Tube Preamps...I'm sold

Shindo Monbrisson at $7,900.The best tube preamp you could hear,unless you want to try the more expensive Shindo preamps.
No balanced connections and no remote.
Hitherto unexperienced musical bliss.
http://www.6moons.com/audioreviews/shindo/monbrison.html

Teajay,why don'y you identify the "mystery" Japanese line stage?
Sounds like you tried the WRONG Japanese brand.
And do you really still place at the top of your list "soundstage" and "details"?
I moved beyond that audiophile Chimera years ago.
Might want to give great tube electronics a try and get back in touch with the music.Details and ss are for young beginners who don't know any better.

I don't remember making any personal remarks,Teajay.And everbody finds me condescending(and that IS a personal remark).
The Monbrisson is not a linestage,it is a full function preamp with an unbelievable phonostage built in.
If you have access to a record player,or any analogue component,I urge you to give it a try through the Monbrisson.My digital sounded better than ever through my Shindo preamp,but it was only when I got back to analogue through the preamp that my system's full potential was realized.It provides a direct connection to the emotional essence and flow of the music that I have yet to experience with any other gear.Digital is not even close.It makes pretty sounds and detail and slam etc.,but not music,IMO.
Also,everyone I know of who uses Shindo gear uses the cords that come with the gear or the Shindo premium cords which are only about $400.
The shindo products are voiced by Ken Shindo,who has probably forgotten more than most of us will ever know about making magic with a stereo,and that includes his cords and the NOS tubes that are in it.
No experimentation is necessary.
Also,I am just curious if you would care to divulge the dealer who provided you a new Monbrisson to audition but did so with the wrong cord.
As I understand it,there are only a handful of dealers in the US,and I don't know of any dealers who provide brand new unused gear for home trials--of any brand.As everyone knows,most gear doesn't sound its best untill it gets some hours on it.Surely your dealer knows that.
All in fun.

I have used passive preamps in the past and liked it better than the active stages I tried.
I then went dCS straight into different amps for quite a while and preferred that to the couple of preamps that I tried(amateur that I am,Audiofeil).
But when I got my Shindo Vosne Romanee preamp,it was a complete change of landscape like no preamp had ever been before for me.
It was like adding another amp into the chain,it transformed my system in an almost unbelievably positive way.
So,forgive me if I seem incredulous at your initial reports,but they differ wildly from my own experience of the Shindo gear,and ,frankly, from every other report I have read of others who have actually heard the gear.
Even someone as mainstream as Michael Fremer was quoted as saying the Shindo demo was the best he heard at a show in the recent past(pretty sure it was he).
But maybe the Monbrisson isn't the best choice for an otherwise all ss and digital system with low efficiency speakers and a tough load.
With your preferences,Teajay,I'm kinda surprised you even wanted to try it.

Well,Jmcgrogan2, I am surprised that in all fairness you don't ask Teajay if he has financial ties to placette.If you check,I think you will find that he has reccommended placette on more threads than I have ever mentioned Shindo.
And I am sorry that you are yet to find yourself a system that instills as much enthusiasm in you as mine does in me.
Dare I say,maybe you should give Shindo a try ,too.

I count at least 14 different plugs for Placette by Teajay.
I appear to have about 5 for Shindo.
So there! Jmcgrogan2

Audiofeil,old age does not necessarily equate to the ability to make sound judgments in any field,and the evaluation of audio components is no exception.
And yes I am an amateur in audio.I don't make my living selling audio or anything related to it.
I vote for equipment with my own money and have to pay for everything I try.
I guess I will never aquire more "sense" about things audio,because I will never waste anymore of my money on SS gear that is hawked to to the audio masses by guys who have lost half their hearing and by companies that issue endless new revisions of the same old junk that wasn't very good when it first came out decades ago and isn't any better now.
I don't need your approbation or any one elses when evaluating equipment,I only need my ears.
And how do you like this statement:Solidstate SUCKS!
(Good) TUBES RULE!!!!!!