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Amps from New Zealand

Just some news from down under. Most of you are familiar with Plinius amps and I see that they generally get great raps on Audiogon. Interestingly, their new SB300 is a class AB amp and it got a great review on the Audioenz website, withe reviewer claiming it to be the best Plinius he has heard so far.

Another New Zealand company, Perreaux produces some really good amps. I have experience with the 200P and 350P (and the SM6 reference preamp), having owned both and found that they are both capable of driving my Nautilus 802's. Today, I had the first listen to their 750P monoblocks. These were recently shown in New York. Anyone looking for a real grunty pair of monoblocks must audition these. With Sanibel Sound dealing with Perreaux products in the USA, it shouldn't be impossible. Ignore them at your peril.
markvetnz
markvetnz OP
20 posts
 
I am neither biased toward any company or their amps. I simply mentioned the Plinius amps because this is a company that has traditionally been heavily in favour of class A amps and it is interesting to note that they seem to be shifting away from Class A and its inherent inefficiencies toward class AB. As for the Perreaux, this was the first time I have heard amps this powerful. They were tremendous. If you are looking at amps in this category then try and have a listen. Personally I don't give a stuff what you spend your hard earned $ on. Have any of you heard the new Plinius 300B? Probably not. It has only just come out here in New Zealand. As for the monoblocks; fell free to buy anything you like but perhaps I could save you a few dollars by making a genuine recomendation.

In the land of the blind the one eyed man is King!
manuel_
38 posts
 
I was offered a Plinius SB300 in July/03, almost a year ago. I live in Spain and don´t consider "It has only just come out here in New Zealand"
Finally I bought a SA102, a horrible sounding class A amplifier that makes me very happy.
Am I biased towards Plinius? Maybe yes maybe not ...

In the land of the one eyed men, opticians don´t earn big profits!
trelja
3,223 posts
 
My own perspective is that while both Plinius and Perreaux often build some very good sounding products, I have personally witnessed reliability problems with each of them of late.

This always takes me back to when Perreaux pulled the plug on the US market in their last go 'round here. While I didn't get stung, I am sure a lot of folks can jump in here to share war stories of trying to ship a massive power amp halfway around the world for service. It wasn't that the company didn't support their customers, it is that it costs a tremendous amount of money to ship something on the order of 75 - 100 - 150 pounds to New Zealand. Expensive to the point where so many simply said the heck with it and just bought something else.

While I can be daring at times, my motto for both companies is currently, buy them at your own risk. Again, nothing against the sonics of either, although sometimes the Plinius gear can be a bit cool for my tastes if paired with the wrong speakers. Just one man's opinion...
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