Soulution 710 Amplifier and 720 Preamplifier

Hi Bvdiman,

8 Goldmund amps are incredible. I don't find anything lacking in my Goldmund gear but I know my current speakers are not the right fit which is why I am using Boulder gear. I would imagine Goldmund would work well on Verity or Wilson Benesch (two brands of gear I had in the past).

To Brian, how would you characterize the sound of your speakers? I would probably put Goldmund on one side and Boulder on the other and perhaps MBL to the warm side of Boulder (by some margin). From what other have said, Soulution might be between Goldmund and Boulder.

To Bflowers,

I would imagine your system to be pretty darn excellent. The most radical change would be to switch speakers and keep everything else. Don't know that I would do that though but if we assume the B gear is solid and you want to really change the sonic presentation, speaker change would be the fastest, most radical way. And it would still be cheaper than a Soulution pre/power front end (assuming buying used top-notch speaker vs. new Soulution).

Hi Classicjazz:

IMO the German Physik Carbon mk IV are as dead neutral as I've heard. However with cool sounding amps they can take on unusual stridency. I need to stay with neutral to slightly warm amps.....Boulder, MBL, Soulution, Pass, Clayton M300's. As the Soulutions are much more $$ than most of the competition, here in the USA, they will have to really stand out at audition for me to make the purchase.

Thanks to all respondants for all the insightful comments and information.

Brian

I have owned Lamm 2.1 amps and the L2 preamp, MBL 9008a's ,6010d preamp, 1621a transport,1611f dac and currently own the Soulution 700 monoblocks, the 720 preamp, and am auditioning the 740 cd.

Yes, Soulution is very expensive. Is it worth 3 times the excellent Lamm equipment, 2 times the excellent MBL equipment? It depends on what you are striving for and what you can afford. It was a "no brainer" for me.

Like Davis - i own the 700 monoblocks and the 721 (have separate phono linestage) and for me they are the right choice (wont go into value discussions as of course it is a ridiculous price). I think the comments are interesting on the internet with these amps (710 & 700s). i find some people say they are analytical and others comment that they don't have enough bloom. (i have heard some people say they are not transparent but that is so far off, i just ignore those comments). what you have to realize with both the 710 and the 700s is that they are completely neutral and transparent. may sound cliche by now, but they truly show everything up stream from them. if you get happy with your system (most importantly your cabling) then i think these are one of the best amps out there.
JV on AVGuide was going through his theory of 'Absolute Sound' vs. 'hear everything' vs. 'enjoying the music' - stating these are 'hear everything amps'. i found this funny as the word Absolute by definition is objective, so i would restate his list as musicality, absolute sound, enjoy the music - with these amps being the absolute sound category, anyway, these amps will let you hear everything exactly where the music is supposed to be as it was recorded (soundstaging, quality, etc). if you do get the set-up you like you'll love these amps (i have listened to the 710 extensively and would say it is even more neutral than the 700s). you will find yourselves listening over and over to your favorite recordings, wondering why you like this musician better than another one, because these amps will let you hear the difference. yes, there will be some favorites that were recorded so badly that you don't take them out as much as you used to, b/c the Soulutions will let you know just how bad they are. But that too is music and there is a lot of good recordings out there (Beatles new release in FLAC is amazing). To me, Vinyl is better than ever with the Soulutions. i understand those who state they want the bloom of a tube amp, but most of those people are listening to chamber music and some big orchestra - Soulutions play those well too, but they play everything across the board just like it was recorded (for better or worse).

i think one thing you should take into account when making your consideration that most negative comments on the forums are from people demoing the Soulutions in a dealers systems or hearing them at a show. for those that own the Soulutions or tested them in their own system (and got the right cabling, front-end, etc) i have never heard anything but gushing reviews. in fact, of the big reviews that have happened (in US and Europe) a big percent of the reviewers have kept them as their reference.

Audiobrian,
any update on your decision