It’s been a confusing couple of months here in the neighborhood. Since the last installment of this series, our townhouse development has been filthy with amplifiers. First in, and involving a story that had a happy ending, was the Audio Research D‑80 power amplifier. That review goes live very shortly on SoundStage! Ultra. It was followed in short order by the VinnieRossi Brama integrated amplifier, which you can read about now on that site.
And—in late-breaking news—the Engström Arne integrated amplifier just arrived, the receipt of which is the subject of my January editorial on SoundStage! Ultra. As fate would have it, all three of these amplifiers contain vacuum tubes, and that’s a dramatic change from the mostly solid-state lifestyle that I’ve settled into over the past few years. Used to be I was a tube guy through and through; at one point I had a habit of boasting that there were no transistors in my stereo system, and that I could keep listening to records after an EMP attack or a Carrington-level solar flare.
I’m no longer a tube snob, although I still have a soft spot for that buggy-whip technology. The turning point was my experience with the Simaudio Moon Evolution 860A v2 amp. I could live with this, I recall thinking at the start of the review period. I love this amp, was my final thought. I subsequently purchased a Bryston 4B³ and never looked back.
But now it was a tube invasion, which very much suited my neighbor Ron, who has always been, and continues to be, a tube guy. Ron’s daily ride is a Leben CS‑300 integrated amplifier, which is powered by two EL84 tubes per channel. It’s a great-sounding amp, one that’s an heirloom piece.
As I said, the Audio Research D‑80 was the first arrival, which just happened to coincide with the start of my Europe trip, where I visited Pro-Ject and EAT as well as International Audio Holding, the parent company of Siltech, Crystal Cable, and Sphinx. Since I would be AWOL for a couple of weeks, I handed the D‑80 off to Ron so that he could take a listen and break it in for me. Ron’s continuing love affair with the Bowers & Wilkins 805 D4 Signature speakers led him to convince me that the break-in process would be much more successful if it were performed with those speakers.
Ron’s not the most positive guy I’ve ever met. If there’s a problem with a component, he’ll find it, which—to be honest—is very handy, because it means he can help identify issues and get them sorted so I don’t have to do it. That’s exactly what happened here. I received a text when I returned from abroad—it seemed that the D‑80 was fitted with a cooling fan, and it sent Ron spiraling down a rabbit-hole of annoyance.
I headed over for a cappuccino and a listen. While I wasn’t anywhere near as fussed about it as Ron was, sure enough, without music playing, I could clearly hear the fan. From the listening position. Clearly. This didn’t seem right, so I shot off an email to Valerio Cora, the owner of Audio Research. This particular unit was one of the first ones out of the factory, so Cora was extremely interested to learn about this issue. Turns out that the fan was installed to cool the voltage regulator. We exchanged a number of back-and-forth emails, and the upshot was that they discovered at the factory that, yes indeed, the fan was louder than optimal. Further, they determined that it was permissible to run the amp without the fan, so long as the ambient temperature didn’t get too high when the amp was being driven hard.
The solution was for Audio Research to retrofit the D‑80 with a temperature probe and a relay that would activate the fan only when the voltage regulator’s temperature exceeded a safe level. The factory promptly shipped us the part, a small wiring harness with a thermal switch. Installation was straightforward, with Ron leading the way, making sure I didn’t screw anything up.
While we had the amp upside down with its panties removed, we admired the clean layout and excellent parts quality. The job complete, we stood around for a few minutes, congratulating ourselves on (a) completing the work and (b) working with the Audio Research folks to help improve this amp. I shared our success story with Cora, who thanked us and confirmed that this change would be incorporated into the production of the D‑80.
We buttoned the amp back up and energized it. As we expected, given that the amp was sitting in a standard-temperature room and wasn’t being pounded, the fan did not engage. We listened for a short spell, and then I left Ron to it. It seemed expedient at that point to leave the amp with Ron for a while longer so he could monitor the situation. If there were any additional problems related to our installation, Ron would find them and alert me. After a few days, I checked in with Ron, and he was much happier—at least as happy as he could be, given his mercurial nature.
