Solid State Power Amp Reviews

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Audacious AudioSolid State Power Amp Reviews
EMM Labs MTRS power amplifier
Jason Victor Serinus  |  Mar 20, 2024  |  12 comments
Edmund (Ed) Manfred Meitner's name and reputation have long been synonymous with pioneering achievements in the fields of digital audio, especially DSD. In 1971, after designing the first fully automated studio console, Ed identified what he calls "the jitter problem." He worked with Sony and Philips to help create and refine SACD and subsequently designed the first complete six-channel DSD playback system for home use.

In 1998, while developing the eight-channel A/D and D/A DSD converters still used to create most SACDs, Ed founded EMM Labs and became head of design, with the goal of bringing DSD to the consumer realm...

Less widely discussed are Ed's amplifier circuit designs, which are the heart of the EMM Labs MTRX and MTRS amplifiers he designed collaboratively with Mariusz Pawlicki, EMM manager of R&D, and the late Zenon "Zanny" Muzyka.

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Budget Component ReviewsSolid State Power Amp Reviews
Emotiva XPA Gen3 two-channel power amplifier
Herb Reichert  |  Jul 20, 2017  |  41 comments
Have I told you about my objectivist friend—the left-brain audiophile who puts a lot of trust in measurements? He has a high natural intelligence and is an extremely experienced listener, but once he knows a component doesn't measure well, he can never again experience it impartially.

I don't want to embarrass my friend, so in this story I will call him O., for Mr. Objectivity.

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Audacious AudioSolid State Power Amp Reviews
Esoteric Grandioso M1X monoblock power amplifier
Jason Victor Serinus  |  Mar 24, 2023  |  15 comments
At AXPONA 2022, I eagerly headed to the Esoteric exhibit, where I spoke with Keith Haas, national sales manager of 11 Trading Company, Esoteric's US distributor. When I learned of the forthcoming Grandioso M1X monoblock ($35,500 each), the culmination of a complete revision of the company's top-selling M1 monoblock (now discontinued), I worked with Haas and Editor Jim Austin and set up a review.
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Solid State Power Amp ReviewsSolid State Preamp ReviewsPhono Preamp Reviews
Final Laboratory Music-4 phono preamplifier, Music-5 line preamplifier, & Music-6 power amplifier
Art Dudley  |  Jan 26, 2003  |  0 comments
Modern hi-fi is little more than a way of getting electricity to pretend that it's music. Of course, good source components remain all-important, and even if loudspeakers are imperfect, most of us can find one or two that suit our tastes, if not our rooms and the rest of our gear.
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Solid State Power Amp Reviews
First Watt J2 power amplifier
Herb Reichert  |  Sep 20, 2016  |  11 comments
Every time a new audio technology enters the marketplace, a debate begins about its relative merit. That debate never ceases, even decades after the technology first came (and sometimes went). Turntable platters driven by belts vs rims vs idlers vs directly by their motors. Analog vs digital. Tubes vs solid-state. Triodes vs pentodes, Single-ended vs push-pull. Objectivism vs subjectivism. The power and seriousness of each of these debates has splintered our global hobby into diverse tribes, cults, and subcults—and therein lies one of the chief joys of being an audiophile: participating in cult rivalries.
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Solid State Power Amp Reviews
First Watt SIT-3 power amplifier
Herb Reichert  |  Jan 22, 2019  |  11 comments
I am obliged to begin this review of First Watt's new stereo power amplifier, the SIT-3, with an explanation of how I believe a power amplifier should be reviewed. Why? Because the 18Wpc SIT-3 is a unique and historically important design that can't be wired up to just any loudspeaker and then critiqued on the basis of its bass power, treble brightness, or midrange acuity.
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Solid State Power Amp ReviewsAudacious Audio
Goldmund Mimesis 8 power amplifier
John Atkinson  |  Nov 29, 2011  |  First Published: Sep 01, 1991  |  2 comments
To judge from the $6400 Mimesis 8, Goldmund walks its own way when it comes to power amplifier design. High-end solid-state amplifiers from US companies like Krell, Mark Levinson, Threshold, and the Jeff Rowland Design Group marry massive power supplies to large numbers of output devices (these often heavily biased to run in class-A), built on chassis of such nonmagnetic materials as aluminum. By contrast, the Mimesis 8 has a magnetic (steel) chassis, and uses a relatively modest power supply, that for each channel based on two main 4700µF reservoir capacitors. The 8 offers just two pairs per channel of complementary output MOSFETs (Hitachi K134/J49). These carry a modest bias current of around 80mA total.
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Gramophone DreamsSolid State Power Amp Reviews
Gramophone Dreams #43: First Watt F8 power amplifier
Herb Reichert  |  Dec 03, 2020  |  9 comments
I spent my childhood summers on the Reichert family farm near Turtle Lake, Wisconsin, where, inside the red 1880s barn, my uncle Harold played 78rpm records for his cows.

