2. amps-preamps
  3. 1188816325

How good is the Dodd battery powered preamp ?

I heard an early sample from Jan 07 and it was spooky with the superb s/n ratio and dead quiet background voices are Real and instruments have a nice woody tone ,or brassy real trumpet sound, and the Bass was very tight and fast. The review that was in 10 audio was a sample only running 2 of the 4 batterys all new models run 4 in series for unlimited current on demand , also the review sample provided from a dealer named in the review
is of little knowledge in electronics, the preamp had less than 60 hours on it ,therefore the teflon -Sonicaps were
not even close to be run in, no wonder the bass was a little shy .Wake up guys before you test any product make sure is has at least 200 hours on it to give the product a fair evaluation.
pjl2122
pubul57
3,712 posts
 
Seems like you prefer the new Red Wine. Does make me pause to see what the consensus will be for their new preamp.
viper_z
95 posts
 

08-05-08: Pubul57
Seems like you prefer the new Red Wine. Does make me pause to see what the consensus will be for their new preamp
Forget about 'consensus', the 'consensus' in this hobby is that there's no 'consensus'.

Just buy the RWA and return it if you don't like it, you got nothing to lose. For the record, I do not own RWA product but I like their humble marketin strategy.
pubul57
3,712 posts
 
I do like the marketing strategy (30-day trial). Others that use it are Placette and BENT Audio.
pubul57
3,712 posts
 
Just ordered a new version of the Dodd, with four battery operation. We'll see. It will be interesting to compare with my "off-the-grid" Bent TAP w/autoformer.
mrjstark
1,112 posts
 
Well Pubul57, like I have said already - it is a close call between the two. Is Isabella better? In short, I like them both. Dodd can (or used to be) be had for $2495 which makes it one of the best values that I know off. Isabella is IMO just a bit better when it comes to sound stage and imaging.
It is also voiced to sound more on the warmer, fluid but still detailed side. The biggest diference is in its buil-in Isabellina DAC which is just awesome. However with DAC option Isabella price jumps to 6K which is quite expensive and puts it in completly different price frame then Dodd.
If I had extra 6K, I would go with RWA and its build-in DAC.
Dodd on the other hand will give you 95% of the Isabella performance and with careful speaker placement, right tubes and some diffusion it will make you stop looking.....at least for a while. I am planing to give RWA another try when my system will be at its 100% so I can ones again evaluate it and look closer into its bass performance which IMO was a bit more polite then Dodd.

Cheers
Mariusz
More to discover