Anybody own Audio Experience Symphonies?

I love my symphonies (non + version). Excellent design and build.

Tweaks: Rolled tubes to Electroharmonix Bugle Boys (12ax7). Inexpensive and a nice improvement. Replaced output wima caps with auricaps ($5 each). A nice improvement. Replaced output wire (factory stuff is silver plated 28 gauge single strand copper in teflon) with solid silver 28 ga in teflon - this reduced some mid treble grain.

In stock form, the unit is par for the price. Out of the box and broken in, it sounded almost identical to the preamp section of my NAD 350 integrated. In tweaked form it performs better or equal to anything I've tried up to the $1200 price range. Bass is solid, deep and taught. Sound is not overly warm. Resolution and transperency is excellent. Soundstage is wide, deep and tall. This tweaked unit leans toward the AR tube sound. Clean, fast and dynamic.

The output impedance is high, so there may be a few power amps out there that will yield some hiss. You must also let the preamp warm up for a half minute before turning on the power amp. My B&K ST202+ works great with it. Dead silent background. I am using Maggies 1.6qr with homemade xovers and an Onix CD-88 CD player with OPA627 upgrade (a terrific sounding player when tweaked this way).

I use it with a Cary Rocket and never had any hiss. Used to use it with Marantz Monoblocks. The 500MA's. Also good. Had a top of the line Rotel that was not as good for a preamp and finally sold it. Currently I am engaged in an interior revamp. I will post when finished.

Hi, I am in the process of purchasing a Symphonies Plus and I have seen the posts of how the 12xa7m will improve. I was just wondering what sort of sound difference they made from the people using the 12ax7m tubes. More detailed sound, tighter bass, brighter high's, or more accurate midrange?

I have a Symphonies connected to a Perreaux PMF2150B and KEf 105,2's. In a no mod listening, I have to say that it's not up to a Copland CTA 305. The air between instruments is not there, and the sound is much compressed. Not as detailed also.
The Copland is 3000,00 cdn vs 894,00 (plus shipping) for the Symphonies +, a possible upgrade for me.

Is someone had the opportunity to test the two units?

I posted a reply a while back. I have recently rolled the tubes from EH to the re-issue Tung Sols on a tip from Mr McShane at Tube Asylum (there is a specific series of re-issue Tung Sols that he recommends over others). Another full step in improvement. More bass slam and dynamics. Complex material comes off much better. Centered images are a bit more forward while the rear images stay rear. Now I understand what was meant by the TNT review saying that the music was a bit disjointed with the EH tubes. Then after about 100 hours of the new tubes, I changed out the rectifier tube to an early 1950's RCA. I never expected a rectifier tube could make more than a tiny difference, but it did. Much improved texture in the treble region. Gobs of detail yet relaxed. This one is a keeper.