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Integrated amp suggestions under £1k - new or used.

walriley said:
Shame, as that would have been brilliant of you. Did you ever try lead acid batteries?
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You can get that kind of stuff in your lounge? I go to a lot of palaver, but lead acid is one place I won't go.

I have a DC3, too. A really useful piece of kit, mine has two 15v outputs and one 12v. If you decide to go there, you can get Sean to build one anyway you want. Although it's close to £600, I consider it one of the best pieces of kit I ever bought. It's been in my system since 2013. I had a DC2 before, I think I even had two of them for a while.

For instance, you could get one that would power the Monoblocs, and take care of the power for your passive pre.

The temple audios are designed with passive preamps in mind, it's a natural. A long time since I had tubes in my system, you'll get used to the clean sound. Anything else will sound turgid.
 
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I sometimes use a Bantam Gold into Regs Ela mk 1. I power it with a 12v yuasa intruder alarm battery. Works great, better than a Maplins power supply I have, not sure if that's regulated or not. Never heard any other supplies, other than the switch mode it comes with.
 
when i say lead acid, i was referring to the small sealed 12 volt units (say, 7Ah) that typically power a kid's ride on toy car or suchlike. They are about £20 a pop, so i would need 4 of them to run the monos properly. I could box them up to stop them looking so utilitarian. Either that, or order some regulators and the appropriate transformer and build a PS myself, but that could get quite expensive, so the battery option is probably the next upgrade. just not quite yet.
Gotta say that i'm surprised by just how hear-through these amps are. I was aware of slight differences between digital interconnects on the WAD 6550. Nothing 'slight' about the monos, though. Bloody night and day! I initially thought that these amps were bass light until i swapped in a DIY digital interconnect for the cheapo one that had been lashed in previously. Bass suddenly made an appearance! More tonal colour to vocals too, the trade off being a slightly sharper treble. These things are a bargain for £500!
 
You’ll fall in love with them eventually. We’ll make sure of that :) But as with most giant killers they only slay the ones nearby, those over the horizon remain undisturbed.
 
walriley said:
Gotta say that i'm surprised by just how hear-through these amps are. I was aware of slight differences between digital interconnects on the WAD 6550. Nothing 'slight' about the monos, though. Bloody night and day! I initially thought that these amps were bass light until i swapped in a DIY digital interconnect for the cheapo one that had been lashed in previously. Bass suddenly made an appearance! More tonal colour to vocals too, the trade off being a slightly sharper treble. These things are a bargain for £500!
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Then you owe it to yourself to try Mark Grant's HDX1 coax, truly exceptional value and the best digital interconnect I ever had in my system. Like going from a church to a cathedral.
 
+1

Mark Grant’s HDX1 is excellent, well made, no nonsense and pretty cheap and, given that it is coaxial cable works best of all as that.
 
Thanks folks. You're suggestion is duly noted. By the way the cable I'm currently using is Shark Wire no.SP1808G. Thanks for all your help and suggestions!
 
Excellent dog.

Interesting, almost no bass in the recording but I presume that’s the recording.

Do you know No Man - collaboration between Tim Bowness and Steven Wilson? You might like them.

How long are the ICs from passive to mono blocks?
 
Believe it or not, that's a problem with the digital interconnect i was using at the time - i think it was very mid forward, but what can you expect for £4 off ebay?! - and also the vid was recorded on a Galaxy S7. Another contributing factor was that the analogue ICs I was using at the time were very much better suited to digital transfer. I've since bought some Van Damme cable and terminated them with RCA plugs myself and they are a shit load better. Deeper soundstaging and more weight to the sound. Hard to believe there are people on this forum who actually get aggressive over others saying there are sonic differences in cables. by the way, the ICs were 50cm long.
 
oh, and the room acoustics are tripe too. Low ceiling tends to suck the bass out of anything playing in there.

I'll look out for your music suggestion too.
 
Yeah, go for it! Give us a rundown on how you got to where you're at currently, as well. I'm intrigued by that sort of stuff.
Fan of mini schnauzers, perchance?
 
