Yamaha AX596 is an excellent reliable home amplifier. I use it in my home office. It has a lovely rich sound and drives my Kef bookshelf speakers, or my Kef Ref 104 floorstanders or my Jamo floorstanders with 10" base units, all with great ease. The build quality is great too, nice and heavy. It has really good shielding, so I do not have to worry about either mains or air borne interference. I bought this stereo amp because I already had a Yamaha DSPAX1 in my TV lounge and I was so impressed with it. I would recommend this amp to anyone but you will have to get one off Ebay now as they are discontinued.

I was so impressed with the AX-396 (see other reviews in Yamaha amps), that I bought the AX-596 for no other reason than to own it. Just like the 396, the 596 looks mean and does an equally great job, faithfully reproducing all that goes into its circuitry, for your listening pleasure, with more wattage to boot. While the AX-396 has 60 watts p/c, the AX-596 has at least 100 watts p/c and it will let you know it too, if you have a good speaker system that can handle it and it won't break down at higher output like other brands might. Coupled to a Yamaha Grpahic EQ, this unit is the top line thoroughbred in my stable and it can match easily the heaphone amp (no brand name here) which I also have linked to this system and that is no easy feat to achieve. Many other amps just cannot do this simply because their headphone circuits are more a hurried afterthought than a true integral part of the amp. The AX-596 has the ability to absolutely make all my music sound great. It has great subtle sounding low end bass and ear splitting high end and everything in between is magnificent.

As I quoted above, I bought this amp as a treat to myself because I love the AX-396 and straight amps (without extra bells and whistles on them) are rapidly disappearing from shops now, in favour of the home theatre amps which are sadly taking over, but the nature of this beast becomes apparent as soon as you use it. It is made for all applications and like the AX-396, it sounds great no matter how you use it or with what other components. If I was to award the AX-396 10 out of 10, then this amp would get 11 out of 10 if it was possible.

Rest assured that owning one of these amps will leave you wanting for nothing else. It simply and unadulteratedly (there's a big word) does what is was made for...

In a single word - "Perfection"...