@teajay I just wanted to thank you kindly for the nice words posted! I'm very stoked that you're digging the ML II thus far, and since you received a "fresh" build, I believe it will continue to open up even more in further hours. Best wishes! Aric
Aric Audio's Motherlode II line-stage keep me up all last night
I received for review Aric Kimball’s new flagship line-stage the Motherlode II on Wednesday morning of this week. This beautifully built two piece (the massive power supply has its own chassis) went into one of my systems to burn-in/settle-in until I had a chance to have a lengthy listening session to get my first take on its performance. That turned out to be yesterday starting around six in the early evening. Well, I was so mesmerized by its performance I did not go to bed until four in the morning!
I have had the pleasure to review four different Aric Audio pieces in the past. Aric designs and builds some of the finest tube based amplifiers and line-stages on the market today for amazingly reasonable prices. Besides, he is totally "good people" with the strong suite of offering his customers first rate support of their Aric Audio purchase. He went "full monty" with the Motherlode II regarding parts quality, a short list of some of these are Khozmo volume control, Vishay resistors, special high-end caps, dual torodal power transformers, dual chokes, and a very innovative way to drive the pair of 6SN7 tubes to perform at their ultimate performance level.
Why was I up all night listening to this line-stage? It would have to be one of the most quiet/transparent tube based preamplifiers I have ever had in-house for review. This allowed all the micro-details to be easily heard. The overall speed, dynamics, aliveness it brought to the system were at the level of the finest tube or solid state line-stages regarding delivering the PRAT of the music being played. The Motherlode II created a large layered and realistic sound-stage with 3D imaging and air around each individual player. My favorite 6SN7 tube are NOS TungSol 1940’s Black Glass oval plates. When I put these tubes into the Motherlode II I heard the beautiful timbres and tonality that these tubes have to offer clearly coming through in the production of the music.
If you are looking for a tube based line-stage that will give you reference level performance in the price range right around $5000, take a look at Aric Audio’s website for all the details regarding the innovative design and the specific parts that are used in this piece. This linestage is a "killer" performer. This will be a fun and a total pleasure to continue to evaluate the Motherlode II and in the near future write my review on it.
I have had the pleasure to review four different Aric Audio pieces in the past. Aric designs and builds some of the finest tube based amplifiers and line-stages on the market today for amazingly reasonable prices. Besides, he is totally "good people" with the strong suite of offering his customers first rate support of their Aric Audio purchase. He went "full monty" with the Motherlode II regarding parts quality, a short list of some of these are Khozmo volume control, Vishay resistors, special high-end caps, dual torodal power transformers, dual chokes, and a very innovative way to drive the pair of 6SN7 tubes to perform at their ultimate performance level.
Why was I up all night listening to this line-stage? It would have to be one of the most quiet/transparent tube based preamplifiers I have ever had in-house for review. This allowed all the micro-details to be easily heard. The overall speed, dynamics, aliveness it brought to the system were at the level of the finest tube or solid state line-stages regarding delivering the PRAT of the music being played. The Motherlode II created a large layered and realistic sound-stage with 3D imaging and air around each individual player. My favorite 6SN7 tube are NOS TungSol 1940’s Black Glass oval plates. When I put these tubes into the Motherlode II I heard the beautiful timbres and tonality that these tubes have to offer clearly coming through in the production of the music.
If you are looking for a tube based line-stage that will give you reference level performance in the price range right around $5000, take a look at Aric Audio’s website for all the details regarding the innovative design and the specific parts that are used in this piece. This linestage is a "killer" performer. This will be a fun and a total pleasure to continue to evaluate the Motherlode II and in the near future write my review on it.
Showing 5 responses by aricaudio
Hi Teajay, Thanks for the kind words and the heads up on the ML II "making the cut"! I'm really excited that you love the unit and am very appreciative of your willingness to give it a listen at the onset. Part of what brought this model to fruition was your critique of some of my earlier designs, which pushed me to set the bar higher! Best regards, Aric |
Howdy folks, I wanted to again say Thanks! - and also, wanted to post that I have the parts en route to relaunch the Special 6SN7 preamp with all of the upgrades that Mark1 has incorporated into his. It will be added to the website once time frees up to complete the build- probably 3 weeks or so. The price point will be a bit higher, but still well below the Motherlode II. On that note, I will be relaunching the Transcend 6SN7 linestage just after that, which will punch well above it's weight, and fill in the gap between the Unlimited II and Special 6SN7 for any who may have interest. Best wishes, Aric |
@rocray that's great news, and I'm very glad to hear you found a lightly used ML II that fit into the budget you had set! For anyone that would like to check out some of my current builds, or to see what's under the hood on my products, I have a new Facebook page at the link below which I would like to invite you to! The link is here: https://www.facebook.com/Aric-Audio-Systems-102227592179530 |