Mark levinson no.532h

Amp to the preamp is important and matching brands and the era of each is the way to go. They were voiced together. The ML 432 with the 326S is also the way to go.

I recently upgraded to the Levinson 526 preamo and 534 amp and WOW, what a great sounding combination. Very hard to put into words. The 532H  went down the road to a lucky new owner, it sound fabulous with the 526 pre. 

I owned the 532H and the 326S preamp and I just put them together back in my system. They are so fluid, balanced from top to bottom, music just flows not highlighting any range of reproduction. Each recording and each instrument sound so different, color and tone and shading, and the noise floor is so low that acoustics of the room or hall come through as you hear on only a real good tube system but with dynamics. Brass as the bite, but not the glare, a sax has a golden tone, and color, along with fingering and the sound coming from sax opening, in other words not just notes and 1st attack, the whole instrument. Vocal recorded well are holographic, the piano has wooden over tone from the keys not just notes and sharpness, you hear the Ivory. My Mcintosh system which I love had more grunt, more upfront, heavier sounding, big bass, yet in the mix was more glare, I always felt it was warm and bright at the same time and the noise floor cannot compete against the ML.

The ML compared to upfront gear would sound more laid back due to it being more natural, but once you relax and listen it hits you how well these two ML units are reproducing the recording and again each recording stands on its own, while McIntosh and Krell and other leave their imprint on every recording. My 532H has been boxed up for several years as well as the 326S so this is the sound I am getting after 2 days of being turned back on, it will take a few more weeks to come into their own.

I also must say those who say it looks lacking internally, well that is only because of how they placed the parts and transformer. This is not a cheaply built amp.

How good is this power supply? you turn the amp off and keep right on playing as if it was still on at the same volume, that tells you how much storage the power supply has, my McIntosh gear amp turns right off with no sound coming from it.

Who has the most storage the ML and my McIntosh is 100 watts more. 300 vs 400 McIntosh, both sound good but different, ML is the accurate one of the 2, the McIntosh is more forward with a heavy sound to it, the ML is more depth, width, and placement, in place of the closer sound field of the McIntosh. 2 amps with a different perspective of sound reproduction. ML are keepers and I am glad I hung on to them.