Class D amp with Tube Preamp Combo?

Hi Guidocorona, Jim and anyone interested,

Here's the review Ait did some time ago where he referenced the Nuforce Ref 9V2SE with others:

http://forum.audiogon.com/cgi-bin/fr.pl?ramps&1205629120

I believe this is an aberation, perhaps limited to his set up, and not a typical scenario for the Nuforce.

Regards,

Kenobi

Thanks Kenobi, now I do remember the review. I can only guess that AIT may have been dealing with a NuForce right out of the factory or with very incomplete break in, or dead cold. Only on a dead cold and recently installed NuForce I have experienced noticeable artifacts at the top. These went away gradually with time. . . and completely.

Hi Guidocorona,

Thank you for your confirmation. It took me a while, at least a few weeks for the sound to mature and probably a few months to where its at currently.

Audiophiles are an impulsive bunch and not the most patient. I am also one. Luckily, this time, I stuck around and am being rewarded. Many who did not have successful integration with their systems didn't give it the proper time and a bit of care in priming the unit to the rest of their system. In my case, I didn't discover its magic until I got rid of hard spiky cones and other detailed-wrenching isolation bases (and replaced with softer, more balanced ones) from the rest of my components. Turned out the NuForce amp itself had that in spades and needed no help in that area. A bit of warmth from cabling or upstream sources will nicely balance its inherent attributes and allow it to play music the way its intended.

Best regards,

Kenobi

Hi Kenobi. You're absolutely correct about hard spiky cones (been there, done that). The NuForce feet are definitely good just by themselves. I found, however, in my system I was looking for a more "soft" presentation. I installed some Bright Star Audio Isonodes (the large ones) under the fixed feet of the NuForce amps. Mainly because I had them lying around. They gave me just what I was looking for!

As I've said many times, I'm not trying to trash your systems. You love them and that's great for you.
The NuForce problem I had was due to RF emission, I am sure of that. I used a heavily broken in demo unit that had hundreds of hours of use on it, so I don't think it was a break-in issue. Maybe the demo system I had was defective, who knows. It was certainly much worse sounding than either of the other amps I auditioned, and it caused a noticable rise in my system's background moise level just by inserting it into the loop.