Emotiva XSP-1 Pre-amp

Hi audionut

Have you tried posting your XSP-1 preamp questions in Emotiva's Lounge/Forum. Maybe there can be some people there who can help you with your problems with the XSP-1. Emotiva employees check there periodically and are more than willing to help.

Hi Jedinite24,
No, maybe I should do that and see what happens. Thanks.

Thanks for all the nice opinions. I am still expecting more reviews before I make up my decision.

The preamp is starting to open up. The thin sound quality is now sounding much fuller. The soundstage has opened up. The bass, while still not the equal to my YS Audio Balanced A2SE, has improved nicely. It's sounding much less like a solid state preamp and becoming very enjoyable. I also changed my CD player which has helped to improve the sound. My first report was when the preamp had about three hours on it. Now it has about 25. I still don't care for the looks of it. Very cheap looking. And it actually looks heavier than it is.

I ended up selling this preamp. The YS Audio Balanced A2SE is a far better preamp than the Emotiva XSP-1. The McIntosh MCD201 CD player made the Emotiva sound better, but I just couldn't get passed the Emotivas' dry two-dimensional sterile sound. Very poor customer service too.