Pre/Power Amplifiers

Shortly after the turn of the new millennium, PrimaLuna began manufacturing valve amplifiers for buyers hankering for an alternative to the stereotypical solid-state sound. The Netherlands-based company launched accessible tube designs with up-to-the-minute styling, starting with the ProLogue and then DiaLogue ranges. These played an important part in proselytising the joys of 'glass audio' to a new generation. Now, the company's new EvoLution range – EVO for short – has taken over the mantle, with 100, 200, 300 and 400 levels. The EVO 400 pre/power amplifier combination you see here (£4150 apiece) is the company's third-generation flagship.

It is not unusual for products featured in Hi-Fi News to rival a family car for cost. But a pair of monoblocks that weigh as much as a car and cost as much as a house? While that is surely breaking new territory for us all, the prospect of 'stretching the envelope' in power output, industrial design and sheer audio performance was clearly uppermost in CEO Dan D'Agostino's mind as he contemplated the next step on from his 400W/8ohm Momentum monoblocks [HFN Oct '16].

The time is early June, and let us imagine that this issue has been on the stands for two weeks. Editorial secretary Jennifer Scotland walks to where I am sitting and dumps a pile of letters on my desk. The angry correspondence has arrived.

There's something very 'old school' about Simaudio's latest MOON pre/power combination: both units certainly look the part in their combination of black fascias and exposed metalwork, though you can also have them in all-silver or all-black, where they have an air about them of being stripped for action. The £7800 740P preamp, for example, eschews the current trend for digital inputs and network streaming capability, and is a simple, direct, all-analogue line-only affair.

Primare – the company that describes itself as 'the sound and vision of Scandinavia' – is also becoming rather more visible in the UK and rest of Europe thanks, in part, to the boost provided by a couple of EISA awards. Based in Sweden and founded by Danish designer and audiophile Bo Christensen, Primare has found its métier over the past few years. Its Prisma platform brought integrated wireless streaming functionality to the hi-fi world before most – and delivered it with typical Scandinavian panache. Ergonomic excellence is central to the brand's values, and this is surely a concept whose time has come.

Can we agree that it's possible to love more than one system, as you would savour more than one type of whisky or wine? Masseto and Tignanello are simply not mutually exclusive. Luxman's re-imagined NeoClassico series is appropriately costly but not saddled with a 'high-end' price, so at £2500 for the D-N150 CD/DAC and £3000 for the SQ-N150 integrated amp, it is not an alternative to, nor a substitute for a high-end, high-power system. It is not out to usurp the role of your D'Agostino.

Surprises, at my age, could prove fatal, so I neither invite nor encourage them. Even pleasant ones. Neither do I relish my preconceptions being challenged: 'Old dogs, new tricks...' That said, and despite spending countless hours listening to assorted Constellation systems over the years, I must admit to being unexpectedly bowled over by these Inspiration Mono 1.0 power amplifiers.