Are some of us cultish in our beliefs

Launche, yes i did break my commiitment to get the Cayin A88, as i saw the opportunity for the Xiansheng. But as you point out at these price points the Cayin can still bea possibility. That is if the Xian, due to arrive tomorrow, should not meet some expectations. If it does not, then I may not in fact get the Cayin , as it also has KT88's. I tried some EH KT88's in my JOR, and the sound was flat and just aweful. THe JOR has KT90's and offers a perfect balance with bass, mids, highs.
. The PV web site mentions this amp has bass, so we'll see.
If the amp turns out to be a dud, I'm only out of pocket $700, and may either list it (doubt it'd sell, but then maybe at $500, with the Cayin I;d be out $1200) or give it to a friend. When I say dud, meaning the KT88 is not the sound I;'m after for my classical.
The new opportunities offered from china are entriguing, and they seem to learn well.

in addition to equipment preferences, there are sonuc preferences.

rather than be concerned about sound, i'm concerned about timbre. i'm a timbre "nut".

are there any soundstage , dynamics, timbre, bass, et al. "nuts" out there ?

Mrtennis- Your confession about timbral fealty is utterly on target although I don't see how you can differentiate it from a concern for sound.
I see soundstage as an entertaining but non-essential part of the presentation as it really doesn't occur much in live acoustic performances and can't occur in amplified venues. The other points about timbre, dynamics and bass are indisputable necessities in my opinion.
I think Bartokfan was actually seeking brand name loyalties however, and asking us to confess our brand name biases.
As is well known by now, I have fallen wholeheartedly for the Zu speaker line and have become a "Listening Post"/ dealer for their products as of last week.
I have always admired cleverness as I see it in Zu designs and as I read it in Viridians comments. Hence the reference to being a Viridian groupie. Also greatly admire the input of Jax2.

What I hate about these forums is, cult or not people always seem to back a product and say stupid enough stuff that it hurts the rep of that product.

I'm a disciple of the timbre, phase and timing accurate so for me, when it comes to speakers, Thiel and Vandersteen are my only options now. All other non-speaker brands are fair game though.

And I agree with Undertow; when it comes to brands try to keep it positive or not say anything, except of course I encourage folks looking at other speakers brands to question why a speaker manufacturer intentionally will reverse the phase of some of the drivers in order to "make it sound better." Talk about intentionally screwing up the music content playback of a recording...