Upgrading from Primaluna


Recently went down the front end upgrade path and am running a nice table and phono now. I'm curious as to what the weaker link in my system is between my Primaluna Dialogue Premium Preamp and my Dialogue Premium Hp Power Amp. I'm considering swapping out the amp to a Ps Audio BHK250 for the summer to avoid heat, but am curious if I would be better off dealing with the heat and moving up to say an Allnic L-7000/Arc Ref 3 for the Pre. I'm happy with tubes on the front end, but curious if I'm running out of gas with 88DB efficient speakers and a single chassis tube amp. Which amp would you upgrade first and what benefits would you expect?

128x128j-wall

I'd agree with most of the above, work on room, the Hana could be improved upon. Moving away from tubes may not be what you want, I had modded PL Dialogue Four, tried moving away from tubes to SS for summer listening, didn't work for me. In my case went to 300B monoblocks, although that solution wouldn't work for you with 88db speakers. I do agree you'd have to spend much more to substantially improve upon PL.

I"d also try diffusion as well as absorption at first reflection points. The 10' width really does limit you. With that small of size of room I don't see how amp power is a concern, unless you have severe impedance curve and amp has trouble coping. Quality of those watts of more importance if impedance not an issue.

 

Re speaker width try moving you speakers about one foot each toward the side walls and then cant (toe in) the speakers until the axis of your speakers cross in front of your listening position. Obviously it helps like hell if you can deaden the first reflection points but it is not as critical with the severe toe in. Also, I don't recall seeing you comment about the location of your listening chair, but it would probably be best located about 8 to 9 feet from the plane of the speakers (if aesthetics allow :-).

I have Sopra 2 running off BHK 250. I had a Krell KAV2250. Both are rated for 250x2 but believe it or not the PS Audio has way more power and slam for big hits. I bought used for 4000. Have not tried rolling tubes yet for sound changes but looking into that once the tube market settles down 

@j-wall

 

Thanks for the additional info. Photos would help also. From what you say of your room… even more the reason to work on room treatments, definitely. You want dampening behind you speakers… dampening along the side wall at reflection points, tube traps in the corner. You have tremendous opportunity to improve what you have.

 

If you post some more photos, we can perhaps be more helpful. Corner diffusers are really cheap… could also help.

How much heat can it possibly make? Is it appreciable enough to even worry about or to make much of a difference in room temp? I own a class A Amp that gets quite hot, but I mean I'm not sitting on top of it or near it. I use it year round...no idea why some make this an actual issue..it isn't.