I had an AR 150M (class D) with an AR LS26 (tube) running electrostatics and it sounded sublime.
Tube Pre/ Class D Amp - Who has done it?
Open forum for those who have actually tried this. Really curious to know who has been happy, or maybe unhappy, with a tube preamp driving a Class D amplifier?
Of course, tube pre with a solid state amp is a classic pairing for hard to drive speakers, especially ESL's. This is a little different. I'm really curious to know what pres and Class D amps have had great synergy.
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I started with Rouge 7 and Bel Cantos m600’s. The sounds stage was poor, midrange was very laid back. Overall not very good. I decided the Bel Cantos were not my cup of tea. So I replaced them with AGD Audions and everything got better except the sound stage still sounded small and not tube like. So I replaced the Rogue with a Cary SLP 05 ultimate NOS Tubes and now I couldn’t be happier. |
@ghdprentice I've gone through most permutations of Pass Labs amps, Coda amps, and Audio Note integrated amps (SOTO SE and Cobra being my favorite). Current reference is an LTA Microzotl Level 2 preamp as a reference McGary SA1E tube amp. Before that I had a Supratek Cabernet. I use Class D Audio amps in my secondary theater system and even listen to music on them on occasion. I preferred them over the PS Audio M700 which as I stated earlier I greatly disliked. I've had the opportunity to demo the AGD Audion MKIII at Axpona over the course of a couple days and I loved them, but I need to try it in my space first. |
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