INTimidate. With the Classic INT? Let's talk shop for a moment. You're Nagra. Trade shows are regular venues to promote your brand. Hello big rooms, often far bigger still than this Forthwise exhibit with Diesis Roma S.E. open baffles and dual 18" Bonham companion subwoofers. Let's be honest. That already well exceeds the listening rooms of most your clients. To impress crowds at such events where a visitor might hand you an 1812 Overture CD then ask for the remote relies on copious headroom. That's particularly so if you don't collaborate with loudspeakers of unusual sensitivities, diligently control what gets played at what SPL and strategically avoid the big expensive rooms to begin with. Eventually, such avoidance is bad for perception. Though it has four not two 300B, your valve amp in a compact Classic chassis clearly won't do now. Even if a Classic INT would, it'd just not impress enough. Instead you need behemoths of a kilowatt into low Ω, of a 1'600VA transformer per channel. If required, bi-amp. Use four. So you design then build yourself just such beasts. Alors, Nagra HD Amp towers. Your brand just hit the big times of big exhibits with big speakers and big crowds.
That's properly intimidating. In such venues, it also means click bait for show reports or review requests and creates the necessary airs of opulence, exoticism and exclusiveness which the hifi market at its uppermost end relies upon. But is any of it relevant to your own 4x6m room, to the actual power/SPL requirements of your speakers and listening habits?
If you're still Nagra, big expensive power amps are an absolute prerequisite for brand perception, cachet, extreme applications and opening up luxury markets. If you're back at being Joe Private and honest with yourself, impressing crowds of strangers with over-the-top exhibits in ball rooms no longer tracks. Why should you pay for any it? Half the stuff wouldn't even fit into your room to begin with. When sanity returns because reality intrudes, INTimidate morphs to more INTimate then Classic INT.
Which isn't to say that its 200/4Ω watts couldn't be seriously INTense and INToxicating in our normal-sized rooms and INTo the speakers that are appropriate for them. As reviewer Lim Yuan put it: "The Classic's sound could be perceived by some, especially old-school 'tube sound' aficionados, to have a leaner harmonic presentation. I do confess to having a preference toward perhaps a breathed-on degree of midband richness, better than it being anaemic and sterile sounding; or having a mid-bass and lower midrange that can make make some recordings devoid of weight. I never felt this with the Classic, however, and felt its presentation in the end to be actually more convincing." Having experimented with valve amps both SE and p/p and tube preamps including rare DHT versions, this resonated. It encapsulates why today I listen to actively buffered passive or autoformer preamps into advanced transistor amplifiers. My tube adventures eventually registered as indulgences in colorations which no longer pleased me as much as quicker more insightful less 'padded' circuits. Of course padding needs no tubes. Designers so inclined can also groom transistors for warmth, softness and harmonic density. Where on that axis would the Classic INT fall?
When a 2020 shopper asked on a forum about that, "the separates are much better. You can get most of Nagra's house sound which is very natural, smooth but powerful and defined by simply adding the Classic Preamp into the chain. I heard Nagra's pre with Bryston amplification of all things and it was amazing. Plus I think the Nagra Classic preamp is better engineered than either the Classic integrated or Classic Amp. However the Classic Amp is much better than the integrated."
Untrue. The 
Classic INT is the Classic Amp plus linestage functionality. Hifi racism just can't accept that. But it's certainly true that if you want tubes and headphone drive, you'll want the separates at right.
Power-amp wise, it just won't buy you more or better. Just look under the hoods. It's right there. So are 100 watts. Watts-for-euro buyers are honor-bound to overlook either Nagra. While avoiding imperfect summing from paralleled parts, a single 'purist' pair of Exicon transistors per channel won't do more. That's reserved for bridging Classic Amps to 200w/8Ω; or extra transistors in the 250-watt HD Amps whose peak power into 1Ω is 1'650 watts according to this review. Classic INT buyers know that 200w/4Ω are sufficient for their needs; and are happy to part with a third of the HD's ask to achieve them.
It seems not far-fetched to suggest that—minus low-Ω drive where the HD's far bigger power supply has disproportionate advantages!—the Classic Amp and Classic INT are half-sized versions of the statement monos. The real limitation in the Classic range is the chassis size which Nagra allow themselves. It determines what fits inside. That has direct bearings on power supplies. At right we saw the stacking which the big caps of the Classic Phono require to fit. As a brand with enviable history tied to laboratory looks and footprints, anything called 'classic' must operate within clearly defined parameters. Defiance would mean no longer being recognizably classic Nagra. And who ever heard of nouveau Nagra? That's where being iconic is both blessing and curse. Writing that is ridiculously easier than having to steer a big firm through such turbulent waters. Given the acclaim Nagra collected since splitting their portfolio into Classic and HD ranges, management clearly navigated them expertly. Now we've got the Classic INT genesis story, its tech, features and hardware relatives.
Full HD setup at Nagra's Montreal dealer Filtronique.
