How does Berning ZH270 compare to Cary Cad211 AE ?

Tomryan:
How does your 890 compare with your Air Tight? Looking for specifics here please! TIA

I have owned both amps, but, not the merlins. Both have their own merits. I have, in fact owned over 35 amps in the past few years(2.5)My suggestion is neither, as my Dodd 120 bettered each, and most others in my most important catagory. Musical. Extended. Detailed. Musical. If you have a chance to get these, jum[ on it. They are very inexpensive.....so most of us audiophools would never consider them. I just received my Lamm ML2's today, so hopefully, they will have some real compitition. It's funy, my tube compliment for the dodd's cost me about the same as the amps, go figure.

Can anyone tell me if the Joule VAMP integrated has the same sound as the seperates described here . I have been checking into this int. and the Berning 270 . I would like to know how these two integrateds compare to each other .
My apologies to you Nr9 !

Two quick comments:
Saki70 - I believe Joule is no longer supporting the VAMP. I don't know this for a fact but I would contact Joule before buying one.
Nr9 - I find the Audience AU24 cables to be slightly lean. I like it better than Valhalla but if you are looking for a warm cable I'd look elsewhere.
I have not heard the Berning or this particular Cary amp but I find most Cary products too warm and euphonic for my tastes. I don't know how well they work with Merlins but the Atma-Sphere amps are very, very good.

The Air Tight and EAR are two very different designs, the first being SET 300B and the second P/P EL34. One with 8wts and the other 70. I had to sell the Air Tight because it wouldn't properly drive my Harbeth C7-ES2s. They like and need some power.

The Air Tight was a superb SET and I wish I'd found speakers that were easy to drive and would work in my small room. However, I have to say that I have not for one minute missed the SET "sound" as the EAR is also superb and I get beautiful music making from it. It's also a little quieter than the Air Tight and also has dual mono gain control. That is a great feature on the Air Tight. If the Harbeth was 90db, 8 ohms flat, and had a simple and easy crossover, I'd have not gone looking for a new amp and would have kept the Air Tight. I don't miss it one bit though - the EAR is that good. I bought Stereophile reviewer Art Dudley's unit as he bought the sample he reviewed. He had to buy $20,000.00 Lamms to beat it.

I also found the Audience a bit lean in my system and with a slight upper end hash. I use Cardas Gold Refs for ICs and TG Audio speaker cables.