He used a wind-up Victrola sitting on a shelf directly in front of the cows, just below a framed reproduction of an Alpine landscape painting. He said the music and the mountain scene relaxed the cows, causing them to give better milk. Harold played the same Gustav Mahler symphony every day.

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Audacious AudioSolid State Power Amp Reviews
Gryphon Apex Stereo power amplifier
Michael Fremer  |  Aug 17, 2022  |  28 comments
Some time ago, an amplifier in for review caught fire when first powered up. I don't mean it smoked and sizzled and shut down—I mean that actual flames shot through the top grate. Fortunately, I was able to grab a kitchen fire extinguisher and douse the thing with foam. (Sorry, this was decades ago, and I don't remember the brand, but I think the company had a fire sale and was shut down.)
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Audacious AudioSolid State Power Amp Reviews
Gryphon Essence Mono power amplifier
Jason Victor Serinus  |  Nov 26, 2020  |  15 comments
"Oh goody!" thought self, to self: "Another Gryphon component to review." As eloquent and revelatory as that statement may be, there's an even more illuminating backstory.

I had been aware of Denmark-based Gryphon Audio since the advent of the Gryphon Exorcist, a now-discontinued demagnetizer that cost far more than your average break-in CD, but I only began to encounter Gryphon electronics at audio shows a few years ago. While at first they seemed available for review only as a complete package, Jim Austin was able to arrange for me to review the Gryphon Ethos CD player–D/A processor ($39,000).

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Solid State Power Amp Reviews
Hafler Transnova 9500 power amplifier
Thomas J. Norton  |  Aug 04, 2016  |  First Published: Apr 01, 1993  |  4 comments
Boy, do we ever get letters. From readers angry that we review too many expensive products. From readers depressed that we review too many affordable products. From readers bemoaning our digital coverage. From readers asking when we're going to get with the 21st century and stop gushing over analog. From readers wanting more coverage of tube products. From readers wanting more coverage of MOSFET amplifiers designed for high voltage gain on the output stage.
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Solid State Power Amp ReviewsJ. Gordon HoltBudget Component Reviews
Hafler XL-280 power amplifier
J. Gordon Holt  |  Mar 03, 2010  |  First Published: Jan 03, 1987  |  0 comments
Some time ago in these pages, Anthony H. Cordesman observed rather ungraciously that the whole line of Hafler electronics "could do with reworking." This was interpreted by many readers—including the good people at the David Hafler Company—as meaning that AHC felt the entire Hafler line to be mediocre. In fact, he does not. (He had given a Hafler product a positive review a few issues previously.) Tony's comment, however, did express a sentiment that most of us at Stereophile have shared for some time: a feeling that Hafler products had slipped from the position of sonic preeminence which they enjoyed during the 1960s and '70s to one of mere excellence in a field where only preeminence is acclaimed.
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Solid State Power Amp Reviews
Halcro dm38 power amplifier
John Atkinson  |  Oct 15, 2004  |  First Published: Oct 01, 2004  |  0 comments
One of the highlights of recent Consumer Electronics and Home Entertainment shows has been the demonstrations of sound quality put on by Australian amplifier manufacturer Halcro with Wilson Audio loudspeakers. At my first exposure to one of these demos—described in my April 2002 "As We See It"—enormous dynamic range was coupled with a grain-free presentation and almost holographic stereo imaging to produce a breathtaking sweep of sound. Paul Bolin reviewed Halcro's dm58 monoblock in October 2002, and that amplifier was subsequently voted this magazine's "Amplification Component of 2002" by our reviewers.
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Solid State Power Amp Reviews
Halcro dm58 monoblock power amplifier
Paul Bolin  |  Oct 13, 2002  |  0 comments
Revolutionary is a word that's tossed around all too lightly in the world of audio. The understandable impulse to tout every new development as a quantum leap forward in sound reproduction has made it difficult to sort out the evolutionary from the truly groundbreaking. And there's not that much left to do in amplifier design that is worthy of being described as "revolutionary," or so it seems. Vacuum-tube circuitry has been thoroughly understood since the late 1940s, and 40 years of development of solid-state has rendered it, in its finest implementations, a worthy competitor and alternative to the venerable tube.
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Solid State Power Amp Reviews
Halcro dm88 Reference monoblock power amplifier
Brian Damkroger  |  Aug 19, 2006  |  0 comments
When I went to my shelf of Stereophile back issues to find Paul Bolin's seminal review of the Halcro dm58, I was shocked to find myself leafing further and further back—through not only 2004 but 2003 as well, all the way back to October 2002 (Vol.25 No.10). It doesn't seem possible that it's been almost four years since Halcro exploded onto our radar screens, the dm58 emblazoned on that issue's cover alongside the banner headline "THE BEST AMPLIFIER EVER!"
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