The Red Wine Audio amplifiers are a reasonable value amplifier if you're looking for:
1. Off the grid performance. No need to depend on the power quality of your AC line.
2. Solid state reliability combined with a tonal density and richness which is more often associated with tube amplifiers.
What the Red Wine amplifiers do not excel at is a certain aliveness and high frequency extension that good tube amplifiers can do very well. You can get high frequency extension out of other solid state amplifiers, but in my experience you're often getting a healthy dose of listener fatigue to go along with your hyper detail.
As for the preamp, the Isabella should sound better than it does. It is, to my ears and with the stock JJs, overly warm and overly slow. The $500 Lightspeed attenuator is better, but only if the rest of your system is suitably compatible with a passive.
I'm on a transparency kick lately, so my "transparent" may be your "thin" and my "warm and slow" may be your "full of body".
I have not heard the LFP-V editions of any of the RWA products. I understand they're faster, more dynamic, more transparent, etc. I also understand that the new RWA amplifiers now have a tube buffer.
I don't hesitate to recommend RWA gear to all sorts of my friends who are not as obsessed as I am and in fact, they really like the RWA gear despite me telling them that a true valve amplifier may sound better.
When I demoed a very neutral Dayens Ampino for them, they continued to prefer their RWA amplifier. So as always, results dependent on system, room, your own ears, etc.
