A lot was made in the day how Carver knew how to make solid state amps sound like tube amps by altering the amps transfer function. Peter Aczel explained it in detail in the old Audio Critic. One of the first amps, the MC 400, I think, was altered to sound just like the Conrad Johnson Premier 1 which was a 150 lb tube behemoth putting out over 300 wpc, and costing over $5k in the early '80's. At the time the CJ was Absolute Sound's choice for best sounding amp of all time, and was one of the products that started the preposterous pricing escalation of audio gear resulting in the routinely priced $50 k "flagship" amps, dacs and preamps we see today.
If Carver's amps were made to mimic the characteristic tube amplifier sound is it any wonder we are seeing the poor distortion numbers Amir has measured on two of these products?
I think we might see better number on some of the solid state classics of the day, though not the Levlinson ML-2 which was designed to run in pure class A with zero negative feedback. But something like a Hafler DH 200 would be an interesting review from this era, and might have performance numbers in line with today's solidly engineered class AB designs.