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Best Balanced Tube Amp To Pair With Meridian G02?

As the Subject title says, I am trying to decide what my best options are insofar as my best options for power amps to pair with the Meridian G02 preamp. I was just able to get one in mint condition, with warranty, at a steal of a price.

I want to pair this with a tubed power amp that has great soundstage, that classic midrange magic, and a rich, but not slow, or rolled off sonic character. Ideally, I would also want a balanced tube amplifier, as the Meridian is maximized for balanced performance, although it will handle single ended.

What would you recommend? My max budget for the power amp is about $3000.00, used, to maximize my buying power. Of course, less is always fine too.

Thanks for any expertise, recommendations or assistance.

Specifications for the G08 are included in the link:

http://www.meridian-audio.com/data/G02_ds_scr.pdf (Open in New Window)
nightfall
nightfall OP
133 posts
 
I am a very great admirer of your wonderful products, and my first choice was to go with a used pair of M-60's, or even an S-30, my budget simply would not also support one of your preamps.

I then originally purcased the Meridian, since it was balanced, with that in mind, and buying a used Atmasphere power amp. However, I have since been told that your amplifiers only perform optimally when linked with one of the preamps of your own design, unfortunately.
nightfall OP
133 posts
 
My Subject title was somehow lost when I posted my last reply. Sorry.
atmasphere's avatar
atmasphere
7,068 posts
 
However, I have since been told that your amplifiers only perform optimally when linked with one of the preamps of your own design, unfortunately.

Most of the reviews you might have seen on our amps have been done for the most part with single-ended preamps. The amps don't care if the preamp is single-ended or balanced, however its a fact that balanced cables, if driven properly, will sound better for their own reasons. So by default the amps will sound better when driven by a balanced source and our preamps *are* balanced, but the amps are designed to work with **any** preamp.
swampwalker's avatar
swampwalker
5,132 posts
 
Nightfall- I can attest that my M-60s sounded great driven by a wide range of pre-amps. However, if you are using an RCA connection, you may to use a shorting pin in the XLR inputs on the amp.
almarg's avatar
almarg
8,673 posts
 
However, I have since been told that your amplifiers only perform optimally when linked with one of the preamps of your own design, unfortunately.
I have no personal experience yet with Ralph's products, but fwiw I believe I can state with certainty that there is no technical reason why that should be so. Both your Meridian and Ralph's preamps are fully balanced, and have low output impedance. The amp will not know the difference, although of course synergy between the sonic characters of those and other components in the system will come into play.

Given that you want a tube amp, I would expect that apart from the intrinsic sonic character of the amp itself, by far the most important interaction that is involved will not be between amp and preamp, but between the amp's output impedance and the impedance vs. frequency characteristic of the speakers. I could not find an impedance curve for the 17.5's, but if you or someone else could locate and provide a link to one I think it would definitely help to focus the recommendations you will receive.

Regards,
-- Al
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