Audio Mirror Preamplifier

I am close with Vlad and have heard his Linea preamp. I demoed a broken-in unit at my house over the weekend. It is incredibly good for its price point. It is very musical, natural sounding, and soulful. It does not have the imaging precision and solidity of the preamp stage in my $38.5K reference T+A SDV 3100 HV, nor does it have the sense of space and detail due to having a softer top end than the T+A. But if I would pick the unit over a number of other tube preamps, of which I’ve personally owned a number, including the Viva Linea, Modwright LS-36.5 DM, PS Audio BHK preamp and many others. I wouldn’t hesitate to place it in the same sonic league as any of those. 

If you can live with its constraints, I highly recommend it. What constraints? Three stereo inputs maximum, one stereo pair outputs, all single-ended / unbalanced. It is a purist preamp, so if you have subwoofers, for example, you would need to get a y-block connector for the RCA outs. 

I am a past owner of an Audio Mirror Tubadour III SE DAC and Reflection 45 SET amplifiers, so I have intimate familiarity with the house sound of Vlad’s components, which is extended, holographic and pleasantly on the warmer side of neutral without giving up important detail and subtleties in recordings.

In a time when many manufacturers seem to be on an endless quest for ever more neutrality and detail (often to the detriment of musical enjoyment), Audio Mirror unapologetically endeavors to recreate music in your room that you can (and will) enjoy for hours and hours without fatigue.

And, this at stunningly reasonable prices. Vlad’s $5000 Reflection 45 SET amplifiers might be the absolute best bargain in tube amplification offered today.

I suspect the Linea follows the Audio Mirror sonic roadmap, and if that’s in line with one’s preferences then I heartily recommend installing one at home for an audition. Vlad offers an audition period of generally 14 days. Plenty of time to decide if it fits into one’s system and goals.

An earlier comment stated “all single-ended/unbalanced”. While it’s true the Linea is not differentially balanced, the Linea has transformer coupled balanced outputs. If they’re the same as the Lundahl transformers in his Tubadour IV, then they’re among the most transparent transformers sold.

@tvad 

In a time when many manufacturers seem to be on an endless quest for ever more neutrality and detail (often to the detriment of musical enjoyment)

Spot on observation.

Charles

@tvad Thank you for correcting me on the transformer-coupled balanced outputs. I forgot about that. To add more, there are both the single ended outputs and this pair of transformer-coupled outputs, but a switch is installed to toggle one or the either. Vlad mentioned he cannot bypass this switch and enable both outputs without sacrificing sound quality. 

Your right in the sonic signature of his preamp, and it was a nice change from the preamp he offered many many years ago, which had less bloom and was much more etched and sterile in comparison.

Interesting to read about this. I wonder if he could make it with an extra set of pre-amp outs. I love having those for my subs. Otherwise, you’d have to use Y-splitters, right?

Consider, as a comparison, this similarly priced preamp from Aric Audio --
See the extra outputs? Handy.

Some years back I bought a used AM preamp on Audiogon. It arrived with a damaged remote control volume pot. I sent it to Vlad and he not only fixed it for free he also paid return shipping. Excellent products and superb customer service, I’ve never forgotten how well Vlad treated me. 

@hilde45 I'll let Vlad know about the thread and see if he can comment. Given how compact the unit is, I don't know what's going on inside and whether he can make a second set of unbalanced outputs, though I know it doesn't take up much room. This would still require folks to use all RCA, where I know many like going balanced from their preamp to amp. In this case someone would need to use some form of balanced splitter, or perhaps have a subwoofer like REL that can tap into the amplifier's speaker outs.

Hello everybody. I am not frequent on forums. I am very busy working on orders and new audio projects :-))))

Here is a clarification on the new LINEA preamp. It uses output transformers for both balanced and unbalanced outputs. The switch is not changing/flipping the outputs. It is connecting/disconnecting the ground to the transformer, making it balanced or unbalanced. Transformers are Lundahl and yes they are one of the best sounding. Adding an extra RCAs to the output is possible but it's not simply a matter of adding a pair of RCAs. The load impedance need to be considered. LINEA output impedance is pretty low so it will work with any 47kohm load(some solid state amps have low input impedance). I can always replace the XLRs with a second pair of RCAs and eliminate the switch.

No experience with the preamp but had Vlad's 45-Watt SET power amps for many years. Outstanding product from one of the best in the audio biz. Vlad stands out as a true gem of a person. 

Thank you Vlad @audiomirror for providing accurate guidance and a solution for people with subwoofers!

I'm having a preamp made for me and the designer is keeping the preamp out for the sub separate, load-wise, from the one going to the amp.