Nigel said:
I sometimes use a Bantam Gold into Regs Ela mk 1. I power it with a 12v yuasa intruder alarm battery. Works great, better than a Maplins power supply I have, not sure if that's regulated or not. Never heard any other supplies, other than the switch mode it comes with.
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Bantam gold into ELA's? Now THAT would be worth hearing! Always loved the ELA. They were on the end of one of the best demo systems I ever heard.
 
Above I put the Bantam Gold mid way down my list with the Croft at the very top - but sorry - reading the above - I haven't listened to a Gold with a £600 PSU.
 
beammeup said:
Above I put the Bantam Gold mid way down my list with the Croft at the very top - but sorry - reading the above - I haven't listened to a Gold with a £600 PSU.
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The croft amps sound like they'd be great. That sort of small scale manufacturer, where enthusiasm for the product and attention to detail is everything. Me, I'm just trying to simplify my life and not worry about tube degredation, etc, hence the move to class d. Luckily I appear to be getting the best of both worlds, by which I mean a simpler setup, that the missus will go near, and better sound.
 
walriley said:
Bantam gold into ELA's? Now THAT would be worth hearing! Always loved the ELA. They were on the end of one of the best demo systems I ever heard.
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Noticed I said 'sometimes use.' After a few weeks, the lack of drudge, as Peter aptly mentions, soon becomes too thin, sterile and an overall missing engagement to the sound. You start to realise your just not enjoying listening to music as much as you once were. Playing records becomes no fun. Back goes either my Exposure Ten or clone Naim NAP140 and off we go again. Obviously these comments are just my experience.

I'd love to hear one of those Nuprime amps, maybe they would combine the best of both worlds, after all Amptastic and Bantam are both so reasonably priced, I don't know how they would compare to the bigger, more expensive products.
 
Nigel said:
... After a few weeks, the lack of drudge, as Peter aptly mentions, soon becomes too thin, sterile and an overall missing engagement to the sound. You start to realise your just not enjoying listening to music as much as you once were. Playing records becomes no fun. Back goes either my Exposure Ten or clone Naim NAP140 and off we go again. Obviously these comments are just my experience.

... after all Amptastic and Bantam are both so reasonably priced, I don't know how they would compare to the bigger, more expensive products.
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Hmmm, I hadn't used my BG for about 4 years, but during what was supposed to be a big clear out of unused gear, I put it back in to the system. I prefer it to the twin amptastics that had been my amplifiers for the last 4 years.

With a DC3 providing power, it's clean and to my ears is as harmonically rich as the recording allows. I've had various naim amps over the years, and an Avondale S100, I would not take any of them in preference.
 
Nigel said:
Noticed I said 'sometimes use.' After a few weeks, the lack of drudge, as Peter aptly mentions, soon becomes too thin, sterile and an overall missing engagement to the sound. You start to realise your just not enjoying listening to music as much as you once were. Playing records becomes no fun. Back goes either my Exposure Ten or clone Naim NAP140 and off we go again. Obviously these comments are just my experience.

I'd love to hear one of those Nuprime amps, maybe they would combine the best of both worlds, after all Amptastic and Bantam are both so reasonably priced, I don't know how they would compare to the bigger, more expensive products.
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Yeah, I've owned ELAs myself. The only reason they went was because the room they were in (different house) was way too bright, even with them on the end of an Electrocompaniet ECI-2 and a Rega Planet. A shame, cos I do believe they'd be brilliant in a sympathetic acoustic.
 
Well, the WAD has gone. Wired it up to demo it to the buyer and was shocked at how good it sounded. Still think i've made the right decision though.

Anyway, popped up to CPC Farnell in Preston and got myself four Yuasa 12 volt 12ah sealed lead acid batteries ( The Monoblocks run on 24 volt supplies, so it's 2 in series per side, and 12 ah rather than 7 to avoid having to charge them every five minutes.)

Not had a chance to run them in anger, just to confirm they are working as planned. I shall report back with my findings.
 
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