Pre/Power Amplifiers

The technical differences between CH Precision’s M10 and the single-chassis M1.1 [HFN Sep ’25] are realised across the board – power output is higher, output impedance, noise and distortion are lower, and the response more extended. With ‘global feedback’ set to 100%, distortion holds to 0.0003-0.0006% from 1W to the rated 300W/8ohm at 1kHz and 0.0045-0.45% from 1W to 100W at 20kHz, while the output impedance is also at its lowest 0.007-0.017ohm (20Hz-20kHz) in this mode. There is a regular increase in THD with each 20% reduction in feedback – at 80% this is 0.0007-0.042% [cyan trace, Graph 2] alongside a rise in output impedance to 0.02-0.03ohm (all re. 20Hz-20kHz/10W). With feedback at the 0% minimum, THD rises to 0.004-0.17% [green trace, Graph 2] while the output impedance increases to 0.075-0.086ohm, offering ~11x less damping than at 100% feedback. All this feeds into the overall system sound.

In practice, the M10 comfortably exceeds its 300W rating, delivering 2x395W/8ohm and 2x710W/4ohm with its massive PSU supporting 435W, 850W, 1.64kW and 3.04kW (55.1A) into 8, 4, 2 and 1ohm loads, respectively, under dynamic conditions [see Graph 1]. With 100% feedback, the response is flat to +0.0/–0.07dB into 8ohm, –0.08dB/4ohm and –0.10dB/2ohm (all re. 20Hz-20kHz). Wideband, it has –1dB limits beyond 1Hz-100kHz into 8ohm while the dual-mono layout yields a superb 102dB stereo separation at 1kHz (78dB at 20kHz). In the default ‘0.0dB’ setting, overall gain is +23.5dB, requiring 3.26V from a balanced (XLR) source to raise the rated 300W/8ohm. The M10 also sets a state-of-the-art 106.6dB A-wtd S/N ratio (re. 0dBW). PM