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SS Power Amp suggestions.

Hifinut, do you know if the Music First are designed by Nick (Longdog) since his power amps are on the shortlist.
 
i believe so

"I mentioned the MM phono amplifier earlier, and MFA was fortunate there to employ the skills of Nick Gorham from Long Dog Audio as a collaborative product. Jonathan has decided to engage Nick again for the SENLAC, though this amplifier is a thoroughbred MFA product. Having said that, it does mean the SENLAC SJE will have had Nick’s work on his own 200w power-amps as a starting block for ideas for this 100w baby. I first met Nick at the Whittlebury Hall show a number of years back, a gentleman with distinctive long beard who wouldn’t look out of place on a Harley Davidson or coming down a chimney in December. When he was asked to work on an amplifier the main constraint was getting the ‘big version concept’ into a small enough package to fit inside the casework that Jonathan wanted to use. He made sure a good part of that case work was given over to the heatsinks at either end, but inside there is still enough room for 3 circuit boards, a 300va mains transformer and 27000uf of capacitance in the power supply. This amplifier is Class AB simplicity, or rather as Jonathan put it to me “complex simplicity”. There needed to be enough components to get it to work well, but it needs to be simple enough that it doesn’t change the sound nor slow it down. As Nick puts it so eloquently; “I try and design stuff to do as little damage as possible”. Whilst he hasn’t made the amp overly complex, he hasn’t gone to the other extreme either. “I have not removed 50p parts just to save board space if the circuit was better with them”. The main constraint was getting the big version concept into a small enough package."

from the review

http://hifipig.com/music-first-audio-senlac-sje-monoblock-amplifiers/
 
stevec67 said:
The 557 is easy enough to find. DV will tell is that the 559 is far superior, it may be, but a 557 is a very meaty and powerful item that will drive most speakers you can think of.
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Yes it is as the 558/559 are based on the DSP8000 system. The 557 is meaty but not really at the same level of performance. It may be that with speakers that are an easier load to drive the difference will not be as much but with my speakers adding a second 559 in bridged mode gave an improvement in SQ. I can only guess that this is because the bridged amps have twice as much Class A power. A pure Class A amp if it has enough grunt will I think be the best performer but they are BIG and HEAVY and use a lot of juice. Oh and more difficult to hide from SWMBO. Somehow I managed it with a pair of 559s perhaps thats because they are a black finish and sort of 'disappear' unlike gawdy silver hence why I haven't got some HUGE Class A amps like those Passlabs.............

Oh and arthritis in my hands, back and knees don't help with moving these big babies.

Cheers,

DV
 
Yank said:
I'd want to try Pass Labs, or DartZeel.
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Pass Labs. Great SS amps but maybe a little on the rich side with the speakers here? One name that rarely gets a mention is Sim Audio .It should do. As SS amps go, they are some of the finest I've owned and would, I imagine, be a great match for the Estelons. I would of course take Devialet monos over any of them - I'd just suggest your brother blind tests a few alternatives before making a decision.
 
Nice. All the Moon/Sim Audio stuff I had was different in that it possessed a distinctly organic quality that one usually encounters with good valve amps - but without any additional tonal warmth or glow which would probably not suit the loudspeaker in this instance.
 
I met up with my brother yesterday and he wanted to thank everyone who has posted on this thread. It has thrown up a couple of amps he had not thought of and is open minded to what he will purchase. I know he will definitely want to try the amp in his own system, and will update this thread further as and when he demo's various units.
 
Nord acoustics nc500se monos.. £750 each. Rocking my shahinian hawks. Big upgrade from my prior caspian m2!
Haven’t heard any of the other suggested amps for compassion though.
 
Darth Vader said:
Yes it is as the 558/559 are based on the DSP8000 system. The 557 is meaty but not really at the same level of performance. It may be that with speakers that are an easier load to drive the difference will not be as much but with my speakers adding a second 559 in bridged mode gave an improvement in SQ. I can only guess that this is because the bridged amps have twice as much Class A power. A pure Class A amp if it has enough grunt will I think be the best performer but they are BIG and HEAVY and use a lot of juice. Oh and more difficult to hide from SWMBO. Somehow I managed it with a pair of 559s perhaps thats because they are a black finish and sort of 'disappear' unlike gawdy silver hence why I haven't got some HUGE Class A amps like those Passlabs.............

Oh and arthritis in my hands, back and knees don't help with moving these big babies.

Cheers,

DV
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The bridged amps will have half the class A power, not double...

Class A is the ultimate though!
 
At the weekend a Vitus (don't know which model) is coming for a home dem. I have also been in contact with a couple of distributors and am waiting to hear from them.
 
Regarding your post re 230V transformers in American stuff, be very wary. A while ago now but a friend had six pair of Parasounds fry their transformers, another ones Audiopax 88's went tits up ensuing in two years of grief. I had a horrible experience with Passlabs. Mate in Clifornia bought me a used one, went to their factory for a voltage change and inspection, lay in my garage for over a year whilst I argued the toss with Nelson. He arranged repair eventually and it was a wonderful piece of kit when sorted. Left field maybe but I haven't seen anyone mention Musical Fidelity, before the Pass and a Supratek pre I had a Nu-Vista integrated and it gave very little away at a fraction of the price.
Can see where he's coming from though as 32 valves in my system is beginning to be a p.i.t.a. when one, always the last one decides to play up!
 
Yomanze said:
How about one of the new EWA Class A amps like the M50.
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I've been itching to try out adding a power amp to the pre-out of my Creek 50a and the M50 kind of fascinates me. Same output power (watts) but 3x the juice (amps). I've just been unable to find out details about the Creek's pre-out (output level and impedance) that's needed to find out if they are a good pairing.

The input sensitivity of the 50P power amp is 410mV so presumably any connected power amp should work nicely if they have a similar sensitivity.

The Creek may not be the most optimal pre in the world, but I like the Ruby DAC and the radio so it would not be that easy to replace either.
 
Well a Vitus RI 100 intergrated was delivered later on Saturday and needed time to warm up. I only heard it for a couple of hours, but speaking to him yesterday he was really liking it so definitely in the running. I understand the dealer will bring a T & A amplifier asap and I am waiting for some more info from a couple of distributors.
 
My little tip... If the dealer will allow, hold onto the Vitus for a week or preferably two. It will make for an interesting comparison.
 
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