Amp/Preamp Asylum

Posted by viridian (A) on March 23, 2012 at 13:09:54

In Reply to: RE: Quicksilver Mid Mono VS Latino stereo 70 0r St 120 posted by gouldglen on March 22, 2012 at 05:09:17

at the same time. The Dyna has the same VTA input board and large can cap that Latino uses as well as Russian oil caps, that he recommends, triode switches, and generally high quality parts. It does not have the nice Latino stainless steel chassis, high capacity power transformer or brand new output transformers. It does have the cloth lead output transformers and the largest stacked of the original Dyna power transformers. Additionally the board was set up for low gain using 12AU7 or 12BH7 tubes, the stock Latino setup is the same board but set up for high gain using 12AT7 tubes. In this context high and low are misnomers as the low gain board actually has more gain than a stock ST-70 and the high gain has screamin' more gain than that.

To cut to the chase, the Mini Mites smoked it in all of the audiophile approved ways. Much, much more extended on the bottom, with much better slam and quite a bit more extended on top, with clearly better dynamic contrasts. The only, and I mean only, place that the Dyna bettered the Mini-Mites was in the continuousness of the midrange and the ability to seperate midrange instruments.

I'm sure you know where this is going. Not being an audiophile, I kept the Dyna, though I imagine that most listeners would choose the Mini-Mites. It's nice to have two such marvelous choices around.

BTW, I have no idea how this translates to the full Latino rig vs. the Mid Monos, not being an audiophile and all.

Edits: 03/23/12