Anthem MCA 525

The Anthem MCA 525 is 61 pounds' worth of multichannel muscle. When Anthem visited Crutchfield to demo their line, I casually attempted to lift the MCA 525 — and was humbled by its heft. It will drive even power-hungry speakers to movie theater volume levels without breaking a sweat. And this well-engineered amp excels at controlling the stop-start motion of your speakers' drivers, enhancing virtually every aspect of sound quality from deep bass, to dynamics, to soundstaging. Usually, 5-channel amps like the MCA 525 are paired with A/V preamp/processors like Anthem's superb AVM 60 . But if your home theater receiver has preamp outputs — and many do, like Anthem's MRX Series models — you can easily connect the MCA 525 and use it to drive your main and surround channels. That surge of added power adds startling impact to movie soundtracks. The MCA 525 is constructed like 5 mono amps, with dual toroidal power supplies for plenty of stable power. The MCA 525's rated power output provides a clue to this amp's u...