The new Coda S5.5 amplifier: It's a "Petite Beast"!
I have in-house the New Coda Technologies S5.5 amplifier for review for Stereo Times website. It will be awhile before I write the review. However, I'm so impressed by the performance of this petite amplifier, it only weights 45 pounds, that I wanted to give a heads up to you GON members if you are in the market for a balanced pure class A amplifier, delivers 50 watts @ 8 Ohms, and can drop 100 Amperes of current on a peak!
The world class build quality of Coda amplifiers is on display with the S5.5, along with the most beautiful purity of tonality, precise sound-staging, complete liquidity offered by pure class A design, and what might be the best top end regarding details, decays, and a natural shimmering without brightness or any edge at all.
The S5.5 uses extremely wide bandwidth output transistors instead of the usual TO3 devices used in most transistor designs. I own the Coda #16, which is great, but the midrange/high end is taken to another level of musical enjoyment with the S5.5. The S5.5 has a sense of speed/aliveness that is exciting to listen to that you experience in live music. The amp is dynamic as hell, has driven with ease any speaker I have tried it with, hence my nickname of the "Petite Beast". Remember, 50 watts pure class A, can drop 100 amperes of current and only weights 45 pounds.
Teajay (Terry London)
@hanki just for clarification, you’re Magico S5 speakers have the following specs and you don’t find the S5.5 lacking in power or bass output compared to other amps? Sensitivity: 88dB I have the SF Amati Traditions, which present a similar load, so I’m wondering if it might be a good match for them. |
@johnah5 do you have any thoughts on whether the S5.5 might be a good match for Sonus Faber Amati Traditions? People tend to recommend around 500w to bring out their best and are usually paired with McIntosh. |
@grk you're right. I verified in the manual, it says this about the front buttons:
So as long as I don't mind walking over to hit the button instead of using a remote, this option will allow me to use any preamp without bypass support. Nice! |
Sorry if this is a little off-topic, but I’ve been struggling to find good preamp options that have HT bypass. I need the preamp to take bypassed input from a surround processor, and normal input from a streamer. Then it occurred to me. The S5.5 itself has XLR and SE inputs. Is it possible to bypass the preamp altogether and connect the surround processor to the amp SE inputs, while the streamer/preamp is connected to the amp XLR inputs? What will happen if there is a signal being sent from both sources, will it mix the audio or explode? |
@sim_audio_nerd would you have any comments on how Sim Audio Moon amps compare to the S5.5? I assume you were running them at some point. |
