best preamp ever - cost is no object

Last Tuesday I got an H-Cat P-12R line stage. I very much doubt if any line stage or preamp can be its equal.

I estimate that I have owned 45 preamps during my long sojourn in audio. I recently got the six and hopefully final version of the H-Cat P-12 line stage. From the first version that won TAS Golden Ear Award, I have been impressed with this technology, label Doppler correction. This gives more precise location of instruments and vocalists with all frequencies originating at one point. This yields no smear to the sound and great tonal accuracy.

While the P-12R is still getting better, I find myself restless to hear other records and discs to hear whether they too sound far superior to how they used to sound. Brass and transients leap at you as they do in live music if you are as near as the microphones. Drums have the impact that that I had previously only heard on compression driven horns.

As an innovative circuit, this device has evolved. Early on I thought it was excellent, but then it got better in the P-12B and better yet again in the P-12B X5. The only real word to describe the sound was realism. I thought the last version could not be improved, but I was wrong, very wrong. I know of five others who now have their P-12Rs and who are also raving. You must hear this unit.

Good tennis analogy - mainly on the fact that technology has immproved all over this years and audience is now broader, let me elaborate.

How would Connors performance would be improved at his time with the new light materials used on raquets, better grip tennis shoes, improved trainning techniques in 20 years ahead (Marantz 7c, Mac c22) or the other side around: short point rallyes, marekting interest preassure on the player, short term winning long term strategies? etc..

Bottom line: It is not only a matter of playfields, but also sinergy and subjective evaluation that will provide us a way to express OUR very personal thinking on the best preamp (that is why I own an integrated now je je je)

Enjoy,

Fernando

hi tbg:

i understand that you feel that the h cat is your favorite preamp. how can you say that it has no peer.

i think that asserting that a product is better than its competition is not helpful. you haven't auditioned every preamp that is in current production and yet you make a statement which is so subjective.

wouldn't it be more realistic to say "the h cat is my favorite preamp because........"

by the way if someone prefers a tube sound, why would he/she want to audition the h cat, which, i heard several years ago in my own system. i'm glad you like it, but it sounds like a typical solid state preamp. i heard the preamp with its companion amp.

Agreed with Mrtennis.

The word "best" is so overused and misused, that its meaning is almost lost. To say that something is your favourite (i.e. "I like it best of all") is not the same as to claim that something is "the best" in absolute terms.

As I see it, audio equipment can be evaluated in two ways.

1. On technical grounds (i.e. objective criteria that is measurable and quantifiable)

2. On aesthetic terms (i.e. a subjective appraisal of the beauty of how something sounds).

Either approach is valid, and both approaches can be combined in order to render an opinion. However, one must accept the inherent limitation that aesthetics are subjective, thus opinions on such matters are relevant only in relation to the mind of the listener. Consequently it is improper to apply the word "best", in unqualified terms, to a subjective opinion.

Having said that, my favourite preamp is the Orpheus Two.
:)

Mrtennis and Oxia, of course I agree that no one can really say anything is the best. I must say, Oxia, that I don't regard what limited aspects we can measure as a superior method for evaluation. This is the old objectivist position.

Given the many line stages I have heard, however, none even approaches the new P-12R. As a long time tube equipment user who often dismissed solid state linestages with the exception of the TAD, I can assure everyone that the P-12R has none of the characteristics of either tubes or transistors.

As I have said, I have had six or seven different versions of this line stage as it evolved into the exceptional unit I have today. I just replaced an H-Cat of two versions ago with the P-12R. One would not want to listen to the old unit, as good as it was.

I don't think there is much purpose in verbally discussing sound other than to say, "wow, you have got to hear this."