Living voice and kondo

Audio999,

Just as I thought, you really don't have a Kondo amp on hand under $7000.00 that is better than the AN CSS for sale.

My wife and I spent a afternoon with Kevin Scott and had a listening session with his speakers and Kondo amps. Wonderful sounding and impressive. I have all AN gear and have heard a number of AN set ups and they also are wonderful sounding. To say it is ignorance and misleading that AN amp will sound as good or better than a Kondo amp is childish speaking. Kondo's gear IMHO is why over priced
where Peter has made some affordable amps that the average Joe can buy.

I agree with Boy_lah's assessment that the LV speakers need more juice than the typical 10wpc or so that a SET 300B amp can deliver to the extent you like to listen at lifelike decibel levels and you listen to music that demands a lot of power (e.g., rock, pop, orchestral). I use my SET 300B amps in a second system that is devoted almost exclusively to chamber music and small group jazz. In my medium-sized room, I get very satisfying, lifelike volume levels with this sort of music, but I am often using every bit of the clean power output capabilities of my 300B amps.

I am very interested by this tread. I have acquired some Living voice OBX-R2 and I am very happy with them. I've heard them with Conrad johnson and the match was pretty good. I am using a Lavardin It (solid state). Quite good but I am in the impression that Living voice speakers do prefer tube amplification.

They use to match Living voice with Border Patrol amplifier. By that time Border Patrol where located in the UK and the distribution in North america was limitated. Now Border Patrol are located in the USA. I've never heard them but they might worth a listen if you can schedule one. They also use Canary audio.

Regards

Windsurfer. The OBX-R2 are extremely transparent so what you feed it up front, you will hear it. Kevin Scott has gone through various 'quality' brands over time. Originally Canary Audio, then BP now Art Audio & Kondo.

Main thing Kevin tells me is go for ~20watts and a good amp and you'll be in heaven. And I agree!

I no longer own the OBX-R2's, but felt they mated very well with my 25 wpc New Audio Frontiers 845 SE integrated amp. This is an 845 based SET integrated that has been compared to the Kondo Ongaku amps. I have no idea of how they compare, as I've never had the pleasure of hearing the Ongakus. I do know that this is a fabulous integrated amplifier that occasionally turns up on Audiogon in the $4,500 range used. I believe they presently list for $9,500 dollars new.