Compact Low-Powered Amp Recomendations?

It used to be very doable but now that copper costs a fortune, there are fewer options. I would look for Antique Sound Labs Wave 8 monoblocks. There is a pair for sale here now (I have no affiliation whatsoever). You will get much more power supply with them than you would with a stereo amp - and that is important IMO. And they are quite small.

Arthur

Hummm, the seller of those ASL WAVE 8's is asking nearly double what they sold for brand new a few years ago. Admittedly they were a bargain at $99/ea. (no cage), $119/ea. (w/tube cage), but $400 seems a bit obscene to me.

Another nice choice would be a Sophia Baby. I saw one here recently for $295. There is a small tube amp kit called SPUD being sold on the Hawthorne Audio site for $285. You would need to build it, but it looks like an easy build.

You might want to consider the simplicity of something like the Trends 10.1. It cost $150 brand new and it has gotten excellent reviews. Another choice might be the Super-T amp from Sonic Impact, $139 brand new and it has also gotten favorable reviews. Both the Trends and SI Super-T would produce basically zero noticable heat.

Enjoy,

TIC

I have a Sophia Baby...very nice. Also Sophia made an el34 amp that has been dc'd but is available on A'gon for 400 to 500

All,

Thanks for the feedback. I am now leaning more towards the purchase of a low powered integrated (more flexible). Any ideas?

Steve

Second the sophia reccomendations. Also that Trends unit mentioned before is absolutely stunning. www.audiomagus.com sells them in stock ot tweaked form.

I had a stock baby and a stock trends driving bg ribbon monitors and while both were good, the trends high frequency pureness stol the show.

All,

Thanks for the feedback. I am now leaning more towards the purchase of a low powered integrated (more flexible). Any ideas?

Steve

Steve,

The Trends is a near no-brainer at $150 brand new. You can resell it at 50% of list if you don't like it and only lose $75!

I have the Red Wine Audio Reali-T and it is really good. It is a 6 w/channel integrated amp with a Scott Nixon DacKit built in. It's a really flexible unit and it sounds great! The Red Wine Audio Clari-T is basically the same thing without the built-in DAC. I've seen Clari-Ts sell for well under $500. It's pretty spankin' good and it's battery powered! But, it's automatic charging system makes it work just like any other amp.

Enjoy,

TIC

BTW, If I were looking for the ultimate cool office system, I would have to look at one of these:

http://cls.audiogon.com/cgi-bin/cls.pl?dgtlplay&1194920311

It's an all-in-one CD Player, tube amp, tube pre-amp and tuner in one cool package. Gotta love the hidden volume control and selector knobs built into the top of the front post. How cool is that?!!!!

Oh, and you can even stick you iPod onto it!!!!

Enjoy,

TIC

Reubent,

Thanks! The TA 10.1 definately sounds like a no brainer. I'm a little concerned about having to keep an eye out on the DC offset. So many choices....

Steve

Steve,

I don't own the TA10.1, but I have a friend who owns it and he says it is very good. He modified his a bit as was suggested on some web forum. Anyway, his system is one of the best I've ever heard, so I trust that when he says it's good, it's good!

I can also tell you that the Red Wine Audio Clari-T or Reali-T are very good, but more expensive than the TA10.1. I just got a new CD player and honestly I'm shocked at how good the Reali-T (Clari-T amp, plus DAC which I'm not using) now sounds driving my DIY Hemp Acoustics single driver speakers.

Enjoy the hunt.

TIC