Ayre and McCormack ... a good match?

Jmc-I see your point about putting the link to his ad. A bit over the top. Take that out and my post verges on making sense.

As far as Atma-sphere, it is the best amp ever in my system including McCormack, Krell, & Manley among the more notable.

Entrope,

Tim put a link to his own for sale ad in the public forums, how could you have missed that? That's a no no in a public forum, and Tim was man enough to see that, to his credit.
It's good to see that the Atma-Sphere club has his back though. I may buy the Atma-Sphere with that kind of product support. :)

Hi John, your point is well taken. I wish I had considered that option at the time I posted, but I was in a hurry and just plain didn't think of it. At the time I thought it would be better to be up front that I was selling one. However, after reading your post, I looked up the moderation guidelines for this site and you are correct, posts that may be declined include, "Posts that are obviously trying to sell something." Even though my ad is already paid and posted here, I should have e-mailed Hodu separately about having the preamp for sale.
To Hodu; I believe my positive comments about the K-5xe are directly relevant since Steve McCormack uses the Jensen transformers in my DNA 500 as well as in the balanced monoblock conversion upgrade to the DNA 0.5 that you have. I have previously posted my positive impression of the K-5xe in these discussion forums, where I stated "I am listening to the K-5xe now, and it is very nice in every way, with no flaws or shortcomings, but just not quite the last degree of richness, clarity and dynamics that the A-S provides. If I had never heard the A-S, I would probably be perfectly happy with the K-5xe." There is quite a bit of additional information regarding the Ayre preamp posted here and at Audio Asylum. You might also look up Sam Tellig's review in the May 2006 Stereophile, and Jason Kennedy's review in HiFi+, which is posted on the Ayre website. There are many different opinions regarding preamps here, so listening for yourself may be the best and only way of knowing for sure what is right in your system. Good luck. - Tim Mitchell

John-

As I see it no specific pitch was made in this forum. He addressed his comments as a "plug" which was a reasonable disclaimer.

Mitch2 has experience with the item and related his thoughts-the purpose of this forum-as well as noting a possible bias on his part.

Personally, I prefer the Atma-sphere also.

You are correct Mitch2, that was a shameless plug. It would have been best if you had contacted Hodu offline and present your sales proposition in private rather than using the public forums. These forums are supposed to be for advice only, not as a sales tool. Personally, I refrain from responding to a thread asking me about a unit that I am currently selling. Though I have been known to contact the interested party offline with an opinion, and with any sales information.
That's just my $0.02.

Regards,
John

Ok, this is a shameless plug, but the comments are true. Disclaimer - I am currently selling this;
http://cgi.audiogon.com/cgi-bin/cl.pl?preatran&1171971732&item
I have recently tried the K-5xe with my DNA 500 and thought it performed very well. You are correct, the impedance is a perfect match even with the lowish input impedance of the DNA 500 (10k ohm). In addition, the ergonomics are excellent and match perfectly with my CX-7e cd player. The blue/purple light is very nice looking and casework is top notch. The sound with my McCormack was clean and musical with good bass punch. The only reason I am not keeping it is that I just can't bring myself to give up the sound of my $7,000+ Atma-Sphere MP-3. I sure will miss the ease of use of the K-5xe though. I was able to use only one remote for both the K-5xe and my CX-7e, and the appearance of both units mate perfectly. In fact, if you would be interested in both the CX-7e and K-5xe let me know since I have some gain matching issues with the cd player and my MP-3 so I am thinking of trying a different player. Both units are in excellent condition.