No single best amplifier here. What decides it is what you have to drive, what you need to plug in, and how much of the system you want in one box.
| Area | Better | Why |
|---|
| Power | A | PS Audio Stellar Strata MK2 has more power - 100W against 80W into 8 ohms. That is about 1dB, which is a small step in loudness but real headroom on peaks. |
| Grip on hard loads | B | Denon PMA-3000NE holds up better into a 4-ohm load: its output nearly doubles to 160W, where the other increases strongly. That matters with demanding speakers far more than the 8-ohm figure does. |
| Built-in DAC | evenly matched | Both have a DAC on board with much the same capability. |
| Amplifier class | depends | PS Audio Stellar Strata MK2 is Class D and Denon PMA-3000NE 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 | PS Audio Stellar Strata MK2 takes up about 28% less shelf area (1481cm² against 2066cm²), and it is 132mm shallower, which is the measurement that decides whether a rack door shuts. |
| Price | A | PS Audio Stellar Strata MK2 costs less - $3,499 against $3,799 at list. |
| Watts per dollar | A | PS Audio Stellar Strata MK2 is the cheaper watt - about $35 per watt against $47. A blunt measure, and it says nothing about how either sounds, but it is the honest one for raw output. |
A PS Audio Stellar Strata MK2 B Denon PMA-3000NE
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?
PS Audio Stellar Strata MK2 has the edge on paper, though not by much. The rows marked "depends" are more likely to decide this than the score is. If your speakers are a difficult load - 4 ohms nominal, big woofers, or a sensitivity in the low 80s - Denon PMA-3000NE is the safer partner, because how an amplifier behaves when the impedance drops matters more than its 8-ohm rating.
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.