which valve amp for Forte III or Heresy III?


Miss tubes sound badly, that warm, rich, 3D and present sound… so gonna keep my MA8900 and Audio Physic Avantera III and get a valve amp!

I started with a Leben CS300Xs (something magical about it, voices, jazz, bossa…), then tried mastersound 300b and recently bought a MA252 (which I sold for the MA8900), and man I was sold, love tube sound.

The contenders are:

Mastersound Dueventi, Unison Research Simply Italy or S6, Octave V70 Class A, Leben CS300XS and Luxman SQ-N150. Never tried EL34 tho. What I really like bout Dueventi and Luxman is the integrated phono pre, which makes less boxes cables to the end solution. Not into Cayin, LM… only the ones mentioned.

I know well the Heresy, only had couple of days the Forte III, which were too much for the MA8900 and send them back not even with 3 hours of use. But wanna give them another chance, read so many good comments.

70% vinyls, 30% DAC.

Any comments will be appreciated,

Thanks in Advance.

superelmar

The best tube sound I ever got was from my Triangles and not my Heresys. If not Triangles, perhaps something from Focal. I put about 5 different amps on my Heresys and they all sounded flat. 

My second system includes a Leben CS-300xs driving Forte III's and the synergy is fantastic.  I have tried pairing the Forte III's with a Cary SLI-80HS, Luxman MQ-88uC, and Sugden A21SE and the Leben pairing is far and away the best.

I now have a Rogue Atlas paired with my Heresy IV's. I am simply in awe every time i sit down. It's such a harmonious combo. Everything has opened up, soundstage, dynamics, depth, sweet midrange and treble, weighty lows. I like switching between Ultra, and Triode. I never thought anything could come close to my MAC 240 in my price range... but here I am. Seems there are plenty of reasonable options second hand here and elsewhere. On another note, I was very intrigued by Rogers, just slightly out of my range.

Cheers