One is a streaming all-in-one and the other is an amplifier. Judge them on how many boxes you want and what you already own, not on the spec sheet alone.
| Area | Better | Why |
|---|
| Power | A | Cambridge Audio Evo 300 has more power - 300W against 200W into 8 ohms. That is about 1.8dB, which is a small step in loudness but real headroom on peaks. |
| Grip on hard loads | evenly matched | Both behave much the same into 4 ohms - output increases strongly (550W and 350W). |
| Built-in DAC | A | Both decode on board. Cambridge Audio Evo 300 goes higher - 768kHz against 384kHz. Very few recordings exist above 192kHz, so treat this as headroom, not as sound quality. |
| Streaming | A | Only Cambridge Audio Evo 300 has AirPlay 2 and Chromecast. |
| Room to grow | evenly matched | The same expansion options on both. |
| Amplifier class | depends | Cambridge Audio Evo 300 is Class D and Rotel RA-1592 MKII is Class A/B. Class D runs cool and draws almost nothing at idle; Class A/B runs warm and is the long-established mainstream choice. Modern examples of both measure well - judge by the rest of the page. |
| Shelf space | depends | Cambridge Audio Evo 300 takes up about 23% less shelf area (1463cm² against 1888cm²), and it is 59mm shallower, which is the measurement that decides whether a rack door shuts. |
| Price | B | Rotel RA-1592 MKII costs less - $3,200 against $3,999 at list. |
A Cambridge Audio Evo 300 B Rotel RA-1592 MKII
depends neither is better in the abstract - it turns on your room, your system or how you will use them. Only specs published for both amplifiers are judged; anything missing on either side is left out rather than guessed.
Which should you choose?
Cambridge Audio Evo 300 leads across most of the measured areas for a fairly modest premium, so it is the easier pick if the budget stretches. Rotel RA-1592 MKII is the one to take if it does not.
What a spec sheet cannot show: how either sounds with your speakers, how the controls feel day to day, and what the app is like to live with - which is where most all-in-one amplifiers are actually won or lost. Power figures are the manufacturers' own and are not measured to a common standard, so treat small differences as noise. If you can hear both, that will tell you more than any row above.