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Counterpoint Hybrid Amps: How do they sound?

I've been curious about the Counterpoint SA-100 and NPS amps. They had a tube driver stage and MOSFET outputs. How do they sound compared to other things out there? Are they reliable? Counterpoint was famous for having equipment that was unstable and blew up. I had been told that the designer was not as technically adept an engineer, and that was why the circuit designs were not the most stable, and certain components were stressed in the circuit.

Anyway, the concept of hybrid amps has always been interesting, and very controversial. The different thoughts:

Hybrid amps have the best of tubes and solid state.

Hybrid amps have the worst of tubes and solid state combined.

Hybrid amps should use tube input stages and solid state output stages.

Hybrid amps should use solid state input stages and tube output stages.

YOUR EXPERIENCE & OPINIONS?
kevziek

Showing 1 response by soix

soix
10,015 posts
 
I just heard about Aria(?) amps and was on their website the other day. Thought I read the designer was the original guy from Counterpoint, but I could be wrong. Was Counterpoint bought by Red Rose? Anyway, the website was www.ariaaudio.com(or something close) and I got to it through www.altavista.com(or something close) but you might be able to access it directly. The amps were hybrid types so I'm thinking it might be the same guy. Just thought I'd pass this on as I didn't see it mentioned above.

Tim
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