CES 2017

Look at that photo, with the beautiful wood-plinthed KT88 amp. What do you notice? That's not a dCS digital stack lying on the table bottom-right: It's an iPad. A fancy red cable, whose name I forgot to get, is connecting a portable music source to the line-level input of a $1850 single-ended stereo integrated headphone amplifier called the Mogwai. It's all handmade by Ampsandsound engineer-proprietor Justin Weber. Look again. Do you see those loudspeaker binding posts? Ah ha! The Mogwai is another of those "fusion" products that I love. It sits on your desk, drives some sensitive desktop speakers, and makes your Audeze LCD-Xs, or MrSpeakers Ethers, sound like deep jungle mushroom magic. (Look out for Gremlins and snakes!)

Why "jungle mushroom magic"? Because that's how lush this zero-feedback amp sounds—and the input tube is a 6SL7, which is surely the most richly-textured of all high-mu twin triodes. This is mushroom magic because the Mogwai allows the user to roll-in a choice of output tubes: the KT90, 6550, KT77, KT66, EL34, and, last but not least, the 300B-like 6L6GC beam power pentode. Tube bias is adjusted automatically—therefore all of these mind-expanding tube-rolling possibilities may be auditioned by the user, without worry or fuss. Output power is 2Wpc class-A into 8 ohms and 1Wpc into 32 ohms.

The Ampsandsound Mogwai and all of its parts, including the transformers, are made in America.

Who could ask for more? In case you forget: the Mogwai is a fine wire-and-wood audio pet that costs only $1850…I must have one for review! Right now!