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ARC's new REF-75

I read Paul Bolin's review of the new REF-75 in AudioBeat and was really taken by it. So, this past weekend I drove down to Newport Beach and attended The S.H.O.W. to take a listen. In spite of the room being a bit bright, I could clearly hear the advantages this amp offers.

The REF-75 is physically beautiful with a kind of retro look. Must have been the meters. I love the looks of this amp! I placed my hand on top of the amp and it was barely warm to the touch. It runs really cool in spite of not having fans. Another advantage ... no fans ... no fan noise.

Right off the bat, the REF-75 was so grain-less, it was simply amazing. The sound comes out of a perfectly black background and the inner detail is amazing with great decay on vocals and simple instrumentals. I love classical guitar and small jazz groups, so this is right up my alley. Vocals were amazingly clear and realistic as well because of the lack of grain. Separation of instruments is another VERY strong point of the REF-75, adding realism to orchestral music. Tonality is one of the first things I listen for ... and this amp is right up there with the best of the ARC amps, including the big REF Monos. The demonstration was made using Wilson Shasha speakers ... 87db, and the meters hardly moved at all even while listening to full orchestral music. The darned thing just coasted no matter what was thrown at it. So, dynamics are terrific ... the amp supposedly uses the same power supply as that in the REF-110, so that would account for the dynamics and particularly good bass punch and depth. Huge sound stage as well. Width, depth and height were more than expected ... in fact, huge in every way.

The REF-75 I listened to at the SHOW was a prototype, but based upon what I heard, I'm buying one later this month. I've owned and/or listened to a lot of ARC amps over the years, and I can say without reservations, that this is one of the very best amps ARC has ever done. The release date is toward the end of June and the retail price is scheduled to be $9,000.00 US. Oh, and if you own a REF-110 ... sell it quick!

As a further note, I visited the Optimal Enchantment room and auditioned the new ARC REF-250 mono blocks. Randy Cooley, the owner of Optimal Enchantment, had the system set up in a suite and really had the system/room dialed in. Randy always has a great demo and has an impeccable taste in music. What I heard in Randy's room this year was simply magic. It had me shaking my head in disbelief wondering how much more information could still be hiding in those record grooves. Was it better than what I heard in the room that demoed the REF-75? Ahem ... it was, after all, Randy Cooley's room. :>)
oregonpapa
213cobra
885 posts
 
>>but what I found is those with deep pockets to buy new gear often seek out components with a sonic signature that leaps out at them.<<

No doubt. But what does that kind of assertiveness of signature have to do with music? This has always been a tension in music reproduction, but there was once a balance. Now it seems in runaway. It would be easy to blame buyers who respond to the sound you describe, but it's builders who started down the path. I trace it to the sonically disastrous introduction of Krell circa 1980, which was a sharp turn in ego purchasing. At the time I was astonished that reviewers went along with the sound. It bent the industry, and of course only led loudspeaker designers to come up with more crossover-intensive designs, also having more difficult loads to drive. It's not hard to understand buyer preferences evolving toward the synthetic since the industry has been moving its market away from natural references for many years.

I agree VTL in triode mode, like most pentode or tetrode amps offering a pseudo-triode option, sounds different and largely better. Hardly anyone uses them that way, though.

My complaint about Focal is the obviousness of compression and tonal strain near the crossover points, and the insufficient unity behavior of the drivers -- not unique to Focal but it sounded especially distracting and not least because of being present in such an expensive speaker well engineered in so many non-sonic ways. I have to believe the designer(s) can do much better with so much material cost in their speakers.

Phil
213cobra
885 posts
 
>>What I'm trying to get to here is that there will always be trade offs. Never a system IME that will do all types of music as well...<<

I don't agree. Any combination of hifi gear claiming fidelity can and should perform any kind of music "well." Perhaps not perfectly, but certainly well. If it cannot play a full orchestra, Andrew Bird, Jack White, James Blake, Sierra Leone's Refugee All-Stars, Gillian Welch, Led Zeppelin, Doc Watson, M.Ward, the full international catalog of MA Recordings, Sonny Rollins, Gram Parsons, Justin Earl, Tom Waits, Hound Dog Taylor, Alison Krause, Kate Bush and Maria Callas with equal credibility, then a system is too skewed to genre.

I didn't reference my own systems, but you looked them up. Unless you've put together strong, big-glass SET with a fast & clean full range driver based speaker option of over 100db/w/m efficiency, you won't have heard the sound implied by what you saw listed. As speakers, Audio Note, Tannoy, Quad all impose marked trade-offs denting the polar graph of "all types of music [played] well." Good as they are, this can be overcome via some other brands.

You can get to a higher state of musical realism via many lesser-known brands *not* named Audio Research and some of the other offenders I mentioned. And I didn't mention "bliss." This is important to the point. Realism and convincing musicality are the objectives. If that's present, then you get bliss if the music content takes you there. If it doesn't, no bliss. Not all music is blissful. Were it so, that would be a distortion too.

Cary, Kondo, Jadis, Audion -- each a very different sound. I couldn't lump them together as representing any one thing. I haven't claimed there is one path; I've said that THIS path, represented by the ARC REF series and for reasons I've already written, is a dead end for anyone expecting more fidelity, not less, over time. That ARC has done worse in recent years doesn't convince me to be enthusiastic about the current series. I agree the new amps are better, still continuing a flawed direction. If you believe criticism is intrinsically condescending, then so be it but that's neither the tone nor intent of what I've written. Regardless, I stand by my description and people who don't agree will buy the REF amps or something like them.

Phil
johnsonwu
469 posts
 
@213Cobra: re: "sonically disastrous introduction of Krell circa 1980, which was a sharp turn in ego purchasing"

Ironically that perfectly describes yours truly in the mid-late 90s. I had quite a bit of disposable income and churned through many many amps of the well known brands, anything that had a shiny faceplate and weighing over 90lbs each. Ego purchasing, that was it. I went after anything that provided me with a false sense of air. I mistook squeaky highs as detail, and bombastic thuds as realistic bass. Nowadays I spend more on classical concert tickets and jazz gigs than audio gear. With that my taste for reproduced music changed quite a bit. These days I still buy Audio Research gear, but I buy them just for rebuilds, taking advantage of their trannies and pretty solid regulator circuits.
kana813
956 posts
 
213cobra-

If someone doesn't have speakers that are over 100db/w/m efficiency and needs an amp in the same power range as the
REF 75, what would you recommend?
salectric
758 posts
 
Kana813, You asked 213Cobra for an alternate amp in the same power range as the REF75 that is more musical. Although I don't claim to be 213Cobra, I can certainly recommend the Emotive Vita monoblocks to be a highly musical alternative in the same power class. My Vitas now have Tung Sol KT120s and so should be roughly comparable in terms of power. More importantly, in terms of sound, they allow music of all varieties to sound like itself without the ARC house sound distractions.
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