Preamp Deal of the Century

Outlier, thank you much for the info regarding the remote.

To those who have the Syrah or Cortese, is the volume control a smoothly turning knob or a stepped knob? Has anyone asked Mick for something specific in regard to output control?

I'd also be interested in hearing from those who got their Supratek 'customized' and with what features?

Thanks in advance,
Travis

As I said before after one channel went out and I had John Tucker repair it, he greatly modified my Syrah. One of the things we did was to replace the inexpensive pot with a stepped attenuator. Since he also made the unit parafeed, put a constant current source on the output tube, and switched to 6N1P from the 6SN7, however, I can tell you little about the benefits of each mod.

T bone - the remote operates smoothly. Mick uses an Alps pot for the remote controlled preamps.

I fully recommend against having your preamp customized - beyond the remote.

Most every "option" I asked for had a problem. My first Chardonnay preamp was a a dog - Mick realized this and replaced it.

Options I asked for:

A single chassis version. - Mick tried and then 1/2 way through couldn't do it.

XLR outputs - Mick used the wrong connectors and a makeshift (engineered on the fly) transformer output that did nothing but make LOUD hum.

Theater by-pass. After explaing to Mick how this should work, he came up with his own solution and the results were less than optimal. To date, I don't know if the feature works or doesn't.

Remote. Mine increases in volume when you press the down button and lowers with the up button. Silly and quirky but annoying none-the-less.

Subwoofer output - works great but its a standard feature if you consider the fact that Supratek's come with two sets of outputs - one can be used for a sub.

T-bone,
It is a smooth turning volume control. They are all parafeed now.

Just get the standard.....it is what it is, not a Levinson. That's the lesson. Bwhite, how is the phono going? Etthan's too? Haven't heard either of you say, so thought it might have been disappointing over long haul, although hope not.