Specs here
I know it's expensive. and who knows what it sounds like, but by God Almighty that is beautiful to look at!
it's hard to quibble about a product without hearing it first. and i applaud the effort to move the state of the art of phono stages forward. i think very highly of all the VAC gear i've heard for sure.
but i agree about the input switch. it cannot make it sound better, and likely has some sonic cost. when you are dealing with less than .2mv signals there are no places to hide.
i can see it in a 'around $10k phono stage' like the Allnic H3000 i had. sounded great, very flexible. but ultimiately it was somewhat compromised by being so flexible. i did enjoy being able to have 4 tonearms and cartridges all 'at hand'.
for $50k my priority would be pure teleportation. maybe it can do it.
Last I knew, VAC used Sowter transformers for MC cartridges and they don't contain any silver wire to my knowledge. I had my Counterpoint SA-5.1 modified by Mike Elliott with Sowter 8055 transformers and I hated them. I sent the preamp back to Mike and had him remove them. Even though the Counterpoint SA-2 pre-preamp had more noise, it was 1000x better sounding to my ears than the Sowter transformers.
I know my buddy Frantz will comment on MSRP but I must say that Kevin sure knows how to make eye candy as well as very good gear
FrantzM; said:Am I the only person to find this ludicrous?
It looks beautiful. Is it worth $50K? Only the people who buy it can answer that question. He appears to be using naked Vishay resistors which are expensive (in small quantities they cost around $7 each the last time I bought a batch of them compared to a 50 cent metal film resistor). However, I see lots of dirt cheap electrolytic caps inside as well.
Of course it's the engineering that counts, not necessarily if each resistor, cap is the best/most expensive. The sum total for any statement product's parts is a fraction of the msrp set by the manufacturer anyway.
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