Audio Research Ref 5 preamp

I had the Ref 3 and compared it side by side with the MBL 6010D which I kept and I sold the Ref. When I moved from tube to Spectron power amps, the Ref 3 was not a good match and the MBL was much better. Not a question of the Ref 3 being inferior, but I suspect the impedance made the difference and the MBL was more natural and controlled proving yet again the importance of system synergy in the real world.

While I am very impressed with the 6010, I would like to try the Ref 5, but not with my Spectrons. In the appropriately matched system the Ref preamps are as good as it gets and I am sure the Ref 5 will offer state of the art performance for a 'reasonable' high end price and quality dealer back up. If you like the ARC house sound, which has a definable character, I am not sure I would need to go from a 3 to a 5 as I am sure the changes are incremental.

Probably around this time replacement of 610T (to match up Ref.5) is already lurking on the horizon somewhere at ARC.. Anybody anything yet? Anyone remembered the time lapse in between release of Ref.3 and 610T? Would be great if ARC could improve their line of Reference amps in similar fashion and magnitude as they did with the pre.

Interesting question. I am happy with my REF210s however maybe there are silver handles on the horizon as one of the upgrades. A little beefier fan/cooling configuration would be a nice upgrade. Circuit boards are already horizontal, so no upgrade there...

Hi Guys,

Very interesting discussion.

I assume the comparisons made till now are based on the original ARC tube configuration. I know that exchange of the ARC tubes by NOS tubes has also a remarkable impact. Has anybody had a chance to compare REF5 and REF3 with "tungsol blackplate" and the 6H30 DR's "diamonds". Next question of course will be what happens if you change the original ARC tubes in the REF5 with the same NOS tubes!

Personally, I was never that motivated to spend time rolling tubes. I did it once with a PH3SE and sure, the Mullard NOS tubes I used did seem to improve things, etc. etc. I spent time analyzing the differences and how to quantify and qualify them in words. To me, tube rolling is an ancillary swirl, as it were. I started wondering if I was actually getting unused NOS tubes, and if they were worth the premium $. It all seemed like time taken away from simply enjoying the music.

AR uses tubes they can easily get. I am inclined to conclude that that's good enough for me. All that said, however, if someone were to take the time to make the comparisons and had a strong recommendation, I would be inclined to listen up and maybe consider for the next tube replacement. I welcome others' points of view and perspective.