The power amplifier alone in an 18U is a great piece.
Wire it up as a stereo power amplifier, if you can.
IIRC, the power amp has a pair of 56,000uf 71V caps, and using that and the massive transformer, for just ’stereo’ is, well, overkill. Tons of reserve power.
It’s so good that if someone asked me for advice, for a 125 wpc 5 channel power amp (parasound, adcom, etc), and they said they could get an 18U at a good price, then.... I’d advise them to try that, instead of a dedicated power amp. As it is a very well built power amp, all on it’s own. To try the 18u along with the other pure power amps.
The 18u may easily outclass your onkyo, sound quality wise, if you use the onkyo for stereo and phono use, and switch to the 18u for this.
the drawback to the 18u is the potential to have it shut down from some fault in other unused parts of the circuitry, besides the parts you want to use. But you are already running that risk with the onkyo.
Wire it up as a stereo power amplifier, if you can.
IIRC, the power amp has a pair of 56,000uf 71V caps, and using that and the massive transformer, for just ’stereo’ is, well, overkill. Tons of reserve power.
It’s so good that if someone asked me for advice, for a 125 wpc 5 channel power amp (parasound, adcom, etc), and they said they could get an 18U at a good price, then.... I’d advise them to try that, instead of a dedicated power amp. As it is a very well built power amp, all on it’s own. To try the 18u along with the other pure power amps.
The 18u may easily outclass your onkyo, sound quality wise, if you use the onkyo for stereo and phono use, and switch to the 18u for this.
the drawback to the 18u is the potential to have it shut down from some fault in other unused parts of the circuitry, besides the parts you want to use. But you are already running that risk with the onkyo.