2. amps-preamps
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seeking recommendations for a preamp

I've been lurking a while, but this is my first post. I will appreciate any advice given, and thank you for reading this.

My Kenwood C2 bit the dust. I have lost the right channel, and the input selector is also going out. I'm looking to replace it, and upgrade quite a bit. The wife has given me a $2500 budget, new or used is ok. I listen to Vinyl a lot, as well as my echo dot which is also plugged into my preamp with a headphone to RCA adapter. I'll list my other equipment now.

Completely rebuilt Altec A7-500 with all new parts from GPA
JBL L200s
Kenwood M1D amplifier
Homebrew rebuilt Monoblocks from Zenith consoles with EL84/6BQ5
Yamaha EQ
Thorens TD 318 with an Ortofon cart. Unsure which one as I am at work
SVS PB16 ultra

The room is 16 wide by 20 deep. I primarily listen to the Altecs and tube amps with the SVS sub taking up the slack in the bass from the A7s. Sometimes I listen to the JBLs driven by the Kenwood M1D. I notice that the echo dot sounds a lot better than my turntable, so I know I must be needing a better phono stage. I've tried swapping out turntables with a couple of Dual 1229s with Shure M97XE carts that Bill at fixmydual has gone through thoroughly so It's not isolated to my Thorens. I guess I' surprised that the $30 Echo Dot sounds so much better.  

I admit I don't have the best cables, and will upgrade those as I can. I feel like the preamp is the heart of the system so I want to make a good choice. I love Macintosh, based purely off emotion, but don't know if it's the best choice for my situation. I do not have a local shop to audition, and none of my friends are into audio. What preamps should I be looking at ??
128x128adrianleewelch
dorkwad
538 posts
 
I have an Anthem 710 home theater receiver with the room correction.  It did sound better than my previous Yamaha I had before, but the Anthem is not in the same league as any of the AI preamps in sound.  The rest of the home theater is all Paradigm speakers including the Studio 20 v2 Reference.  

Do yourself a favor and read up on all the Audible Illusion preamp reviews.  
adrianleewelch's avatar
adrianleewelch OP
74 posts
 
I see a 3a on Fleabay for 1700. What tubes do AI recommend. I’m seeing Sovtek in this particular unit
adrianleewelch's avatar
adrianleewelch OP
74 posts
 
And what’s up with the double volume knobs ?
sandthemall
544 posts
 
Call Don Sachs. It’s just at your price range and if you work with him, you can just have the features that you need for a little less than your budget. But you will actually own a preamp that will murder anything below $6-7k. They are that good. Because I didn’t want balanced inputs, I was able to get one with an older case that was left behind at the woodshop...but it was stuffed with all the latest improvements and it saved me a couple hundred dollars.

dorkwad
538 posts
 
The used AI 3A’s should go for $1200-1500. AI has refurbished units that they go over, clean and replace the tubes on for about $1600. Those units are very close to looking new. $1700 on Ebay is probably not a great deal. The double volume controls allow you to fine tune the balance if needed. Nice if you have a slight channel imbalance. It can happen sometimes in many different areas of your system. Adjusting 2 volume pots is pretty easy after a couple tries.   Call AI and talk to Art Ferris doubt the tubes they recommend.  They will be matched sets and will last a long time.  In the 23 years of owning the 2 AI preamps,  I only replaced tubes twice in the 2D and when I first bought a used 3A, right when I got it.  The previous owner said they could use a replacement.  For 6 years, there was NO loss of performance.  

Hope this helps.
Bob


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