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Phil, That is a question she askes herself from time to time....and yes - to my eyes she is hot even after 23 years together. Otherwise - I had hair then - I still have the same amount of hair too - it just all moved south. I am going to have to learn to walk on my hands at this rate!!!

You could argue that is the absence of power tubes that stops the Peach being a great amp.

Judging by the other thread on this topic - the what will Craig do thread - you better make it a nice metalic pink for $3,000. Pink trannies - somehow appropriate dont you think.....

Those attending Indy are really in for a treat! The pCATs are a new standard in my world. No I haven't compared them to every other amp in the world and I apologize if some think that i am going over the top with my praise. But unless you have heard them I cannot accept your opinion. I simply cannot believe that I have this level of fidelity in my house and can listen to it every day. Un freakin believable. Josh Now dont beat about the bush Josh - do you like them or not?????

Edit - forgot to mention - this is the JVC EX-A1. Just wondering - does anyone on the forum own one of these systems and a pair of Heritage speakers? I bought these for the holiday homes we built on the island of trikeri. This was a deliberate ploy to ensure no boomboxes and real loud systems as we sell peace and quiet on the island. With its own speakers (which are remarkable for their size) it maxes out at around 95 dB give or take (the speakers are I think 87 dB/w/m). Thing is - this is a digital amp (and a DVDa player) with 30 wpc into 4 ohms (guess 20 into 8). Would be interesting to match one of these with a pair of Khorns just to see. It even has an input on the back so you could run a TT into it. Woudl certainly make a neat system don't you think. It was about $500 when I bought it - with the speakers - which isn't outrageous considering you get a CD/DVD/DVDa player as well as amp and speakers. Nicely put together too.

Lets see if this works: Its me and the wife on the day we got married - a while ago now.....

If it carries on like this I am going to have to stop eating this stuff....

Islander, Yes - your mails get through fine but I cannot reply so I will here: Good news on the Yamaha - it is designed to not vary its sonic signature with the impedance of the speaker (there are some very sophisticated circuits in there). Apparently totally stable down to 2 ohms although I never tried it on anything that goes that low. Other than that - should certainly be interesting....

Leo, Weren't you planning to play with a Hypex implementation at some point? What ever happened to that? I did - but I dont think I will share the results unless you have tested one already......although I may have already done so.

Dont know that unit Mark so I cannot comment on it. Does it have settings for X-over and volume? Might be a case of adjustment - or moving it - possibly out of the door. The Strata never thunked - but it never cost $450 either - even used to the best of my knowledge.....

Sorry about this - his ISP is blocking my ip - or something like that.

Good sealed design capable of hitting 100 Hz when required with ease is the REL Strata series. 10 inch woofer - nice and quick - perfect match for Heresies but I have never tried it with horn loaded bass. I have heard them with Lothers (a pair of them actually) and it really was a seemless integration to my ears.

Bloody hell - I am not surprised - they look stunning!!!! Nice one.

WB Wolfram - nice to see you posting again. OK - VTA and 103. Basically with the 103 - and indeed most cartridges playing with a combination of the VTA and the tracking weight will change the sonic signature of the cartridge along with soundstaging / depth and the rest. Actually it goes a bit further than that - if you change amp and pre-amp, for example, you may well need to re-adjust these settings to re-voice the overall sound. All of my tuning is on the basis of instrument tone. If I am on my own (harder) I use violins to tune the sound. If I am with Tony I put him in the sweet spot and then play "Mother" from The Wall (he knows it so well - it is his main test piece). Nicely we have confirmed a couple of times that our different tuning systems yield remarkably consistent results. Recently I have changed amp and pre amp back and forth a few times. With the Yamaha in place I run at 2.4 grams and tail down about 4 degrees. With my old amp and pre in place I run at 2.2 grams and almost perfectly parallel (maybe a 1 degree inclination - tail up). YMMV and all that - its all fun and games isn't it......

"The thing that scares me is what if I don't like hearing all the stuff I have been missing." Then you switch it off when listening to music......[*-)]

Where are you going with this Erik? I sence a mission in the offing perchance..... Oh the mood thing - I am not sure it is quite as catagoric as that. I often use music to change my mood - most nights actually. After work I am usually tense and wound like a spring. Spending time with wife and child helps for sure - but there is still an element of....I don't know....performance - more for daughter than wife admittedly. Once both have gone to bed however I can relax and it is the music that enables me to do this. I am not sure if I have mentioned previously on here (probably have - memory of a goldfish) but I used to be insomniac to a huge degree. I would watch TV until bedtime and then lie awake for hours unable to get my mind to shut down. When I stopped watching TV at night and started listening to music that changed dramatically. I am now usually asleep within moments of getting into bed. My mood may have affected my musical choices (I wouldn\t listen to AC/DC before bed - actually ever probably) - but that is also a 2 way street. Music changes my mood - pure and simple.

