Jeff Rowland Design Group


I want to say a good word for JRDG customer service. I own a consonance preamp that is now 26 years old. An absolutely wonderful preamp. Early one morning during a "late night" listening session I made a boneheaded move and while adjusting the line level gain, put that module back in the preamp one pin off. That module became toast as soon as I turned it back on. Duh. The following Monday morning I called JRDG and to my surprise was able to talk to Jeff himself. He looked in his inventory & was able to find another module for the consonance (a 26 year old preamp!) of which I bought instantly. It was shipped out that day & I bought another fuse to put in the preamp itself. Long story short, I couldn't get it to not blow a fuse instantly when powered up, so prior to putting in the new module, asked Jeff if the new module would fix that issue. He said the module would not fix that, so I packed the whole thing up & sent it to him for repair before messing it up any further myself. He received that preamp on a Friday & the following Monday his secretary called me and stated he had it fixed.There was an issue with the power supply (as well as the toasted line module). I received it today & it sounds better than ever. Again, mind you this is a 26 year old preamp that he apparently made a priority of to fix. The new upgraded module & power supply cost a few hundred dollars and his labor charge to check this preamp out & fix it, was minimal. He certainly wasn't prompted by financial gain to fix my mistake, much less make it a priority. That my audiophile friends is great customer service.  
boxer12

I was a big fan and owned many Rowland amps and pre-amps for a long time and ever since they went to the Class D - Power Correction Mode technology, in my opinion, they lost what one was beautiful sounding gear. Too bad as I was looking at their 625 amp and took a listen and to my ears all I could hear was that Class D sound.

Now I would agree with everyone here that they are the best of the best for Customer Service - wonderful people and wish they would get to that ol' Rowland sound again. Just my 2 cents .  

Go by Jeff’s business if you ever get a chance to see a master craftsman and consummate designer. A first class gentleman.
I don’t follow his models closely but I’m familiar with the 625 which I’m sure is Class AB seemingly heavily biased into Class A due to the very warm nature of the unit when on. If I had any criticism it ‘seems’ like his US dealer network is not the best but I understand a very large portion of his mkt is overseas.
George,

625 S2 and 725 mono-amps...are they Linear Class-A/B amps?
Yes your right they do still make linear only in these two, pity they used smp power supplies with them.

Quote:
" I suspect that the signal-to-noise measurement could have been tainted by very high frequency noise generated by the 625 S2’s switch-mode power supply"

https://i.nextmedia.com.au/Assets/20170221014711_jeff_rowland_685_s2_power_amplifier_review_test_lor...

All the rest of their range are Class-D though.

Cheers George
08-11-2018 11:00pm

I was a big fan and owned many Rowland amps and pre-amps for a long time and ever since they went to the Class D - Power Correction Mode technology, in my opinion, they lost what one was beautiful sounding gear. Too bad as I was looking at their 625 amp and took a listen and to my ears all I could hear was that Class D sound.

The 625 and 725 are the only JR linear amps as riced1 pointed out, but what you may have heard from 625 was the (switch mode) smp power supply they both use, the artifacts could give you the impression that it’s Class-D. As they complained about in the above test I posted.

Cheers George