said, when I compare Solid State amps such as the THX and the Phonitor or even the Schiit amps, I find that some are neutral and clean, while others are the same but seem to have more “fullness” to the sound or more nuance while still being neutral and clean…it has befuddled me trying to describe it without sounding crazy lol. So far, the above is the closest I have gotten to showcase the difference. I.E. it’s like seeing an sRGB photo, then looking at an AdobeRGB photo…I’ll be drawn more to the AdobeRGB photo but will have a hard time explaining why…but now that I know the difference I can begin to see that it is in the nuance of colors that I’m drawn to. So similarly, in amps, it is the “fullness” and nuance in tone, or darker background, better separation, and imaging, etc, while still being neutral that I’m drawn to.
I hope I thoroughly confused everyone to the point that their brains hurt and they need to sit down and listen to their favorite amps and headphones 