New Stereo Times review on CODA CSiB Integrated Amplifier

Hey yashu,

If you can I would recommend you cancel your order and consider the Coda integrated. Besides build quality, the Coda is built to a much higher standard, the Hegel is many notches below regarding performance compared to the Coda's beautiful presentation of music. 

Hey rh67,
Coda is one of the great American companies, being around for over twenty years, that has always been kinda a "stealth" presence in the US. Extremely popular in Europe and the far east, but not talked about here. Doug Dale and his team are great people and master designers and builders.

When I reviewed the #8, #16, and 0X7, they never let my house because of their superior performance compared to my reference solid state gear. The chassis work and the build quality actually puts to shame some of the highest regarded and much more costly US products on the market today.

So, yes this piece is a "great bargain" and Mr. Willie's review exactly nails what it has to offer in its performance.

Well arafiq,

I guess you don't trust me because I'm a professional reviewer! With all due respect, I can accept that. I have had the great pleasure of reviewing the Coda #8 & #16 amplifiers and the 07X preamplifier. I purchased the #16 and 07x to use in my big reference system. 

As you you go up the Coda line each step gives you more refinement and "spit and polish" on the house sound. Doug and Eric, with this generation of gear, has produced some of the quietest, grainless, and detailed solid state gear on the market, regardless of price. However, these details are presented in an effortless, musical fashion and does not become analytical or in your face.They still retained the overall dynamics and bottom-end control that Coda always had because of their massive over built power supplies and current loading abilities.

By the way the CSib does not have the 07x preamp as it's linestage. It uses the smaller "baby brother" preamp as its control section. This preamp is still terrific, I have heard it, and gives you about 80% of the performance of the reference and much more expensive $6,500 07x preamplifier. The amplifier is the equal of the #8 single chassis piece.

All of these Coda pieces are beautifully built and our great performers at their price points, in my opinion they actually compete with much more expensive gear, but as you go up in the line there are differences that you can hear.

By the way, something wacky has taken place regarding me posting as Teajay, as I have for over 15 years. Therefore, I started this thread and post under the name Amorstereo, but it's me, Terry London, and I now review for StereoTimes website as most of you Gon members know because I always enjoyed sharing information on great products at reasonable costs.

Hey arafiq,

I still think the Pass Labs XA-25 amplifier, for my taste, is the best sounding of the XA-.8 series, if you don’t need more watts/current to match your speakers. However, I’m not a great fan of Pass Labs preamplifiers. They offer excellent transparency/details, but I found them somewhat thin sounding and not subjectively as musical as my tube based line-stages. What was a shock for me, to be honest, was when I reviewed the Coda 07x because it presented like a tube (color and image density) yet had the speed and dynamics of solid state and of course is quiet compared to tubes.

Therefore, because the Coda CSib has the #8 amp section with the smaller sibling 07X linestage, it’s still more to my taste than the Pass Labs INT pieces. Now, if you team up the Pass Labs XA-25 with the Coda 07x linestage, now your "cooking" a great sonic stew.