Is the Eico HF 81 really that good?

Someone always has to dispute statements So , Larry510 sorry to have to tell you your wrong --- Sam's claim to fame is that he "completely redesigns" and even "fixes " design flaws in the original vintage gear just using the original trans and the chassis and case-which is what he did to the hf-81 reviewed by Peter Breuninger. Read page 159 in Stereophile. That ain't no basic restoration if you ask me. But you can ask Sam himself. Here's his # call him 514 485 3587. I've heard several of his "restorations" of vintage amps etc. They ALL sound great but not very close to the originals. None the less , the ORIGINAL 81 does sound good. BTW Larry510 , did you ever hear Sam's or an original hf-81? Curious to hear your impressions.

Once again JA's measurements call into question the hearing & judgement of his reviewers.

I go the opposite way on this one. Once again whatever JA is meausuring has little correlation to how an amp will sound.

After all, the BPC (mostly silver now) from Best Buy all have better measurements than that EICO. I'll take the EICO anyday & everyday.

hi Lolo

from page 159 of June Stereophile,

"The EICO was restored by Sam Kim of Sam's Audio Labs in Montreal,Canada. The work done included replacing the output and filtering capacitors and all out of tolerence resistors, rebuilding the volumn control, rewiring the undercarriage and resoldering every eonnection."

The author goes on but nowhere does he mention modifying the circuit. As far as I can tell from reading this it was a complete restoration.

Yes I have a restored EICO HF-81 and it's a great amp. I paid a total of 600 dollars for it. In spite of JA's measurements it sounds great ( much like SET amps )!! For copmparison I have tube amps from Cary Audio, Wright Sound Labs and Conrad Johnson.

For the price you pay it's unbeatable and can keep up with many " state of the art " modern amps at a fraction of the cost.

All I can say is get one and listen to it, you will be astounded and wonder why you spend so much on the new stuff.

Larry

I think the Eico HF-81 has incredible musicality. If you allow yourself to have an open mind see how you just widely smile hearing real acoustic instruments and voice on this amp played through todays better speakers (use ones with an easy load for amp with efficiencies over 90db/m). Some complex musical crescendo at higher volumes, for example, get blurred but these nits aside check the threads on audiogon and elsewhere about this low parts quality but timeless circuit amp. These accolades came long before the Stereophile review. BTW: The mono versions of this amp HF-12 are a super value and give the benefits of dual mono-design.

The Eico was not modified. Only restored. The volume control had to be rebuilt because of bad sweeper pad. At low volumes the left channel was down 20db.

Sam also resoldered everything.

I have heard four of these and my mint unrestored one sounded great although it was soft in the bass---it needed electrolytics. The two Sam did are tighter and more open on top. These amps are really really good.

Peter Breuninger
Stereophile Contributing Editor