In the meantime, I caught wind that Doug Schneider had been collaborating with Vinnie Rossi, the founder of VinnieRossi, manufacturer of statement-level amplification, to produce SoundStage! InSight videos, with the first video on our YouTube channel now. The Brama soon showed up at my house and jumped the queue. I promptly decanted the Brama from its extremely impressive case and slid it right into my system.
Once I’d completed my review of this wonderful amp, I entombed it in its case and awaited shipping instructions.
Not so fast! I received an email from Doug, who proposed that he hold onto the Brama so that he could use it to drive the pair of Wilson Audio Sashas that were coming his way in the immediate future. The folks at VinnieRossi were amenable, so we decided that Doug would collect the Brama from me when next he rolled through Toronto from Ottawa (that’s a 4.5-hour drive).
Thankfully, he’d be driving to Toronto fairly soon so that he could deliver a review pair of Sphinx Audio Element 3 speakers after he’d photographed them and had them measured in the NRC’s anechoic chamber. But our supply lines were getting longer and harder to maintain.
Ron and I boxed up the D‑80, dollied it over to my place, and unboxed it. Thinking back, it had been a long time since I’d had a dedicated tube power amp in my system. It’s hard to keep track of all the comings and goings in my room, but I think the last tube power amp was . . . my own Audio Research VT100 back in the mid-2010s. How about that for synchronicity? I’d forgotten what a sensuous pleasure it was to lie down on the ground and stare into a row of tubes. It was like I had my own tube city right there—and I was the mayor.
I’ll leave the subject of sound quality aside for now, so if you’re curious about my experience with the D‑80, you’ll have to wait for the review that will soon be published on SoundStage! Ultra. Here’s a teaser, though: the D‑80 worked just great with the Bowers & Wilkins 805 D4 Signature speakers that were still in residence.
So now I had the Audio Research D‑80 and the VinnieRossi Brama in my listening room. I felt like Smaug the dragon, hoarding his gold.
Rob, my other audiophile neighbor, had been out of sight and out of mind lately, given that he was designing and building a high-end recording studio for a customer, and it was taking up all of his bandwidth. Now that I thought about it, Rob hadn’t had any new gear cycle through his system for quite a while. Ron’s house is lovely, but Rob’s place is more architecturally interesting and a bit more exciting for photographs. It didn’t take much cajoling to get Rob at least somewhat excited about the prospect of listening to the Brama. Especially when I told him the price—which admittedly is outrageous for someone like Rob, who’s not inured to the excesses of high-end audio.
Rob has been running my Focus Audio FP60 BE speakers by way of the Kinki Studio EX-M1+, which is a fantastic integrated amplifier, and he’s been thrilled with the combination. So much so that he’s become somewhat resistant to change. But the prospect of the Brama got him all horned up. So, on a snowy Saturday morning, I rolled the Brama in its armored case down to Rob’s place and—with Ron in tow—hooked it up. The Brama’s elegant casework caught the light that streams in from Rob’s huge windows, as the sun glinted off the polished trim ring surrounding the creamy dial. It looked fantastic.
We fired up the Brama and Rob played a bunch of metal tracks, most of which I had heard on previous visits. Rob likes dense music that’s packed with aggressive overtones, and the Brama’s sexy tube twist on things injected a tiny squeeze of juice into this impossibly complicated music.
“How much did you say this thing costs?” asked Rob.
“Forty-eight kay in Yankee dollars. Seventy thou in Canadian pesos,” I responded. I could see the gears turning in his head as he tried to reconcile those numbers with this amplifier, with this music as it swirled around us.
He shook his head, many emotions running across his face—astonishment at the sound mixed with anger that in no realistic world would he ever own this amp, all bundled up in appreciation at the craftsmanship of this sophisticated chunk of metal.
“And how long will I have this amplifier in my house?” he queried.
“Probably a couple of weeks. You good with that?”
“Sure, why not?” he responded with finality. As I said, Rob likes this stuff, but he’s not quite comfortable with it. He’s still living in the real world, not a universe inhabited by stereo components that cost more than many cars. I think he’ll be okay, though.
Jason Thorpe
Senior Editor, SoundStage!
