PrimaLuna Prologue 1 or 2?

The circuit I expect. I have other amps which use EL34's from which to form my opinions apart from the Primaluna, and my experience with the 1 and those amps with the EL34's is similar except that my other amps have big trannies and produce a tighter bass, but not necessarily deeper bass.

Surprisingly the bass response in the 1 w/EL34's sounds fuller (some might say warmer/looser) throughout the bass frequencies than using the 2 (or in my case the 5) with even the KT88's or 6550's. With these two tube types the bass takes on a different texture, becomes more taut, drum whacks more percussive, its still very capable, and certainly more audiophile approved, etc, but when you plug EL34's (or 6L6's) into the 2 the deep bass become enemic when compared to the 1 or the 2 w/KT88's/6550's.

An important consideration is selecting tube type in the 2 would be the bass capabilities of the speakers. If they don't do deep bass and you want a more crisp tone the 2 would be great, and its really responsive to tailoring with different tube types and brands.

But I'm really sincere in my comments about the 1. I love it for what it is, a great little unit with which you can listen to tunes and forget audiophilia. :-)

I appreciate everyone's comments and suggestions. If anyone wants to take this further (since Newbee raised the issue and it's a valid one), let me add that the characteristics I've always valued in my (and others') systems' performance are: a wide and deep soundstage with solid imaging, accurate instrumental timbre and a sense of air around individual instruments/voices. That's all kind of retro, I know, but I got into this hobby back in the late 70s and then sat out for a few decades just listening to the music. My system chronology includes many fewer component upgrades than most who, like me, have been at this for 30 years. My 20-year-old B&K ST-140 is only my second power amp, for example (the first was a GAS Son of Ampzilla - that *really* dates me).

When I did get active again, I suddenly found reviewers and others talking about equipment having rhythm and pacing and the kind of timing qualities that seemed to me to either be there in the recorded performance or not, not something that a component could add to or detract from. Consequently I'm not sure if I've ever even experienced those types of qualities, or how to even listen for them. I suspect on some level they're at the heart of the "musicality" issue, and whether you get lost in the music vs listening to the hifi. But I have to say I don't know that for sure. I remember when the debate was about whether everyone meant the same thing when they described a sound as "dark," or "dry," or "grainy." It seems much more difficult now. How do I know what a "sense of pace" sounds like?

Before this gets too far off the PrimaLuna topic, let me say that I guess the long and short is I want something that sounds as life-like as possible for the money, and that doesn't cause fatigue from being overly analytical and detailed beyond the detail you get in real sound in a real hall (using a symphony orchestra as a reference). I guess that's one way of saying I want to simply get involved in the music. My current system gets me almost all the way there, but I know it has some weak links, one of which is the preamp. And if I'm going to look into a replacement for it, I thought tubes might be a good approach, and a cost-effective way to do that might be through one of the PrimaLuna integrateds, i.e., maximize the tube effect by having both pre and power. And here we are.

Craig:

Points well made, though if I follow your dates correctly I may still be older (damm).

So, I own the Prologue 2 integrated and Prologue 5 power amps. With either unit, I have never found myself obsessing about 3/4 of the stuff that I read reviewers write about. What struck me about both the 2 and the 5 is that the music had very much a 3D quality to it. The music seem suspended in the air, so to speak. I have recently shuffled all my components around and in the system I use the Prologue 5, the monitors are placed inside of a bookcase, on their sides, about 4 feet up in the air. The system sounds fantastic ... clear, clean, and musical with excellent rendering of the recording ... like what else could I want? My room size is about the same as yours, the speakers have a sensitivity of 86 db, and assuming I don't want ear bleed ... it plays plenty loud.

I use the Prima Lunas as follows:

System #1

Prologue 2 integrated amp, Rega Apollo CD player, SONY SCD 555ES SACD player, Acoustic Research 302 speakers.

System #2

Prologue 5 power amp, Musical Fidelity CD PRE 24 CD player/preamp combo, Rega Ara monitors.

For both systems, the interconnects are Signal Cable and the power cords are Naim.

Without knowing how your current equipment set-up sounds, I think that you would be happy with either the Prologue 1 or 2. I think that the 2 gives you a little more, but I don't think that it distracts from the music. Question though, if you suspect that the preamp is the problem, have you considered picking up the Prologue 3 preamp instead?

Regards, Rich