Good one Seti. Got another one like that - the music.

The holy grail - and just as elusive. My take: The most important component is the weakest link - whatever that is in any given system. However good the back end equipment it is not going to sound all that good with a 128 kb/s MP3 source. However good the source it is not going to sound all that through a pair of $12 computer speakers. However good source and speakers it will sound bad with the wrong amp (2A3 and a B&W 801 for example) Do I dare mention the room - how good can the best system sound in a closet? It goes on and on. In any extreme case where one item is weak then that is the most important part. Even cables - if you dont have any the system wont sound like - well anything. I think this is one reason we end up with so many arguments. Speakers are important - probably the most obviously important, but without the support of matching equipment behind them.......

OB, Where did you get that info from? Everything I have seen on the net points to rising sales of vinyl records and not falling sales. For example http://www.cdfreaks.com/news/Vinyl-records-are-heading-back-in-fashion-with-sales-up-87.html There are others - probably more up to date but I am a bit pushed for time. Not sure who is right here - but I do know that the number of record shops in Athens in growing continuously whilst the CD shops dwindle to just the major players.

Yes - after 20,000 hours of break in time it will probably be broke.

Am I in the strange postion of agreeing with MAS??? OK - my take on break in for digtial equipment. YOU BREAK IN AND NOT THE GEAR! I did a little experiment some time ago with a new Pioneer player (575 - all in one player - dreadful by the way but anyway).... Got the player - listened to it - thought it sounded very poor in comparison to my existing Marantz CD6000 CD player. Made notes on the differences. Was advised by someone that the Pioneer needs break in so I did entirely that - and kept further notes. For 1 week solid I listened ONLY to the pioneer and listed the improvements I detected which were many and various. By the end of the week I was not only convinced that it outplayed my Marantz by a comfortable margin but I was actually worried it now outplayed my vinyl rig. You cannot imagine my amazement when I switched back to the Marantz. It was better in all the ways I had listed originally - no detectable improvement at all IN RELATION TO A FIXED REFERENCE (assuming the Marantz did not benefit from the break!!!???). In other words - one entire week of listing improvements was entirely down to me and not the unit. Boy did I feel like an audiophile sham but you live and learn.....

Far be it from me to suggest that if it was a power surge that knocked out a fuse in your amp then this could just have easily happened with and technology be it SS, Tube or digital. Having said that - send the amp to Craig to get it checked out - why risk it?

Could be a run in issue but somehow I doubt it. Ultimately I suppose the diamond may have a few "rough edges" that will get worn off over time allowing it to sit better in the groove but we are talking a few layers of atoms here so I do not think that would be it. Normally if you think the sound is a bit thin the easiest way to address that is to adjust the VTA. Rule of thumb is that the tilted down towards the cartridge end will sound shriller and tilted back warmer and bassier. Just lower the back end a tad - if you can and see if the sound changes. This is a much easier issue to address than adjusting the phono stage. If it solves the problem - great - otherwise get back to us.

Here we go again. Why do people have such a religious fervour over their choice of amp? If you like low power SET enough to use it and recommend it to others good luck to you. If you like PP / SS / Digital / high power / low power / moderate power / hybrid / separates / integrateds / surround sound then that is fine too - recommend them if you wish. Bottom line is that to buy any amp on a recommendation here or anywhere else without auditioning it first is a huge risk to your wallet and your ears. Last night - with all this fuss about low power amps I got inspired to change mine. I ripped out the 500 wpc Yamaha and the pre-amp and replaced it with my original setup (which turned out to be a lot more complex than I had originally intended). It took 3 hours to do as I decided to re-cable the whole thing and then got a ground loop that took time to find and finally a tube in the replacement pre-amp went microphonic and that needed replacing. Re-cabling was an excellent idea - and having sorted out the ground loop the whole system plays quieter than it has for some time. A couple of hours listening told me that in many ways I prefer this setup to the big one (despite its being a whopping $8,000 cheaper). Dynamics a plenty - much better balanced sound and a more musical experience - all from only 150 wpc (into 8 ohms) [] Amazing how far the power of a couple of light bulbs goes......at this rate I could see myself coming down further in power to maybe 60 wpc in the future []

Mas, You surprised me. Thank-you for that invitation - I will take you up on it after easter and once I have installed skype. Never used it - we have our own internet telephony here (with cheap calls to the US as an alternative) and I also have MSN messenger which allows video calls (very handy with a Grandma in another country 2000 miles away) for FREE!!! I will send you my hotmail addy via email so you can add me if you have Messenger. Thanks again.