Nuforce

I've also got a pair of Aerial 10Ts that I've been driving with a Levinson 331 but have been toying with the idea of uping the power since the 10Ts do love power. The McCormack DNA-500 is on my wish list but, of course, it's price tag is a good bit beyond the NuForce 9s.

Plato, can you say more about the 9s with your 10Ts and what you're having done to the amps? Are these personal mods or is Nuforce still tweaking the design of the 9s? (i.e. is 'latest version' your version or theirs?).

Switching amps may not (then again they just may) sound as good the better traditional amps now, but, they seem to have a rather fast learning curve. Maybe in the near future switching amps may be the reference?

Where do you put the Halcro DM 68 in context of the other
amps eg ML, MC , Pass and so on

Plato, very well said.

Mdconnelly, I also own the 10Ts and after recently hearing the NuForce Reference 9 amps in my system, I sold my beloved McCormack DNA-2 Revision A amp. The NuForce weren't night and day better, but they are more refined, revealing, and musical. Surprisingly, they did an excellent job of competing head to head with the phenomenal bass of the 300 wpc into 8ohm DNA-2 Rev. A or should I say 600 wpc into my 10Ts at 4 ohm loads. (fwiw, my preferred listening levels are 92 to 97 db)

Phd, you said, "There may be more hype behind these switching mono blocks then they really deserve." To that I say, "then again, perhaps not." You issued a good caution to try before you buy. But that should go without saying regardless of the product or industry.

Unsound, these are analog switching amps. Not digital. To see how the NuForce amps rank among some of the better amps TAS is touting these days, I would suggest checking out this very recent review by Chris Martens of the Absolute Sound:

http://nuforce.com/reviews/TAS-Ref9.pdf

One comment Chris Martens made that I find intriguing was,

"The Ref 9s offer a truly extraordinary level of see-through transparency, and as an audiophile friend so aptly put it, “Their transparency is real, not a fake artifact
caused by brightness.”"

I think that comment said quite a bit and without any fluff. Especially when one considers the other amps he's comparing to.

I've not heard the latest and greatest TAS recommended amps as mentioned in the review but until now the DNA-2 Rev. A amp was the overall best I've heard. That includes the Halcros DM68s and DM58 which I've had the pleasure to hear on several occasions.

-IMO
Disclaimer, at the same time I sold my DNA-2 Rev A amp, I became a dealer for NuForce.

I would not buy these amps yet. Not because they aren't any good, they obviously are, but they are a work in progress.

The Ref 8's went through something like 6 iterations with improvements at every step. The Ref 9 is already up to 9.02 or something like that. The good thing about this though is the designers give the option to upgrade the internal modules to latest version for not much cost, but still... I would wait for them to get it perfected with such a new technology.

There is a guy who does level 1 mods on them as well at www.tweakaudio.com

""Some of the things done in the mod include:
1. Remove the LED for clearer sound.
2. Damp various parts for cleaner sound.
3. Install ERS material between power supply and output board.
4. Change input cap to super expensive V-Cap Teflon (maybe world's best cap). We burn in these caps for one week on custom burn-in machine before installing.
5. Change power supply caps to damped nude Blackgates.
6. Change filter cap to hand made copper foil and Teflon tape cap.
7. Change input op amp to better, faster type.
8. Change input jacks to OFC copper types (SoundConnections/Vampire).
9. Change input ground wire to Jena Labs wire.
10. Change output wire to high purity copper Litz Cardas wire.
11. Remove the sound of the binding posts by running the output wires through grommets in the chassis and wrapping the tinned ends of the wire around the outside of the binding posts (effectively giving a wire to spade clamp).
12. etc. ""