any hear dared or ming da amps?

S23chang may be over stating his dislike of the Ming-da a little bit. However he is correct most Chinese tube amps are on the warm, smooth and fat side. The Chinese tend to like things on the romantic side. Which is probably why the majority of tube CDP's come from China.

I had a Jolida 202A which is voiced for extra warmth and bloom. I came to perty much the same conclusions about the Jolida, that S23chang came to about the Mingda: smooth, warm, romantic but ultimatly a little boring and flat.

However many like the sound so I wouldn't discount it, we all hear differently and all have different needs.

Just make sure you are no a tube amp novice. Unlike the Jolida with external biasing the Ming-da requires internal biasing-burning then rebiasing. If not a competent tech will do this for around $100.

BW Maxx

Maxx make a great point "Just make sure you are no a tube amp novice."
While Ming Da might not be the worst Chinese amp, it is still have very high failure rate like other Chinese amps. They discontinue their "bad" model so fast that new model come out every year or so. A friend of my call up the dealer from Hong Kong regarding to the Ming Da amp he bought from them one month ago (as a latest model) and he was told that model already discontinued due to high failure rate. Obviously the amp left his house to some "novice" buyer the following week.
I always suggest my buddies to get a chinese amp for dirt cheap and throw away its transformers, caps, resistors and pots and replace it with the proven circuit and audio grade parts. This way you can have the best of the both world. You get your nice appearance with real audio grade parts.

I know this thread is asking about amps but I'll throw my 2 cents in anywhay.
I have a Dared SL-2000A preamp with Bugle Boy 12AT7's and a fat RCA rectifier.
I bought this preamp because it looked cool and I wanted to compare it to my $1600.00 'Stereophile Class B' well respected, USA made preamp with VG NOS tubes.
I since have sold the 'well respected' preamp as the Dared simply is a better sounding preamp.
I bought the Dared NIB from a dealer for $315.00

David99, As far as preamp goes, it doesn't require good output transformer and the current and voltage requirement are less limited factor by its power transformer. Therefore, preamp is a very different story. As long as you have the proper design then it will sound decent. Not sure what class B preamp you have but most of the tube preamp will sound better than its solid state counterpart in the same price or higher price range. Since we're not talking about preamp, we can have this discussion else where.

Hi David, Even though I've never heard any Dared. I don't doubt what you heard at all. My amp (Jungson) and CDP (Eastound) are both Chinese. I've been into audio since 1973 and these are the two best pieces of equipment I have ever owned.

From my experience and the feedback from other owners of top tier Chinese products its very normal for them to compete with products at 3-4X the price and more.

I also wouldn't doubt if many owners of Ming-da feel the same way. Its all what you value in sonics and how it matches your other equipment.