Gainclone chip amp

JT...I got the Burson HDAM buffer in the last Thursday. I bought it to use in conjunction with my Dac which has no Op amps and my passive volume controls. I've had it cooking for over 80 hours now.

I'm totally amazed at how good this unit is! It has a sweetness to it. Not like tubes..more like pure class A sweetness. The sound is very open and articulate. The unit is so quiet..I can put my ear against the driver and not hear a peep from it.

The 5 mates at Burson know good sound. I can tell just from the small time I've spent with this piece. These fellows put a lot of time into making this buffer. I've owned the Bv Audio Sound Refiner. Which is suppose to be something similar. These two units are NOTHING alike. The SR-10 cost $145.00 more ..there's no way I would have bought one if I'd known about Burson. Now that it's in the system ..I can't see removing it! Burson seems to be in it more for the fun than money. There's no way they're making a real profit off these units at what they sell for. In the U.S something like this would easily cost 2 to 3 times more.

I'm not sure what your mods are in the Pioneer. I would certainly give these guys a ring if you're not using this type of output.Some naysayers will bring up specs and talk about how much better an Op amp is suppose to be..this in one component you just have to hear for yourself. I've never heard anything like these discrete buffers with the power supply. I can only describe the sound as musical, EXTREMELY tranparent with finesse.

That battery powered preamp is another interesting unit. Do you have a website for them? Man with all these goodies you keep finding..you'll have me broke! LOL

Thanks

Gmood,Thanks for the info on the Burson HDAM.I will have to get one.
Audio Artistry is no longer operating.
I did see one of these for sale at Simply Hi Fi[www.simplyhifi.com.au].It needed new batteries though.These were not kits-quite nicely finished things.No phono.

Hello all, Just wanted to update everyone on my amp. I should have took the plunge long before this. This amp really sings. I do however hear a faint buzzing coming from my tweeters but only if I'm close. Don't know if that's normal or maybe some grounding issuses. Gmood1 I did look at the site you gave me for the gainclone chassis. A little expensive for me and the chassis he specifies is for a intergrated unit. I emailed the builder of my amp to see if he could rig me a chassis so I could take a stab a building a kit myself. Lots of different chips from what I see and wondered what you would suggest in terms of 4ohm spkrs. Still waiting on my Sugden pre to arrive from Canada. Can't wait to see how this combo will sound. Stay tuned : )

Hey South43,

Here's a site that sells chassis Autoconstruire..the company is out of Italy. maybe these prices are a little closer to what you would like to spend.

As far as the chips go..Peter would be better at answering your question. I do know he prefers to use dual transformers for these loads. I remember seeing some high powered dual tranny Gain clones for sell on Audiogon. I don't remember who the builder was..but the units looked well made.

The Gainclones are very sensitive to noise from upstream components. This maybe the buzz you're hearing from the use of the NAD as a preamp.
That's a another key to success with the Gainclones. You need quiet upstream equipment. If not.. they will stick out like a sore thumb. I hear absolutely no noise fron my unit unless hooked to a noisy preamp. This is with my ear physically touching the driver.

My paralelled 4780 will drive low impedence speakers well.Even some 2.5 ohm Equinox speakers.It too has a slight buzz though which the maker put down to some earthing problem in the PCB.It does not really seem related to the preamps used.It can be reduced to barely perceptable by turning the gain controls down to about half.Plus installing gain controls means you can better match it to preamps or even use them as a passive preamp-which will sound better than a lot of active preamps.
The3876T amp is very silent.I installed Alps blue 100kohm pots in this without any apparent degradation of the sound.