Krell New Pre-amps?

Krell is in business to make money. The enormous, heavy, high end products they used to make appeal to an extremely small group of consumers. The younger generations currently appear to be more interested in convenience and portable music than great sounding music.

Krell's current product line is still high end, but not as high end as in the past. Their new amps and processors are designed to fit into professionally installed rack systems. They are targeting a slightly different group of consumers for business reasons.

I have owned many Krell products over the years. My current system has 2 Krell Evo 600E mono blocks, one Evo 400E mono block (center channel), one Evo 302E stereo amp (rear channels), and the Evo 707 processor. All connected with Cast. I absolutely love the old Krell products. I love the sound and build quality.

Their new amplifiers have internal fans rather than large heavy heat sinks to dissipate heat, and the power output does not double as ohms are halved (very un-Krell). I don't like fans, moving parts create noise and vibrations and tend to break down. I have not auditioned any of their new products, so I cannot comment on the sound.

If you buy a used Evo 707, make sure it has been fully updated. The DSP chip used in the original 707 had trouble handling HDMI audio (all other audio sources were not a problem). This was resolved a few years after release by installing an different DSP chip at the fell factory at no charge.

I am a busy guy. Rather than FED-EX my unit in it's original box, I closed my office and drove to the Krell factory in Connecticut to personally deliver my Evo 707 for an update last spring (HDMI 1.4 compatible, new DSP chip, software update). I waited in town for several hours while they kindly did the update. I met with Patrick Bresnahan, who was very informative and generous with his time and attention. That demonstrates how much I adore the EVO 707.

I think the 707 was a bargain, even at $30,000. It has 7 channels all very close in quality to the $40,000, 2 channel Evo 2. It also has the digital processing for HDMI. My advice: use the pre-amp analog bypass for music, do not use the digital processing for music. Also, I only use 2 channel stereo for music, the digital processor surround sound messes up the sound stage and diminishes the sound quality (in my opinion). The processor does sound amazing with BluRay Discs movies in master audio.

The Krell 700CX amp is a fantastic amp. I have listened to it many times. I previously owned a couple of MCX mono blocks and loved them. The Evo 707 will work great with your amp. Use Krell Cast MMF cables (sold by Krell, made by Nordost). You will be blown away by the EVO 707. I think a pre-amp has much greater effect on sound quality than a power amp.

I did not upgrade my 707 to 3D because I don't care for 3D TV in it's current rendition. When I upgrade to 4000K TV (when it becomes mainstream), I will continue to use the Evo 707 even though it is not 4000K (HDMI 2.0) compatible. Patrick has told me it would be very difficult to make the EVO 707 HDMI 2.0 compatible (not sure why). It is unlikely that Krell will ever make HDMI 2.0 available for the EVO 707. I will have to connect the video signal directly into the TV. This is something you should consider if you plan to buy a 707. Personally, I would still buy it.

By the way, I think Krell still considers the EVO 707 a 'current' model. I don't think it has been officially archived like the rest of the 'Evolution' line. It is a very special, unique audio product. Unfortunately, I am sure it will be retired very soon.

The only way I would ever give up my EVO 707, is if a better sounding processor becomes available. I don't see that happening in the near future.

So, in all my years involved with the high end audio/home theater hobby (since 1974), if you asked my does one product stand out as being extra special and a favorite, it would be the Krell EVO 707.

One last piece of advice: Before buying a used Evo 707, call a few high end audio shops (also call Krell directly for audio shop referrals) and inquire if they have new 707's or demo, fully updated models. If it is officially discontinued, they will sell new at steep discounts.

Matjet, man, what a great response, Thankyou, that was informative, Thankyou for the kind words on my Krell 700cx, as a matter of fact, krell has it right now, be back by the end of next week, they are going to ship it back monday, they had to do some proccessor ajustments on the left side of the amp, before that, I put 225 hours on it, It's a brand new modded krell 700cx inside and out, me and the wife droped a huge amount of money into the amp, it has 2014 capacitors that was not available in 2005 when the amp was made, then krell changed all kinds of crazy parts inside other than just the caps, you should see the bag of parts they sent back, The amp sounds way,way, better than any stock krell 700cx I have listened to, the amp is essentially new inside and out,The treble is the most prolific grainless, non brittle treble I have ever had the pleasure of hearing, and the mid-range is uncanny, to sum it up, the amp sounds like we got alot more costly amp product than what it retailed for, we are Happy, estatic, dancing around like we are young again when playing the amp, sorry, I lost my self in the joy the amp has brought us, my bad, I have never listened to cast connections, I know quite abit about it though, however, I would be very amused if nordost cast cable connected to cast could out perform my interconnect that I am useing, likly, impossible!, cheers.

matjet, what do you use for digital?

Matjet, you do got my interest going to want the 707 unit, do you believe the krell 707 can compete with world class state of the art solid state pre-amps out there?, if so, I might can ride off into the sunset with such a product and not look back like you, what a system you have!

matjet, I forgot to tell you why krell had to do adjustments, you guessed it, the amp was way to hot on top of the amp on the left side, caused the bias to run wild!, they have tested the amp for 3 whole weeks, when they did all that they did to my amp, they put all new proccessors inside of it, I suppose the one on the left channel was not working correctly after 225 hours of use, I got to get to 500 hours before the amp is fully burned-in,I will get back to that by thursday of next week, cheers.